Jeff Carlson -- photo credit to LNN

By Dori Modney

Jeff Carlson ready to roll up his sleeves for another term on City Council

Oct 23, 2021 | 7:15 AM

LETHBRIDGE, AB. — When asked how it feels to be granted another four years on City Council, Jeff Carlson was quick to reply that, “It is always an honour.”

“It’s a special kind of job and it’s always an honour to serve and I’m so glad to see the voters supported me.”

Carlson was asked what he sees as ‘priority one’ after the swearing-in ceremony on Monday (Oct 25).

“Well, all of us getting together in a room and talking about what we heard through the election and creating a solid plan going forward. that was one of the problems we had over the last four years – we had a good plan but, COVID then came along and, sort of, threw a wrench into all of our plans, so I think that’s the top priority for me, to sit down and hear what we all fell are the issues or the top priorities for the community and build a plan going forward.”

As for the last four years of council, Carlson reflected on that time and said he had no real regrets.

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“Nothing springs to mind – we were doing our darndest to try and help the community through COVID and there may have been some issues the community felt we didn’t handle as well as we could have, and that’s fair, but know that we trying to do our best for the community

Carlson concedes there is sometimes an misunderstanding between what the community hears and what council’s intent is. He said it’s a great lesson for them to learn to communicate better.

“One of the issues that come to the forefront during the election was police funding. It was hard to try and communicate to the community that no services were cut, we funded it from reserves to try and keep tax pressures down, so there were no real cuts to police service. We just funded it from reserves, but the message gets lost when we’re in a campaign.”

In terms of the drug issue, Carlson indicated it was something they knew was coming when they campaigned four years ago.

“We had members of the community, from CASA to the library and Dowtown BRZ coming and telling us that ‘people are doing drugs in our washrooms, people are doing other things they shouldn’t be doing’ – so, we knew there were issues coming.”

“We did our darndest to get in front of it, unfortunately, we weren’t well supported by the province. They gave us one piece of the puzzle, which I think caused more issues than anything else – we knew we needed all of the pillars for opioid prevention, addiction and harm reduction – we needed all of that and we got one tiny piece, which I think caused more issues in our community.”

While every member of the new council may have their own ideas of what issue needs to be tackled first, or with the greatest effort, Carlson related an issue that has been a focus of his since day one of his time on council.

“It’s building and strengthening our local economy – we talk a lot about diversification and that is something that is necessary. We’re a special place here in Lethbridge – we’re well positioned in regards to transportation routes and the border, etc. – we have so many opportunities, we need to ensure that we’re attracting new business, that we are ready, willing and able to provide the services they need – and that’s my priority, economic diversification and strengthening our economy.”

It should be an interesting four years and Carlson is excited to sit down with his fellow councillors.

“COVID has been so weird – we didn’t get a chance to meet each other a lot on the campaign trail so I think sitting down over the next month and sorting through our thoughts and what we heard from the community will be very interesting.”

The new council members will be sworn into office on Monday (Oct 25) afternoon and will hold their organizational meeting on November 1. Their first official city council meeting together will take place November 16.