The Pulse: Dec. 18, 2020

The first version of the People's Agenda from Taproot Edmonton reveals a desire to know where candidates for mayor and city council stand on climate change, homelessness, and the police budget; what they intend to do to improve transportation, infrastructure, and quality of life; and how they will steward the city's budget with integrity.

This is what we've learned from the early responses to our question: "What key issue do you want the candidates to talk about as they compete for votes in the 2021 municipal election, and why?"

While the question is phrased to capture one issue, we learned that for many respondents, the issues are intertwined and difficult to separate. This is apt, as the successful candidates will have to manage a lot of complexity and competing interests.

This project is based on The Citizens Agenda, a way for newsrooms to make elections about more than the horse race or the spectacle by listening intently to what voters say is important to them and gearing election coverage accordingly.

We launched our listening campaign in September, and we have been gathering responses ever since, with plans to do more extensive outreach to people who are not already in Taproot's orbit in the new year. We'll also continue to follow up with respondents who have given us permission to do so, and we'll start to publish stories in 2021 diving further into these topics.

What lies ahead in 2021 for employment, residential real estate, and economic output? Here’s what the experts are saying – with the caveat that no one expected 2020 would bring an oil price war that hammered Alberta’s energy sector and then combined with a pandemic to cause the largest annual economic contraction in Alberta’s modern-day history.

Economic Growth

• RBC Economics says Alberta will begin to climb out of a very deep hole in 2021 with GDP growth of 4.5% after the economy shrank 8.3% in 2020. Recovery to 2019 levels could take until 2023.
• TD Economics released a marginally more positive outlook that pegs GDP growth for 2021 at 4.8% followed by 4.1% in 2022.
• The Conference Board of Canada expects business uncertainty and limited household activity will slow the pace of recovery in the first half of 2021 but a bounce-back of 6% is on the horizon for Alberta next year.

What's the Tsismis? from CJSR recently launched its second season of stories on the Pilipinx identity in the diaspora.

Tsismis means gossip in Tagalog, and each episode explores a theme through the lens of Edmontonians who have a connection to the Philippines, in the chatty way that the podcast's title reflects.

Two recent episodes are Did You Hear She Lent Them Her Vacation Money? and Did You Hear She Gave Her Brother the Sex Talk?, both including the voice of Giselle General, who blogs at FilipinaYEG.

What's the Tsismis? came out of CJSR's podcast bootcamp, led by Chris Chang-Yen Phillips. The bootcamp also led to the creation of That's Food, a podcast that tells "the backstory to food in Edmonton, one meal at a time."

• COVID-19 has killed more Albertans in the past ten months than the flu has in the past ten seasons, according to Dr. Deena Hinshaw. The highest number of deaths in a single day, 30, was reported on Thursday, Dec. 17.
• Massage therapists are finding new ways to work with patients virtually since they aren't able to directly massage Albertans under the current COVID-19 restrictions.
• Alberta is pleased by the federal government's hydrogen strategy, which was announced on Wednesday. "Alberta has set its sights set on exporting globally by 2040 as part of its natural gas strategy, and had input on the federal plan," reports the Edmonton Journal.
• A judge has tossed out a lawsuit by an Edmontonian who was attempting to get the city's mask bylaw overturned.