The representative for the riding of Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills is speaking out today, after a story out of Maclean’s Magazine ranked Mountain View County dead last in its rankings of "Canada's Best Communities" for 2019.

Mountain View County is located between Calgary and Red Deer in the Calgary-Edmonton corridor and includes the towns of Carstairs, Didsbury, Olds, and Sundre.

Photo courtesy of Google Maps

Maclean’s used factors such as crime, economy, affordability, amentias and culture to determine the order, and didn’t include every community in Canada.

MLA for Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills Nathan Cooper says clearly no one from the magazine has ever been to Mountain View County, as he says the stats they are using excluding the urban communities located within the county.

“It talks about the County not having any doctors, well nothing could be further from the truth. We have three hospitals located within Mountain View County. This makes about as much as comparing the equalization formula with Alberta’s oil revenue, but not including Quebec’s hydro revenue.”

Cooper says the magazine uses factors such as crime rate and affordability, but also things like people’s ability to walk to work, which can be skewed when the area they are talking about is almost 4 thousand square kilometres and mostly rural.

“It is absolutely outrageous, it’s not comparing apples to apples, and very clearly no one from Maclean’s Magazine  have ever stepped foot here because they would realize that our people are some of the best in the country, we have amazing views, we have the best place to live, work and raise a family probably in the entire country.”

Outside of Mountain View County, Alberta’s highest ranked community was St. Albert at the 23rd spot, and Canmore at 28th, with Lacombe sitting at about the halfway spot at 204.

Burlington, Ontario was ranked as number one.

Cooper says he's submitted a letter in response to the article and he hopes Maclean’s print it.

You can read his response below:

 

Dear Editor,

As the Alberta provincial representative for the excellent constituency of Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills, I am writing today to take issue with your recent feature regarding “Canada’s Best Communities 2019.”

It seems you have listed Mountain View County as the lowest of 415 municipalities based on some faulty information. Unlike the majority of the communities listed, MVC is a larger rural municipality, surrounding five significant population centres, none of which were included in your list. As a result, the statistics you have used are quite misleading. 

Is the region's population 13,000, or is it closing in on 40,000? Does Mountain View County have no doctor’s office, or does it include three hospitals and a number of offices in Olds, Didsbury, Sundre, Cartstairs, and Cremona? 

I would also take issue with the mobility factors assessment. As a large rural region measured at nearly 4,000 square kilometres where the leading industry is agriculture, it is probably true that zero percent of people ride bicycles to work. That’s not surprising; bicycles don’t pull cattle trailers. However, if you were comparing apples to apples, and included all of the various towns and villages in this assessment, you would find that there are several transportation options, including one of my favourites: the Sunshine Bus in Olds, that specifically serves people with mobility issues and seniors five days a week.

Here are some other things you missed: 

• Sundre and the surrounding area includes some of the most beautiful wildlands in Alberta, where visitors can hike, raft, ride horses, camp, quad, and experience nature. Together with our many excellent public golf courses, our beloved local junior hockey teams, and the world’s leading Bavarian pro rodeo, I expect you have underestimated our arts and recreation sector.• Olds is home to the majority of government services serving this region, including the Olds College. Thanks in part to the renowned applied research division it is becoming known as one of Canada’s leading Smart Agriculture institutions. Excluding Olds College from the surrounding farming community isn’t particularly useful. The institution, founded in 1913, wouldn’t be in operation today if not for the farming community.

We have a saying around these parts, “Strong families build strong communities, and strong communities support strong families.” 

Attempting to describe Mountain View County in isolation of the towns and villages makes about as much sense as crafting a federal equalization formula that includes western oil and gas revenues, while excluding the true value of central and eastern hydro energy revenues. Where’s the fairness?

Sincerely,

Hon. Nathan Cooper,

MLA, Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills