The Southeast Alberta Chamber of Commerce, along with various partners within the Province of Alberta and State of Montana, have long advocated for improved services at the Port of Wild Horse. Following conversations recently this past fall and winter with the Land Border Crossing Stakeholder engagement team, we were pleased to hear of the planned improvements to the Wild Horse Port of Entry.

Alberta’s government has begun a provincewide study looking at more than 100 locations across the province for water storage. This study will be used to help the government plan long-term ways to maximize Alberta’s water supply, reduce the risk of future droughts and floods, and support thriving communities. Dams, reservoirs and other water storage infrastructure play a vital role in irrigation, drought management, water security, flood protection, and supporting a healthy environment.

Through recent amendments through the Government of Alberta Orders in Council on December 6, amendments to the Activities Designation Regulation and Conservation and Reclamation Regulation provide clarity for renewable energy developers on new and existing environmental protections.

A sneak peek of our past 2023-2024 year: We’ve spent over 1200 dedicated hours in our advocacy and lobby efforts over the past year, including over 70 meetings with Government representatives and hosting 26 different advocacy events, along with meetings on issues specific to the business community. We were pleased to see this work pay off in the progress we are starting to see.

We were pleased to attend the Canadian Chamber AGM and annual convention in Halifax, Nova Scotia with our Alberta Chamber delegation. Alberta carried 33% of the national Chamber voting delegation with 103 Chambers represented in person or by proxy. In addition to the Chamber's Executive Director receiving her Level 3 accreditation certification renewal, the delegates participated in various sessions.

The Southeast Alberta Chamber of Commerce has been pleased to work with the Supply Chain department with the City of Medicine Hat over the last 5 years around some of the concerns expressed by our members related to procurement and purchasing. We were pleased to see the procurement policy and protocols reviewed and updated in August 2023...

In February 2024 we contacted our member liquor store companies about the Government of Alberta's consideration regarding permitting grocery stores to sell liquor, similar to the US model of open markets and the recent commitment by Ontario to expand opportunities for liquor sales.

Off-site levies provide a mechanism to recover capital costs incurred for infrastructure to support growth and development. Developers are responsible for any on-site costs as a result of their growth and development, whereas offsite levies are for infrastructure that is off the development site, but supports growth. Off-site levies may be used only to pay for all or part of the capital cost of any or all of the following...

In April 2024, the Chamber responded to our members' request to establish a forum for businesses in the health and wellness sector to connect and share ideas and perspectives and a way to get to know other businesses in the health and wellness sector for both regulated and unregulated industries. One of the first issues considered was the Federal Self-Care Framework and the impact on Natural Health Products.

The Temporary Foreign Worker (TFW) program has allowed Canadian employers to hire foreign workers to fill temporary jobs when qualified Canadians are not available. The TFW program was created in 1973 and has four main streams: low and high wage, primary agriculture and global talent. There has been a lot of controversy around the program more recently in the media and there have been recent change to the program.

Concerns have surfaced once again on improvements to air service and we are finding a need to re-instate our policy with updated background information and recommendations to reflect the current situation with air service in our region. We are reigniting our advocacy to improve air service in our community..

The Southeast Alberta Chamber of Commerce (formerly the Medicine Hat & District Chamber of Commerce) has been pleased to work with the Supply Chain department with the City of Medicine Hat over the last 5 years around some of the concerns expressed by our members related to procurement and purchasing.

We were pleased to see that Alberta’s government is improving Class 1 licensing and training with a new, made-in-Alberta learning pathway for professional truck drivers. Mandatory Entry Level Training (MELT) became a new pre-licensing requirement for Class 1 commercial drivers in Alberta on March 1, 2019. Since then, insurance claims have risen for Class 1 drivers and MELT has been identified by the trucking industry as one of the leading factors contributing to the ongoing commercial driver shortage...

There is a lot of evidence that corporate taxes affect business decisions. In an effort to continue to attract businesses to Alberta, we supported a policy in 2022 aiming to keep corporate income tax rates low in Alberta.

"Policy" might mean different things to different people. To help get a sense of what "policy" means to the Medicine Hat & District Chamber of Commerce, we've put together a blog to help clarify our process.

Alberta Transmission Capacity Upgrades was a policy that has been marked as a success...but what did we succeed in doing?

In Alberta, we know that Agriculture is vital to our economy...but most Albertans don't quite know how it all works. We are currently advocating for a policy to include ag education in our school curriculum.