SUNDRE – Following a failed petition requesting a special general meeting to call a vote on whether to reopen the candidate nomination process, the president of the Rimbey-Rocky Mountain House-Sundre riding’s largely new UCP constituency association (CA) board said she hopes to move forward united by the common goal of winning the upcoming provincial election this spring.
“I think there’s a lot of pre-conceptions that the members of the board now, that we’re only out to do one thing; and that was just to open a nomination,” Aryn Werezak told the Albertan.
“But I want everyone to know that we’re for our constituency and we’re for Danielle Smith, and we’re really, really behind her first and foremost,” Werezak said during a phone interview.
In February, the CA submitted a petition in response to a request from constituency members that called for the holding of a special general meeting (SGM), she said.
Some of the riding's UCP CA members wanted to reopen candidate nominations as they opposed last year's disqualification of Tim Hoven as a candidate, solidifying current MLA Jason Nixon as the riding's UCP candidate in the upcoming provincial election.
“We had constituents ask us and bring forth a petition to pursue this, and we did what we could to follow the guidelines, to follow the bylaws, and to represent the constituents as best we could in a way that we could,” she said.
That petition was made available to Werezak on Feb. 6 both by hardcopy as well as email, she said.
“At the same time, the constituent who sent it to me also sent it to the provincial board that same day,” she added.
A counter petition requesting a special general meeting to oust the new board that was elected during the January AGM was also brought to her attention on Feb. 6 during an informal meeting between members of the CA’s board and Nixon.
“He told us about it. But I hadn’t seen it,” she said. “I still have never seen that (counter) petition, to be open. I’ve never seen a physical copy of that petition.”
Regardless, she went on to say her board was informed that the counter petition had been sent to the UCP’s provincial board.
Asked for her thoughts in response to the counter petition, Werezak said, “To be quite honest, I wasn’t really surprised. We created a bit of a stir at the AGM. Truthfully, I don’t love that there was an ‘us’ against ‘them’; that’s not how I want to see things moving forward. I want our constituency to be united.”
A concerted effort had been launched in the riding to get so-called Take Back Alberta candidates elected to the CA's board during the January AGM.
However, she also recognized not everyone was thrilled by the recent shakeup that resulted in an almost entirely new CA board.
“I know that there were people who were angry with the fact that the board was taken over,” she said.
“(So) when I found out about that petition, I wasn’t surprised,” she added. “I was a little shocked at how fast it came, but I wasn’t actually worried about it, because they didn’t submit it properly anyway. So, it kind of was a non-issue in our board’s eyes anyways.”
During an in-camera constituency association board meeting on Feb. 23 in Benalto, the counter petition was withdrawn.
Providing a point of clarification, she said, “And just for the record, we never officially withdrew our petition; it just was kind of completely ignored by the party board…they weren’t going to allow it anyway.”
“They basically said we could still have an SGM, but it would basically be rendered useless,” she said. “Because no matter how the vote came in, they weren’t going to look at it or allow the nomination to be reopened.”
Werezak also expressed a level of frustration at being kept at arm’s length of matters as they unfold.
“I’ve heard everything second hand,” she said. “The provincial board never told me it was withdrawn.”
That makes her position as president of the local riding’s UCP CA that much more difficult, she said.
Even so, Werezak said the objective remains finding common ground.
“At the end of the day, we also want to unite everyone; we’re all on the same team,” she said. “I really would like to see this back-and-forth, us-versus-them be done and that fighting not be there. We need to win an election in May, and that’s the most important thing.”
There will of course be differences of opinion along the way, but disagreements should not be allowed to derail the primary mission of representing constituents and “especially the members” as well as the common goal of winning the election, she said.
“We’re not all going to agree on everything and that’s OK,” she said. “I think it’s OK for people to disagree on things as long as we can be respectful to each other. As president, I laid that out very clearly with the board, that I won’t tolerate people not being respectful and kind to each other, even if they don’t see eye to eye.”
Responding to whether that meant throwing their unwavering support behind Nixon, she following a moment to compose her thoughts said, “Let’s just say we’re behind Danielle to win however we can.”
Adding that she “can’t speak for everyone,” Werezak said if Nixon is the most likely candidate to win the riding to help the UCP secure victory, so be it.
“We need Danielle to win,” she said.
Emails sent to Cynthia Moore, president of the UCP's provincial board, with requests for an interview went unanswered.
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