Marlin Schmidt

Ken Coates is the Canada Research Chair in Regional Innovation at the Johnson Shoyama Graduate School of Public Policy at the University of Saskatchewan.

PC leadership candidate Richard Starke owns two cats and a Bernese Mountain Dog. It's not clear if this will win over cat people and dog people alike, or alienate them all.

The budget that will be presented to the AU Faculties Council in Athabasca this morning has the tone of a document drafted under protest.

A demoralized university, an administration and board at odds with the government, and a government seemingly reluctant to act is not a formula for success.

It might well be fair to speculate that the Alberta government has put Athabasca University into a form of "soft receivership."

The Alberta government’s request to the president of Athabasca University to hold off releasing budget details until after a meeting with the Advanced Education minister seems unusual.

Michael Phair, Alberta's first openly gay elected official, succeeds Douglas Goss, who resigned as U of A Board chair last summer amid a storm of controversy.

The plan also appears to include a controversial shift from using permanent, secure IT staff to an insecure force of workers in precarious positions.

The cabinet is still smaller than any previous Alberta cabinet in the past decade and smaller than any other cabinet in Western Canada.