‘It creates confidence in our region’: Grande Prairie mayor planning for growth

Grande Prairie Mayor Jackie Clayton speaks with Alberta Primetime host Michael Higgins about priorities for the region in 2025.

Grande Prairie Mayor Jackie Clayton speaks with Alberta Primetime host Michael Higgins about projects and priorities for the region.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Michael Higgins: I want to start with Wonder Valley because that’s been described as potentially the largest A.I. data centre in the world. How real is this?

Jackie Clayton: Yeah the largest data centre in the world as well as probably one of the single largest project capital investments in Canada’s history. So I think it’s something that’s really caught a lot of people’s attention in our conversations with the Municipal District (MD) of Greenview and their proponents, it’s quite possible, and I truly believe if it’s going to happen anywhere in Alberta, it will happen there.

For a number of reasons: the proximity to natural gas, the proximity to water, the relatively inexpensive cost of land, but really the Municipal District of Greenview has been out in front of this. This is plug and play ready. The province is on board, they’re really working together collaboratively to make this happen, and so we’re optimistic that we’ll hear more information in the next couple of weeks. I think phase one will be an announcement that we expect to hear soon.

MH: Was there someone from your region, whether it’s the MD or otherwise, waving a flag?

JC: In the Greenview industrial gateway, they have a executive director who has been leading this charge in regards to attracting investment, and through those conversations discovered the possibility of a data centre.

This has come together relatively quickly, and our role in this, as well as the county of Grande Prairie, is to support the Municipal District. Our region is very collaborative. We know that this will have economic spin off to the city of Grande Prairie. It’s the largest centre of the region as well for jobs and investment of subsidiary companies.

We’re really just doing what we can to support the MD, and they’ve been very proactive in working with the province and the O’Leary Group and their other proponents to make this potentially come to life. So I’m very optimistic to hear more information in the next few weeks.

MH: Realistically, this brings a huge boost to the area. If it comes to fruition, what do you bank on?

JC: More jobs. The construction jobs will be large numbers for multiple years. The permanent jobs over time will be in the 500 range. And those jobs end up landing in the MD of Greenview but the people live in the city and the county of Grande Prairie, they use our services.

The organizations that serve and provide support to a data centre like this would be based primarily in the city and the county and so the economic spin off, not only for future, but what it does is create attention. It creates confidence in our region. So when people are looking to build multi-family or other businesses, they realize the value of that region.

We’ve said for a long time, it truly is the economic engine of Alberta. And when projects like this, added to other projects that are already happening in energy, forestry, and agriculture, it’s just another added element of what the potential is of the northwest of Alberta.

MH: More people coming into your region means you’re going to need more doctors, and I have to think, like most regions in the province, there is a shortage.

What are you doing as a municipality to ramp up the attraction of more physicians to your area?

JC: At the beginning of this term council identified a health care shortage, not just doctors, but in all healthcare professionals, as probably our number one or number two priority, tied with electricity distribution. And so we spent a lot of time focused on that attraction piece, and now we’re really working on the retention piece.

Last year alone, in partnership with AHS, we recruited 32 specialists to stay at the Grande Prairie Regional Hospital. Now we’re focusing on general practitioners. About 10 per cent of my community doesn’t have a family physician, and that’s including myself, and so it really becomes a daily conversation.

Things that we’re doing, we’re providing a concierge service. When that doctor considers moving to Grande Prairie, we show them what’s possible for extracurricular activities for their children, what the schools are, where you might want to live, what the community activities are, really embrace them to be part of our community.

We’re building an ambassador program. We’ll have community leaders on that that will reach out and integrate them into our community, call them to remind them in September, ‘hey, you’re going to need winter coats’, or you might need winter tires, or ‘hey, you should come to the Bear Creek Folk Fest, it’s our largest summer event’. Making sure that not only once they get there, that they’re settled in, but that they want to stay there by embracing the community, just like those of us who have lived there a while. We want them to be part of our community right at the get go.

MH: As with every conversation that we share, we need to ask about the transition from RCMP to a municipal police service. Where are you at with that process?

JC: Currently, the first class of inexperienced officers is being trained in partnership with the University of Lethbridge and Edmonton Police Service locally in Grande Prairie. Want to thank those services for supporting us.

They graduate towards the end of February. That will be our first 12 officers that were inexperienced, then we’ll do another group. And the recruitment was so high, the numbers were so high, 200 applicants for 12 positions, that we increased that to 14 positions.

We already have approximately 20 members that are experienced working integrated with the RCMP and in different programs, with ALERT (Alberta Law Enforcement Response Team) and with our Caribou Centre, integrating right in the detachment with the RCMP.

By the fall, you’ll see us at about 55 members. Everything’s going well. Chief Lakusta is doing an incredible job, and we’re working quite well with the RCMP to make sure this transition goes very smoothly. It’ll be completely transitioned by spring of 2026.