Building a citizen’s movement into a successful political party is a long journey, and last night the Alberta Party brought a close to the first chapter of our story. Two years ago we didn’t exist as a provincial organization, and last night 38 Albertans completed their first campaigns as Alberta Party candidates.

In our first election we set out to do two things. First, we worked to introduce ourselves and our vision for a prosperous, sustainable, transparent and engaged government to as many Albertans as possible. Second, we wanted to run a positive, constructive and forward-looking campaign. We have accomplished both goals.

While not winning a seat is disappointing we are extremely proud that over 17,000 Albertans cast their ballots for our candidates.

Many thousands more were introduced to the Party, and we have a much higher profile than we did before the writ was dropped. We are building for the future, and the past month has seen us taking significant steps toward the general election in 2016. The challenge of building a successful grassroots organization into a provincial contender doesn’t get any smaller, but we have laid a solid foundation for the future. We will continue to work hard and model the change we wish to see in Alberta.

I want to extend my heartfelt thanks to all of our candidates and volunteers, and my appreciation to all the Albertans of every political stripe who worked and voted in this election. Our province is richer for your engagement.

Glenn Taylor 
Leader, Alberta Party