Specialized municipalities of Alberta

1 Branding
2 List of specialized municipalities
3 See also
4 Notes
5 References
6 External links

A specialized municipality is a type of municipal status used in the Canadian Province of Alberta. Alberta specialized municipalities are unique local governments that can be formed without resorting to special acts of Alberta's legislature.^[1] Often, they allow for the coexistence of urban and rural communities under a single municipal government.^[1]

Specialized municipalities may be formed under the authority of Section 83 of the Municipal Government Act (MGA) under one of three of the following scenarios:

where the Minister of Alberta Municipal Affairs (AMA) is satisfied that the other incorporated statuses under the MGA do not meet the needs of the proposed municipality's residents;
to form a local government that, in the opinion of the Minister of AMA, will provide for the orderly development of the municipality in a similar fashion to the other incorporated statuses within the MGA, including other previously incorporated specialized municipalities;
for any other circumstances that are deemed appropriate by the Minister of AMA.^[2]

Applications for specialized municipality status are approved via orders in council made by the Lieutenant Governor in Council under recommendation from the Minister of AMA.^[2]

Alberta has five specialized municipalities that had a cumulative population of 178,598 and an average population of 35,720 in the 2011 Census.^[3] Alberta's largest and smallest specialized municipalities are the Strathcona County and the Municipality of Jasper with populations of 92,490 and 4,051 respectively.^[3]

44 elected officials (four mayors, one reeve and 39 councillors) provide specialized municipality governance throughout the province.^[4]

Branding

An order in council to incorporate any municipality must give the municipality an official name.^[2] Of Alberta's five specialized municipalities, two of them have branded themselves simply as municipalities in their official names, while two others have branded themselves as counties. The remaining specialized municipality has branded itself as a regional municipality.

The use of the regional municipality term in the official name of the one specialized municipality has led to a common belief that a regional municipality is its own separate municipal status type in Alberta, which is not the case. Meanwhile, the use of the county term in the official names of two specialized municipalities and 46 municipal districts has partially led to a common belief that a county also is its own separate municipal status type, which also is not the case. The other major contributor to this common belief is that a county was a former municipal status type in Alberta prior to the County Act being repealed in 1995.

List of specialized municipalities

Name	Region	Incorporation date (specialized municipality)^[4]	Council size^[4]	Population (municipal census)^[5]	Population (2011)^[3]	Population (2006)^[3]	Change (%)^[3]	Land area (km²)^[3]	Population density (per km²)^[3]	Reason for incorporation
Crowsnest Pass, Municipality of	Southern Alberta	02008-01-16January 16, 2008	7		70035565032704572805,565	70035749032704612165,749		700237307-6729634848373.07	70011490000000-3283214.9	Although no specific reason was provided in the order in council that changed its status,^[6] to enable membership in the Alberta Association of Municipal Districts and Counties for increased alignment with its neighbouring rural municipalities.^[7]
Jasper, Municipality of	Alberta's Rockies	02001-07-20July 20, 2001	7	70034584032704-20804,584^{[N 1]}	70034432032704-415364,432^[8]	700342650-67296726084,265	700039000-67296-459843.9	7002925526540852256925.52	70004800032704-336644.8	To provide for the unique needs of residents living within the municipality.^[9]
Mackenzie County	Northern Alberta	01999-06-23June 23, 1999	10		700410927000002246410,927	70041000200000-8924810,002	70009200065408276159.2	700480478-22592-8988880,478.12	69991000000000472320.1	To address concerns about municipal government and management in a municipality that serves a number of unique communities within a very large territory.^[10]
Strathcona County	Edmonton Capital Region	01996-01-01January 1, 1996	9		700492490654084288092,490	700482511-34592-185682,511	70011210000000-3020812.1	70031180560000348481,180.56	700178300-345923542478.3	To provide for the unique needs of a municipality that includes both a large urban centre and a significant rural territory and population.^[11]
Wood Buffalo, Regional Municipality of	Northern Alberta	01995-04-01April 1, 1995	11	700474856-34592-8524874,856^{[N 2]}	700465565-345922912065,565	70045192432704-4992051,924^[12]	700126300-672969673626.3	70046363779704-1372863,637.47	70001000000000472321.0	To provide for the unique needs of a municipality including a large urban centre and a large rural territory with a small population.^[13]
Total specialized municipalities	—	—	44	—	70051789790000-58912178,979	70051544510000-31456154,451	700115900000000208015.9	70051465947400-47072146,594.74	70001200000000-502401.2	—

Notes

References

External links

Alberta Association of Municipal Districts and Counties
Alberta Municipal Affairs
Alberta Urban Municipalities Association

v t e Topics on Alberta

History	Alberta Act Fur trade Historic sites Numbered Treaties Petroleum industry Social Credit	Politics	Political parties Elections (last) Government Lieutenant Governor Cabinet Premier (past) Speaker Legislature Electoral districts (federal) Monarchy Leader of the Opposition Mayors

Geography	Demographics Mountains Parks Lakes Rivers

Communities	Municipal districts (counties) Specialized municipalities Cities Towns Villages Summer villages Hamlets Indian reserves Métis settlements Census divisions Census agglomerations Designated places

Economy	Companies Alberta Treasury Branch Tourism Highways Airports

Culture	Media Education Festivals First Nations Franco-Albertan Métis Music Sports People Symbols Flag Coat of arms Anthem

Category Portal WikiProject

Subdivisions

Regions
Census divisions
Census agglomerations
Municipal districts (counties)
Specialized municipalities
School districts

Communities

Cities and urban
service areas

Rural
municipalities

Municipal districts (counties)	Acadia Athabasca Barrhead Beaver Big Lakes Bighorn Birch Hills Bonnyville Brazeau Camrose Cardston Clear Hills Clearwater Cypress Fairview Flagstaff Foothills Forty Mile Grande Prairie Greenview Kneehill Lac La Biche Lac Ste. Anne Lacombe Lamont Leduc Lesser Slave River Lethbridge Minburn Mountain View Newell Northern Lights Northern Sunrise Opportunity Paintearth Parkland Peace Pincher Creek Ponoka Provost Ranchland Red Deer Rocky View Saddle Hills Smoky Lake Smoky River Spirit River St. Paul Starland Stettler Sturgeon Taber Thorhild Two Hills Vermilion River Vulcan Wainwright Warner Westlock Wetaskiwin Wheatland Willow Creek Woodlands Yellowhead

Improvement districts	4 (Waterton Lakes National Park) 9 (Banff National Park) 12 (Jasper National Park) 13 (Elk Island National Park) 24 (Wood Buffalo National Park) 25 (Willmore Wilderness Park) 349 Kananaskis

Special areas	2 3 4

Specialized
municipalities

Towns

This article was sourced from Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License; additional terms may apply. World Heritage Encyclopedia content is assembled from numerous content providers, Open Access Publishing, and in compliance with The Fair Access to Science and Technology Research Act (FASTR), Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., Public Library of Science, The Encyclopedia of Life, Open Book Publishers (OBP), PubMed, U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Center for Biotechnology Information, U.S. National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health (NIH), U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, and USA.gov, which sources content from all federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial government publication portals (.gov, .mil, .edu). Funding for USA.gov and content contributors is made possible from the U.S. Congress, E-Government Act of 2002.

Crowd sourced content that is contributed to World Heritage Encyclopedia is peer reviewed and edited by our editorial staff to ensure quality scholarly research articles.

By using this site, you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. World Heritage Encyclopedia™ is a registered trademark of the World Public Library Association, a non-profit organization.

Specialized municipalities of Alberta