Alberta Municipalities wants more infrastructure investment in budget

By MEDICINE HAT NEWS on February 19, 2026.

Alberta Municipalities released a statement Wednesday asking the provincial government to increase investment in infrastructure ahead of next week’s budget announcement.

Alberta Municipalities, which represents 264 municipalities across the province including Medicine Hat, says current provincial investments in local infrastructure fall short of meeting demand.

The release states that over the last 15 years, successive provincial governments have reduced investments in local infrastructure by more than half while municipalities battle inflation. A fire truck, for example, has increased in cost by 73 per cent since 2020.

The organization projects the municipal infrastructure deficit to grow by more than $1 billion annually. It says this could result in property tax increases to compensate for rising costs for necessary infrastructure.

Premier Danielle Smith responded to the statement at an unrelated press conference Wednesday by asking for managed expectations.

“We have a lot of pressures in all places. We know we have to invest more in health care, in education, in assisted living, in mental health and addiction, in infrastructure,” said Smith.

Smith says the province loses $750 million in revenue for every dollar that oil prices fall below $70 per barrel, and that prices hovered below $65 for much of last year.

“You can do the math on it,” she said. “That’s a pretty big shortfall compared to where we were when oil was above $100 and we were able to rack up multi-billion dollar surpluses,” she said. “I can commit that you cannot solve a problem like that overnight when you lose $12 or $13 billion in revenue from one year to the next.”

Smith says she’s encouraged by long-term forecasts but that there are short-term issues the province will have to weather first.