Four years ago, Blaine Hyggen made the step from Lethbridge city council to the mayor’s office.
Now, ahead of the Oct. 20 Alberta municipal election, Hyggen is hoping to win his second term as the top politician in the city.
“I’ve already built these relationships with other levels of government,” said Hyggen.
“I can continue from Day 1 — I don’t have to take a couple years to build these relationships. We need to continue moving forward, continue the great work that’s being done.”
Hyggen said the current council, most of whom are also seeking re-election, were instrumental in building Lethbridge up over the past four years.
However, when asked what he felt his personal biggest accomplishments have been during his tenure, he pointed to three things.
“I think one of the biggest things is just the recruitment levels with doctors. Also, water and wastewater infrastructure. In order to attract more businesses, what we need to do is have the support for them so we do have water and wastewater for when they bring business in the community. The other, probably one of the top ones is public safety.”
Hyggen says the Crime Severity Index (CSI) was dangerously high before he took over as mayor, topping all cities in the country, but it’s a different story now.
“Just here in May, we found out we’re the third largest drop in Canada for crime severity.”
He says that significant reduction in crime is thanks to Lethbridge Police Service officers, boosted by more funding.
“Restoring funding to the police service is something that was one of my first resolutions I brought forward when I became mayor, to make sure that they had adequate funding to do their jobs — something that was lacking before and reduced in previous council.”
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On the flip side, when asked what the biggest challenge facing the city currently is, Hyggen pointed to the lack of transportation options between the city’s westside and the rest of the community.
“I want citizens to understand, this is something that I ran on last time, to get a third bridge — but not at the cost of citizens through taxation, the full cost.”
He says there has been a significant amount of work done on this issue.
“I’ve had two resolutions come forward, it was one of my first resolutions out of the gate, is to ask the province for support.”
But that help from the Alberta government didn’t come.
“However, I reemphasized it again in 2023. So behind the scenes, all of this work that’s being done to get funding for a third river crossing is extremely important. I just can’t burden, and I know I say ‘I’, we as council, that decision is something we can’t put on the backs of the taxpayers.”
According to Hyggen, the third bridge is scheduled to be started between 2030 and 2040.
If re-elected, another common concern Hyggen hopes to further address is affordability.
The incumbent says he is looking to cut costs where possible, while really scrutinizing the budget.
“If you can’t increase revenue, you need to cut down costs. I want to work on, and we have been working on, other industrial projects — bringing those businesses into the community so they burden some of that taxation. So, if it’s larger industry and businesses, attract those businesses.”
He says that fiscal responsibility was on display when council dealt with the Lethbridge and District Exhibition issues between 2024 and 2025.
“We decided not to raise property taxes, to find dollars through reserves so we didn’t have to burden taxpayers with that cost.”
He admits more could have been done prior to the situation ending up how it did, but says council was simply not given all the correct information.
“Since the changes over the past year and what’s been done as of late, we’ve seen a $1.4 million additional revenue that has come in to the Lethbridge and District Exhibition. It’s not enough to me and we need to keep looking for those efficiencies… It’s a beautiful building. It does some great work and there’s a lot of changes going on there. We just hope that we can embrace that moving forward and do the checks and balances and review that on a regular basis.”
Heading into the election and advance voting, Hyggen’s message has been clear.
“A question you can ask yourself — are you better off today than you were four years ago? To me, and what I’ve heard from most, is yes.”
Global News is featuring all four mayoral candidates before election day on Oct. 20.
To see more on candidate Ryan Mennie, visit this post. Interviews with candidates Michael Petrakis and Quentin Carlson will come soon.
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