Voters across the province began lining up and marking up ballots Tuesday in the historic Alberta referendum that includes a question about separation.
Elections Alberta opened the doors at 310 advanced polling stations ahead of the official polling day on Oct. 19.
One downtown Edmonton station saw a lineup that stretched almost half a block after doors opened at 9 a.m.
Some voters, like Christopher Hashmi, were seen wearing hats or sweaters with the Canadian flag.
Hashmi said he thinks separation is a bad idea and would only make Albertans more vulnerable to U.S. interests.
Premier Danielle Smith has put 10 questions on the ballot, including whether Alberta should remain in Canada or hold a second, binding vote on quitting Confederation.
Elections Alberta said it received about 658,000 requests for special ballots ahead of the referendum.
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On Monday, the agency said the number of completed special ballots sent back to them by Friday’s deadline was 391,000.
More information about what to expect when voting can be found here.
On Tuesday afternoon, Elections Alberta said 17 advance voting locations would have extended hours to reflect late location openings in the morning:
| Electoral Division | Voting Location Affected | Will remain open until |
| ED12 – Calgary-Foothills | Glacier Bay | 8:27pm |
| ED33 – Edmonton-Gold Bar | Twin Atria | 8:20pm |
| ED35 – Edmonton-Manning | Smart Centre | 8:07pm |
| ED47 – Airdrie-Cochrane | Bow Valley Baptist Church | 8:20pm |
| ED49 – Athabasca-Barrhead-Westlock | Westlock | 8:15pm |
| ED54 – Cardston-Siksika | Tanners | 8:15pm |
| ED56 – Chestermere-Strathmore | The Track Golf Course Banquet Hall | 8:25pm |
| ED57 – Cypress-Medicine Hat | Irvine | 7:18pm |
| ED60 – Fort McMurray-Lac La Biche | Stonebridge | 8:58pm |
| ED71 – Lethbridge-East | Westminster | 8:18pm |
| ED72 – Lethbridge-West | German Canadian Club | 8:10pm |
| ED75 – Morinville-St. Albert | Gibbons | 8:15pm |
| ED80 – Rimbey-Rocky Mountain House-Sundre | Buck Lake Rimbey | 8:42pm 8:20pm |
| ED82 – Spruce Grove-Stony Plain | Best Western | 8:15pm |
| ED85 – Taber-Warner | Foremost | 7:25pm |
| ED86 – Vermilion-Lloydminster-Wainwright | Lloydminster | 8:13pm |
| ED87 – West Yellowhead | Jasper | 8:17pm |
— More to come…
My kind likes my kind, that’s good enough for me
@ Alberta – Immigrants are much more pleasant to deal with than the loud, angry, contrarian monkeys that come here to fling their poop.
Who wants to live anywhere with people like you?
No to all immigrants, don’t want REAL ALBERTANS erased!
Ben’s solution to Alberta losing $20-30 billion annually in support payments to Quebec is to raise taxes on Albertans and charge more royalties to corporations?
Yeesh!
Danielle Smith indulged the cranks in the UCP with her Alberta Next tour to canned audiences. This is the result of encouraging the folks that aren’t for anything but are against a plethora of things.
There are 5 anti-immigrant questions for the racist UCP members.
There are 4 constitutional questions for the anti-Ottawa UCP members.
‘No’ to the nine.
‘Remain’ for #10.
Went to advanced polling at 8:30 before polls opened at 9. Very heavy turn out of a lot of seniors. This is going to further erode UCP support. People are pissed they have to deal with this stupidity, especially when none of it was mentioned during the last election. Not publicly, but lot’s of back room discussions with the separtists who took over constituency associations. Remember what happened the last time Danielle Smith was in politics? Broke the Wild Rose and PC parties, splitting the vote, resulting in the NDP getting a majority. I bet the constituency associations will start to turn on Smith, and a rift will develop in the UCP. Wild Rose party part 2?
Their is nothing historic about the dumb lunatic idiots in ottawa thinking they can wear the daddy pants when they are reetarded POS!
There is nothing historic about a handful of
lunatic idiots trying to make havoc in Alberta, thinking they can force their supreme dumbness on the population of the whole province.
@Rob Wise. Respectfully, Alberta gets most of the royalties and benefits from oil and gas. Conservatives in Alberta have kept royalties too low, frittered away all the tax revenue, and never considered a sales tax. It would seem Alberta conservatives and the UCP should take some responsibility for a problem they helped create.
We need something like the Logan Act in the US to prevent Alberta separatists from negotiating with foreign governments before a referendum. Our political culture is different here-the US would never allow a state to secede. We can tho prevent separatists from meeting up with foreign actors to conspire to sway a referendum, or to negotiate.
Fat, dumb and stupid is no way to go through life!
I don’t understand the referendum on having a referendum to stay with Canada. We have already stayed with Canada since 1905. How has that worked out. Are we richer than Saudi Arabia because of the petroleum under our feet? Has mining to extract things like rare Earth minerals made us a world leader in mineral exports? Are we producing massive amounts of beef at a low cost and exporting all over the world? Because of the expertise of our government making trade deals are our beer an spirits exporters rich beyond belief? Is our Federal taxes being distributed fairly among the provinces?
Naah, I didn’t think so.
Who is going to waste gas on going to vote. Polls say a tiny fraction of Albertans support seperation.
This is not a referendum on separation. Saying so only confuses gullible people who vote with emotions, and zero critical thinking.
Stop calling it a referendum on seperation. No one is separatinh after this vote.
Say YES to the 9 and pick Option 2 and send Ottawa a message that their days of ignoring Alberta are OVER!