CALGARY \u2014 Alberta\u2019s finance minister is set to hit the road today to discuss a new provincial budget that is big on spending but also carries an eye-popping deficit of more than $9 billion.<\/p>\n
Nate Horner will discuss the budget with business leaders at the Calgary Chamber of Commerce.<\/p>\n
Horner tabled the spending document Thursday, saying that while a rising population and low oil prices have put the squeeze on finances, it\u2019s critical to keep spending and weather the storm.<\/p>\n
The Opposition NDP says Premier Danielle Smith\u2019s United Conservative government has mismanaged the economy, wasting profits from the past oil boom while saddling future generations with debt.<\/p>\n
The president of Alberta\u2019s doctors association says the nearly six per cent increase in health-care spending is welcome news, while the Alberta Teachers\u2019 Association says it hopes the province follows through on budgeted promises of more money.<\/p>\n
The mayors of Alberta\u2019s two biggest cities have differing views, with Calgary\u2019s Jeromy Farkas taking issue with education property taxes going up while Edmonton\u2019s Andrew Knack says he knows the hike is needed to properly pay for schools.<\/p>\n
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 27, 2026.<\/p>\n
Dayne Patterson, The Canadian Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CALGARY \u2014 Alberta\u2019s finance minister is set to hit the road today to discuss a new provincial budget…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":502891,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194293],"tags":[49,2798,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-502890","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-calgary","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-calgary","10":"tag-canada"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502890","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=502890"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/502890\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/502891"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=502890"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=502890"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=502890"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}