Front Burner - Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi hangs up his hat

Episode Date: April 13, 2021

Calgary Mayor Naheed Nenshi has seen the city through major change and shifted the world’s perceptions about the city he loves. He talks with Elamin Abdelmahmoud about why he’s leaving office after more than a decade.

In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization, empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. This is a CBC Podcast. Hi, I'm Elamin Abdelmahmoud filling in for Jamie Poisson. It is the end of an era for Calgary. After 11 years as mayor, his worship Nahid Nenshi announced this month that he won't be running for re-election. It's not about the mayor. It's about our broad experiments as a community. When Nenshi

was first elected, he became international news. Electing a Muslim mayor in North America sounds like a contradiction in an era of Islamophobia. So what are the qualities Canadians see in Calgary's new boss? A face of the diverse city that many Calgarians had already identified with for decades, even if the rest of the country didn't see it that way. And for more than a decade, he led the city with what he called a purple revolution, a politics that he saw as neither left nor right. We are the city council for all Calgarians. It doesn't matter if you're red or blue or purple.

We each have to serve every single Calgarian every single day. He went on to build the city's gem of a public library, guide the city through one of the worst floods, and wrestle with some of the biggest changes to the economy the province has ever seen. He's still got almost 200 days to go, though. For more on his career and a look at what's next, he joined me in the middle of a city council meeting on his lunch break. Well, listen, we got to start with the big question. Why are you quitting? You know, that's the biggest question and the hardest question to answer.

The only harder one is, what legacy are you leaving? Which may be next on your list. But we harder one is, what legacy are you leaving, which may be next on your list. But we learned one thing in 2020. We learned that there are a lot of voices out there, new voices, diverse voices, young voices, that really feel like they're not being heard. And at some point, it makes sense to step aside and make some space to make some room for folks. But I think like one of the questions that ended up being raised here with the timing of the quitting is, okay, you're thinking ahead to the new voices that will fill the void that you leave.

Are you, are you sure that they will step up? You know, do you have any assurances that they are ready to take the place where you left? I sure hope so. And, you know, I've been spending a lot of years trying to encourage women to run for public office. You know, I famously spearheaded the change of our antiquated term alderman to councillor in my first term in my first month, I think. And for my pains, I was rewarded with the smallest portion of female candidates in Calgary's history, almost in the next election.

And so there's a lot of women stepping up. There's a lot of younger people stepping up. Now, they may or may not win the election, but this is giving them room to do it. And, you know, we're in a unique position in Calgary in that with my announcement, nearly a majority of the seats on Calgary City Council will now be vacant, which means we're going to have a bunch of new faces. And, you know, my job over the next almost 200 days is to get us through this current crisis as best I can so that a new leadership will be able to create something new and something special. will be able to create something new and something special. So with that in mind, let's do a lightning round of some of the highlights of your term so far. So start with the Calgary Central Library. The building, of course, looks incredible. What do Calgarians tell you when they talk about this library?

Oh, there is joy in their eyes and in their voices. It is such an incredible place, Oh, there is joy in their eyes and in their voices. It is such an incredible place which welcomes everybody. It's architecturally stunning, yes, but more important than that, most chairs are full every hour of the day with kids from every corner of the city, from every demographic background, with people who are down on their luck, with people who are not down on their luck. People sometimes say libraries are passe, everyone gets what they want on the internet, but they've never been busier and they've never been more important.

And I'm very bad at lightning round questions. Let's go to the next one. I would never say that about libraries as I am married to a librarian, but that's a whole other conversation. Okay, next up on the lightning round, airport trail tunnel, nice looking tunnel, on time, on budget. Did you get pushback on making it happen? A little bit. The airport tunnel connects East Calgary, which happens to be where I live, which is also sort of a more ethnically diverse and more working class part of the city. And so a lot of folks in other parts of the city had trouble understanding the importance of that tunnel. But in reality,

it has opened up billions of dollars of investment. It's made it much easier for people who work at the airport to go back and forth. And it allows for a future rapid transit connection to the airport. So I'm very proud of it. And this summer, we'll announce an extension of it. And for those Nenshioo-philes out there, big nerds, there's actually a documentary film made about my campaign and my first few months of governing, which really looks at the airport tunnel. And it's worth seeking out.

You can find it on the internet. It's called At Nenshi, number four mayor, At Nenshi, four mayor. He had a brand, this new smart guy. He tweeted, he Twittered, he Facebooked, he did himself to death on social media. Did you coin the word nenshiophiles or is that kind of out there? I literally made it up right now. Listen, it wouldn't have surprised me if it was a thing that was out there because, you know, in 2015, you were named the number one mayor in the world by international urban research institute what did that feel like

so that was it happened on my birthday it was 2014 and it happened on my birthday um and i was in a meeting and i kind of knew that i was a finalist uh for this prize but i was sitting in a meeting and suddenly my phone just started bouncing up and down. I don't know who follows the World Mayor Project on Twitter, but some people do. And saying I had won, which is actually how I found out. And I walked out of my meeting to a bank of cameras. And that was a pretty nice birthday present. And I remember people asked me, you know, is there a big speech? Do you go to like Stockholm or something like the Nobel Prize, wear a tuxedo? And I said, I really have no idea what's going to happen. And what did happen

is I got a beautiful trophy, which I'm looking at right now in the mail. And that was nice. But what was really nice about it is that it was nominated by citizens and hundreds of people wrote in with very kind things to say about me, which embarrassed me, but it was a lovely thing. If you're wondering about the next year on my birthday, almost as good. I got tacos. That's good. I'm glad that it was almost as good. I will say that, you know, there's been all these significant accomplishments, but also it hasn't been all good for you. You've faced a lot of criticism for raising taxes, for infrastructure spending in the middle of a massive bust on oil and gas when your city is hurting financially. What do you say to people who level that criticism at you?

Well, this is precisely the moment you want to spend on infrastructure. You don't want to wait until the economy is booming, and then you can't afford the infrastructure or it gets too expensive. And in a point where people are out of work, you want to create jobs. And so I will never apologize for doing that. Our taxes are the lowest in the country. They remain that way, even at the end of this term. We have made the city run a lot more efficiently. We found about a billion dollars in efficiencies in the city that we've taken out of the budget. And our properties, our residential property taxes remain the lowest of any big city in the country. And I'm very proud of that, actually. Because, you know, certainly it's better than

what most governments that tout themselves as being super conservative are able to do. You're also a guy who speaks his mind. And sometimes that can lead to some trouble. You know, you face two defamation lawsuits from developers, one which was settled at a court. Do you regret getting so riled in those instances? I regret settling that first lawsuit, because I believe that politicians should be, and it was settled for no money, by the way, but I believe that politicians should be able to speak their minds. I think that people who try to do what sometimes is called slap, strategic lawsuit against public participation,

and I'm not suggesting that lawsuit was one, But I think there are certainly folks who just try to shut politicians up using the power of the courts or the power of intimidation. And if we're going to make room for new and diverse voices, then we should make sure that people are psychologically safe to speak their mind. What do you mean when you say you regret that settling that first lawsuit? I think that it would have been interesting to see how the courts would have ruled on uh on the issue of whether politicians can speak their mind and it's important to note that that settlement also included an apology from the other side and an admission that they were not trying to shut up politicians doing

their job and i think people tend to forget that that. In the spirit of getting riled, you also got in hot water for calling the CEO of Uber a dick. Uber, there's no polite way of saying this, have a brilliant business model and are dicks. They are honestly the worst people in the world to be. Uber is the worst people in the world. I have never dealt with people like this before. So explain to me, what makes them so bad?

In fact, I was at a conference and I met Travis, right? You know, the CEO. And I was like, oh, it's because you're a dick. Would you do that again? Well, let's put it this way. One of the funny things about me is that I very rarely cuss. But I'll just say that future events that happen to that individual probably prove my point. Okay, we will, we will leave that one there. You've been accused at times of being a bit of

a city technocrat, not always able to build consensus with city council with Calgary suburbanites. Is that a fair criticism? Well, in my first election, I think I won all but two or three of the suburban wards. In the second election, I won all of them. In the third election, I won all but two of them. So it seems that people across the city have a desire for a better city. So I had a council meeting this morning, and I think I had one vote against any item all day today so far. And our council has fallen into a pattern in the last year or so on complex issues of typically things past 11 to 3. So, you know, people have made a lot of

the divisiveness on this council. But in fact, what I love about this council is that in almost every meeting, we will end up with a vote split that we never had before. And I think that just proves that people are letting ideas rather than ideology rule the day. In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization. Empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. Hi, it's Ramit Sethi here.

You may have seen my money show on Netflix. I've been talking about money for 20 years. I've talked to millions of people and I have some startling numbers to share with you. Did you know that of the people I speak to, 50% of them do not know their own household income? That's not a typo, 50%. That's because money is confusing. In my new book and podcast, Money for Couples, I help you and your partner create a financial vision together. To listen to this podcast, just search for Money for Couples. It feels like forever ago, 11 years now, that your election became this giant international story about Alberta stepping into the modern multicultural age.

about Alberta stepping into the modern multicultural age. And you were finding that Calgarians did not care, did not care one bit about your religion or your race. They wanted to talk to you about things like public transit. When you look back at that, when you kept getting this kind of attention focused on your identity, do you remember what that felt like? Yeah, very much so.

And I'm cognizant of the fact that I'm talking to someone named Elamin Abdelmahmed. And I think that you will understand what I'm about to say. I suddenly found myself very quickly and very inexplicably famous. CNN and Al Jazeera. Peter Mansbridge did a half hour sit down with me the day after the election. And it was very weird. Because by and large, except for Peter Mansbridge, by and large, nobody cared about the fact that I'd run this come from behind campaign and gone from 0% of the polls to winning the election by spending one third as much of my opponent. Nobody was interested, as you say, in my thoughts on public transit or the future of cities. That all came later. And in fact, people weren't really even interested in the colour of my skin.

I believe I'm the first non-white mayor of any major city in Canada. But all they cared about was my faith. And at that point, I had a real choice to make. was my faith. And at that point, I had a real choice to make. And so I took that as a moment to actually really say, let's take advantage of this and try and move the dial in the world a little bit. I know that sounds like a very heady and arrogant thing to say, but let's see if we can. And I hope that in some small way, I have been able to be successful in that. But, you know, it's no surprise to anybody that these waves of anger and hatred, racism and division are growing so loud. And the voices are growing so very loud.

I could probably count on one hand the number of racist or fat shaming or you name it, nasty personal insults I would get in six months or a year. And the last three or four years have been relentless every day, all the time. I have to ask, let me figure out how to phrase this, because it's something that I'm working through as well, and it is remarkable that you and I are talking on this platform in this country. I do love what that says about this country. At the beginning of Ramadan, in fact. Yes, at the beginning of Ramadan, on the very eve of Ramadan that we're talking. But this is where maybe we might be different. Follow me on this, is that I spent my youth in

Kingston, Ontario. It's a town that is predominantly white. And I spent a lot of time in Kingston, maybe trying to contort myself into an image that I saw as like the most acceptable image, which is to say like making effort to make sure that people in Kingston were as comfortable as possible with all my identities. I didn't talk about being Muslim. I didn't talk about speaking Arabic. You know, like these things were just like things that I intentionally suppressed so that I don't end up talking about them. And I'm wondering if you went through the same thing, if you maybe sidelined some of these identities in favor of taking that Calgarians don't care approach. That is such a thoughtful question. And you know i was lucky in that i grew up in a very multicultural milieu in a very strong faith community that i still identify with very strongly um sometimes people

actually go well you're muslim but are you really muslim and i'm like yeah no really the prayer the fasting all of that um yeah but um you, I have a stock line that I've used in every single speech, I think, since 2010, where I say, we're building a place where it doesn't matter what you look like, it doesn't matter where you come from, or how you worship or whom you love, you belong here. And someone corrected me very recently and said, you know, you've been saying that for so long, but it does matter. It's not that it doesn't matter. It's that it is accepted. And so I think that we are going through a world right now where it's totally okay to be proud of the pluralistic, diverse world we've built here, the society that we built here. I am proud of it.

It is unique, it is special, and we should be proud of it. But at the same time, you know, I don't think we celebrated it as much as we should. And I think we need to celebrate that diversity and those diverse voices now. By the time that we get to your 2017 re-election, it was, the vibe has changed, right? Like you called out xenophobia

that you were seeing on the campaign trail. We are forces out there in the community that are supporting my opponents that really want us to go backwards. They don't want a city that is so inclusive of everyone and is absolutely incumbent on us to hold on to the city that we're proud of to make sure that we vote. Local media accused you of maybe playing the race card that time. Were you expecting that? Was that something that you were prepared for? Yes, but as you say, when I called out the xenophobia, I was accused of playing the race card. When you tell a non-white person they're playing the race card, that is approximately the most racist thing you can say, because you are denying the rest of

their identity. You're saying everything they are is summarized in the rest of their identity you're saying everything they are is summarized in the color of their skin and all those of us who are visible minorities know that the race card is very rarely part of a winning hand so if someone says to you there is racism and it is a problem acknowledge that that is a courageous thing to do and listen to them. So if I can just ask an uncomfortable question here, you know, when you were elected initially, you talked about how nobody cared about your identity because you were talking about the issues and the city embraced you. But then we get to the 2017 election, and you were ready to talk a little bit more about race, you were ready to talk a little bit more about xenophobia. And that seems like that kind

of kicked off a different climate for you in terms of how that message was received. So I'm wondering if it says anything about the electorate about their comfort with how much you were minimizing certain parts of your identity to talk about others. And maybe if they grew uncomfortable by the change of discourse. That is an extraordinary question and a really important one. I don't know the answer. You know, I still won, not just with the plurality, but with a majority of the votes. And so I want to believe, I have to believe, I need to believe that the vast majority of people

are better than that. And that what we see online with the bots and the trolls and the people who lack all elements of human decency or self-control is still a minority of people. But they're a minority of people who've grown much louder. You've said that you won't be running for office in the immediate future. Are you completely ruling out running for office in this coming election? Yeah, I think so. I mean, who knows when the upcoming federal election will be, if it's this year or next year or whatever. I'm a political junkie, so I'll never say never. There may be opportunities in the future that present themselves. But right now, I'm actually pretty excited about figuring out how to serve outside of politics. And seeing what that looks like, I still want to be part of

the story, I got too big a mouth to just sit on the sidelines. And I want to be part of the positive movement for the city for this country. But I want to figure out how to do that, for now, at least outside of politics. The other thing too, is I'm not convinced in this hyper-partisan world that there's really any room for purple in our federal or provincial governments. I mean, who would I even run for? But in any case, you know, I'm happy to have conversations with folks about ways in which I can be helpful, but I don't think it's going to be as a political candidate anytime soon. What would it take for you to run for office?

What would it take for me to run for office? Could you guarantee me the mayor's parking pass again? Because, oh man, I am going to miss being able to park wherever I want, whenever I want. I am going to miss being able to park wherever I want, whenever I want. You know, probably to answer that very seriously, I think what it would take would be, and it's not a nice answer, actually, but what it would take, I think, would be a real vacuum of leadership, a real sense that things are going very, very badly in our nation, and that perhaps in my own limited way, I might be able to help. And I think that's what that's probably what it would take at some point in the future. But right now, as I said, time to make room for new voices and new ideas and see

how they play out. So you're saying when we see the Nenshi sign in the sky, that means things have gone real dire? Is that what you're saying? The Nenshi signal. You know, I will tell you, on a completely different note, I'm actually looking at a picture of myself right now in my office, dressed as Batman. I get a lot of folk art in my office.

And some of that stuff is really fantastic, and I gotta tell you, my abs are fantastic in that photo. I think it is entirely photoshopped. Mary Nenji, thank you so much for your time. All right. Take good care. Before I let you go today, some news we're chasing about the sexual misconduct allegations against former Defense Chief Jonathan Vance and how those are being handled.

House of Commons Defense Committee was investigating the allegations. Yesterday, the governing liberals and the Bloc Quebecois forced a motion that makes the committee wrap up their investigation by Friday. That would shut it down before some important witnesses can testify. I'm Elamin Abdelmahmoud. Thank you for listening to FrontBurner. For more CBC Podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.