Every politician has a vice. Some are inclined to pad their pockets, while some like to be bullies and enjoy exerting power over others. Naheed Nenshi’s vice is his vanity. Nobody thinks more of Naheed Nenshi than Naheed Nenshi does, and he never misses an opportunity to remind everybody of it. He didn’t hesitate to regularly let us all know he was the smartest man in the room while he was mayor, and he never gave speeches to citizens. He lectured them. When he closed his eyes and looked skyward, the condescension was nearly palpable. One could see how he felt he was lowering himself by having to explain to the unwashed what great services he had been providing them.Nenshi never saw a microphone he didn’t want to speak into, nor a crowd he didn’t want to preen himself in front of. That’s why, during his term in office as Calgary’s mayor, his focus was predominantly upon vanity projects rather than the true needs of the city. Nenshi wanted to attend ribbon cuttings for new libraries and public art installations, and he spent millions chasing an Olympic bid that Calgarians rejected. He didn’t want to sully himself with the business of maintaining roads, dealing with public disorder, or garbage collection. Water pipes? Those are boring. In fact, he didn’t even want them addressed. According to a provincial inspection report released November 5, it appears that not only did he ignore warnings of potential failures in water infrastructure, but his office went out of its way to hide the issue from city councillors.Calgarians are now paying the price for the negligence of prior administrations in City Hall. They have endured years of water restrictions and can look forward to massive increases in water bills and taxes in order to repair the neglected infrastructure. Three-minute showers are the order of the day, and toilets should only be flushed occasionally while crews try to bring the water system back up to snuff. The masses truly are unwashed in Calgary today, as Nenshi always viewed them.When confronted by questions raised over the report at a press conference, Nenshi’s reaction was petulance and ire. How dare people question his management of the city of Calgary!When the questions continued, Nenshi had a tantrum and refused to answer any more of them. The contempt he held for the press and, by extension, the citizens of Calgary, over the matter was almost palpable. He then pirouetted on his heel and headed for the exit. .Whether Nenshi likes it or not, though, the issue is far from over, and it won’t be forgotten.Nenshi’s administration in Calgary is far from alone. Municipal councils across Canada constantly stray into territory outside of their mandates at the cost of properly managing the core services they are tasked to provide.Canadian municipalities collectively face infrastructure deficits measured in the hundreds of billions. Statistics Canada data show that a substantial share of municipally owned water, wastewater, and stormwater assets are already in poor or very poor condition, with replacement values running into the tens of billions. Toronto has reported multi-billion-dollar state-of-good-repair gaps for roads, transit, and housing. Ottawa’s light-rail project became a byword for cost overruns and technical failure while ordinary road and sidewalk maintenance lagged. In Saskatoon, council spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on plastic rock sculptures and an AI-powered garbage can that gave wrong advice more often than not. In parts of Quebec, aging water and wastewater systems have forced construction moratoriums, blocking tens of thousands of potential homes. Vancouver has seen dozens of water-main failures in a single year. The common thread is the same: elected officials and senior staff find it easier to fund or champion high-profile initiatives — arts facilities, climate branding exercises, symbolic bylaws, prestige transit — than to fight for the rate increases or capital allocations required to replace pipes that the public rarely sees.Other cities will face similar reckonings. The political temptation to chase shiny objects will remain. The only reliable counter is a clearer public expectation that mayors and councils treat water, roads, waste, and sewers as non-negotiable first claims on their time and budgets. Voters must start demanding their local representatives stay in their lane and focus on municipal mandates. If they don’t, they can rest assured mayors and councils will continue to waste time and resources on projects they have no business venturing into while core needs are neglected.Mayors are not elected to be cultural impresarios or social justice celebrities. Their core job is unglamorous: keep the water flowing, the garbage collected, the streets passable, and the sewers from collapsing. When they lose interest in those tasks, residents eventually notice. Calgary is noticing now.Hopefully, as Calgarians slather on an extra layer of deodorant to mask the effects of reduced showers and forgo the Canadian tradition of backyard hockey rinks because of a lack of water, they are reminded of the prime figure behind the debacle and that he is vying to become Alberta’s next premier. Just imagine what Nenshi could do if he got his hands on control of the legislature. And vote with that in mind on October 18, 2027.
