| Calgary-Fish Creek | |
| Province: | Alberta |
| Prov-Rep: | Myles McDougall |
| Prov-Rep-Party: | UCP |
| Prov-Status: | active |
| Prov-Created: | 1979 |
| Prov-Election-First: | 1979 |
| Prov-Election-Last: | 2023 |
Calgary-Fish Creek is a provincial electoral district in Alberta, Canada. The district is one of 87 mandated to return a single member to the Legislative Assembly of Alberta using the first past the post method of voting.
The district is largely urban located in the south portion of the city of Calgary. It was named after Fish Creek Provincial Park and was created in the 1979 boundary redistribution from the south halves of the electoral districts of Calgary-Glenmore and Calgary-Egmont.
The district has been represented by only three MLA's since 1979. The first was Progressive Conservative William Payne who served here from 1979 to 1993 and the second is Heather Forsyth who has represented the district since 1993 was first elected under the Progressive Conservative banner but crossed the floor to the Wildrose Alliance in 2010. Forsyth was re-elected in the 2012 provincial election under the Wildrose banner. In 2015, Richard Gotfried was elected, as a Progressive Conservative.
The electoral district of Calgary-Fisk Creek was created in the 1979 boundary redistribution from portions of old Calgary-Egmont and Calgary-Glenmore. The 2010 boundary redistribution moved the west boundary to 14th Street into Calgary-Lougheed to keep all of Canyon Meadows in a single district.
| 9 Calgary-Fish Creek 2003 boundaries[1] | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bordering districts | ||||
| North | East | West | South | |
| Calgary-Egmont and Calgary-Glenmore | Calgary-Hays | Calgary-Lougheed and Calgary-Shaw | Calgary-Shaw | |
| riding map goes here | ||||
| Legal description from the Statutes of Alberta 2003, Electoral Divisions Act. | ||||
| Starting at the intersection of Elbow Drive SW with Anderson Road SW; then 1. east along Anderson Road SW and Anderson Road SE to Deerfoot Trail SE; 2. east along Deerfoot Trail SE to the right bank of the Bow River; 3. south along the right bank of the Bow River to Fish Creek; 4. northwest along Fish Creek to the intersection with Macleod Trail S; 5. north along Macleod Trail S to Canyon Meadows Drive SW; 6. northwest along Canyon Meadows Drive SW to Elbow Drive SW; 7. north along Elbow Drive SW to the starting point. | ||||
| Note: | ||||
| 10 Calgary-Fish Creek 2010 boundaries | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Bordering districts | ||||
| North | East | West | South | |
| Calgary-Acadia | Calgary-Hays | Calgary-Glenmore and Calgary-Lougheed | Calgary-Shaw | |
| Legal description from the Statutes of Alberta 2010, Electoral Divisions Act. | ||||
| Note: | ||||
| Members of the Legislative Assembly for Calgary-Fish Creek[2] | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Assembly | Years | Member | Party | ||
| See: Calgary-Egmont 1971-1979 and Calgary-Glenmore 1959-1979 | |||||
| 19th | 1979–1982 | William Payne | Progressive Conservative | ||
| 20th | 1982–1986 | ||||
| 21st | 1986–1989 | ||||
| 22nd | 1989–1993 | ||||
| 23rd | 1993–1997 | Heather Forsyth | |||
| 24th | 1997–2001 | ||||
| 25th | 2001–2004 | ||||
| 26th | 2004–2008 | ||||
| 27th | 2008–2010 | ||||
| 2010–2012 | Wildrose Alliance | ||||
| 28th | 2012–2015 | Wildrose | |||
| 29th | 2015–2017 | Richard Gotfried | Progressive Conservative | ||
| 2017–2019 | United Conservative | ||||
| 30th | 2019–2023 | ||||
| 31st | 2023– | Myles McDougall | |||
The electoral district was created in the 1979 boundary redistribution. The first election that year saw Progressive Conservative candidate William Payne win a landslide majority. Payne would almost double his popular vote in the 1982 general election, taking almost 80% of the total vote.
After the election Premier Peter Lougheed appointed Payne as a Minister without portfolio. Payne lost almost 10,000 votes running for his third term in office in the 1986 election. He still won the district with a landslide majority. After the election he was shuffled out of cabinet. He would run for his final election in 1989 and win his fourth term after facing a strong challenge from Liberal candidate Wayne Gillis. Payne retired at dissolution in 1993.
The second representative elected to the district was Heather Forsyth, who was elected in 1993 as Progressive Conservative candidate. She won a comfortable majority over Liberal candidate Marie Cameron to hold the seat for her party. Cameron and Forsyth would face each other in the 1997 general election with Forsyth winning a landslide. She would win her third term in 2001 with an even bigger landslide. After the election Premier Ralph Klein appointed Forsyth to the provincial cabinet as Solicitor General and Minister of Public Security.
Forsyth won her fourth term in the 2004 general election. After the election Klein shuffled her to the Children and Youth Services portfolio which she served until 2006. She won her fifth term in 2008. On January 4, 2010 Forsyth crossed the floor to the Wildrose Alliance. She was re-elected in the 2012 provincial election, and was one of only five Wildrose MLAs who chose not to cross the floor to the governing Progressive Conservatives along with Danielle Smith in 2014. She retired from politics in 2015.
In the 2015 election, Richard Gotfried picked up Calgary-Fish Creek for the Progressive Conservatives, despite a landslide defeat in the rest of the province. He subsequently joined the United Conservative Party when the two right-wing parties merged, and was re-elected in 2019.
| 2004 Senate Nominee Election results Calgary-Fish Creek[3] | Turnout 45.30% | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Affiliation | Candidate | Votes | % votes | % ballots | Rank | Independent | Link Byfield | 2,944 | 9.73% | 29.76% | 4 | Independent | Tom Sindlinger | 1,994 | 6.59% | 20.16% | 9 | Vance Gough | 1,886 | 6.24% | 19.06% | 8 | Michael Roth | 1,728 | 5.71% | 17.47% | 7 | Gary Horan | 1,565 | 5.18% | 15.82% | 10 | |
| Total votes | 30,247 | 100% | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Total ballots | 9,891 | 3.06 votes per ballot | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Rejected, spoiled and declined | 1,966 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| align=center colspan=7 | 26,174 eligible electors | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 2012 Student Vote Canada results for Alberta[4] | ||||||||||||
| Affiliation | Candidate | Votes | % | Liberal | Nazir Rahemtulla | 54 | 22.78% | NDP | Eric Leavitt | 50 | 21.10% | |
| Total | 237 | 100% | ||||||||||