Hi everyone, I wanted to put out a warning to the local Edmonton art community about a company operating under the name Edmonton Watercolour Group (run by a parent platform called Orble). 

They aggressively advertise two hour beginner workshops on Facebook and Instagram. I signed up for an event, but when I drove all the way to the venue, the doors were locked and the class was a total ghost town. They cancelled the event completely without sending a single email or cancellation notice. 

While I managed to claw back a refund for the ticket price after fighting for it, they completely refuse to compensate me for the expensive specialized art supplies I was forced to buy for the class, or the travel time and gas money spent driving out there. One participant paid for an Uber ride there and back, and told us she'd had THREE other classes cancel (and convert to credit, she didn't even get a refund!)

Looking into it online, this is an automated, faceless operation based out of Australia that sets up hundreds of fake "local" city landing pages, hires random temporary instructors, and leaves students stranded when things go wrong. They don't even have a Google Business Profile where you can leave a public review. 

Save your time and money, stick to real, verified local Edmonton art clubs and studios instead!

Disclaimer: This is not official Elections Alberta communication. These are my own observations and thoughts as a non-partisan election officer who wants to see maximum voter turnout and a smooth election process for all involved. No AI was used in the process of writing this post.

Main takeaways from day one of advanced voting:

1. Please, please, please vote early. On advanced voting days, we have access to computers and scanners that can help the registration of voters and the search on the system to be quick and easy. We can also register voters on the computer very quickly.

However, on election day we do not have access to the computer computers or scanners. Registering voters will be a long and manual process. We will have to find voters in a book of electors and strike you out manually one by one. Registration on election day will be more challenging.

That means, despite the long lineups in the morning of the first day of advance voting, the voting process is still relatively smooth and quick. I can already foresee that that will not be the case on election day given that we are shortstaffed, overworked, and without access to computers.

1. Please make sure you find the right place to vote designated to you based on your address of residence, whether it’s advanced voting day or election day.

You can find the right place to vote on advanced voting days and election day here: https://map.elections.ab.ca/

Please look up your address and find the right place to vote. It is very discouraging for voters as well as us election officers to turn away folks who have been waiting in line and who have made the effort and time to come out to vote, but find that this is the wrong location.

1. Please be patient. Please be patient with the entire process. Most election officers at the voting station are also trying to navigate a tricky system and a time consuming process of preparing ballots with very little assistance or guidance.

Please be patient while you’re in line. We really appreciate it. Please be patient while we prepare your ballots. We have to fold all 10 individually and prepare your bundles. We are shortstaffed and thus overwork. A lot of of the officers today did not take breaks of more than 10 or 15 minutes the entire day. We often arrive one hour before polling starts and we leave one hour after the voting station closes. We only get paid for 11 hours at a day rate, not an hourly rate. We are volunteering two hours or more of our time.

1. If you’re still interested in working for the elections in any capacity, there are still positions open and I’m sure the returning offices would be glad to find a spot for you in the electoral process. If you’re at a polling station and would like to work with Elections Alberta in any capacity, feel free to ask around and speak with a returning officer. Tell them what you’re interested in and what your talents are and they will try to connect you with the right individuals and find you a role.

Feel free to ask any questions. I will try my best to answer them in the comments when I have the time.
I will try to make this a regular series so I can provide updates so that you can all be better informed and so that we can have a smooth election process with a maximum voter turnout.

I live in rural Alberta. I went to go vote at a community hall near our farm and was turned away as I did not have adequate ID. I did have my drivers license as well as mail from my bank and the CRA. The problem is that all my ID, my insurance, my registration, my bank statements and anything else that is registered to me personally uses my PO Box when they send me mail. We are unable to receive mail at our land location, because once again, it is rural.

Any kind of documentation that has our actual land location on it has the farm corporation as ownership and not my name personally.

You must be able to confirm your residential address to vote.

How am I supposed to vote if I cannot receive mail to this address and my identification has my PO Box number on it?

EDITING TO UPDATE: Huge thank you to those who suggested calling Elections Alberta. They they were extremely helpful and there were no wait times.

They were able to direct me towards an attestation form on the website. This form can be helpful for people who are living in conditions, such as a colony, and apparently it’s quite common for those on family farms.

In the past, I was able to use my TD app to confirm my living location, but for whatever reason, the officer at the voting station would not accept it. It is my understanding, however, from another helpful comment that that should be an acceptable form.

Thank you everyone for your helpful comments. I will be leaving this post up in case someone else is struggling with the same kind of issue. Attestation forms can also be used for individuals living in long-term care, facilities, shelters, and anything of that nature.

For some reason my voter card was sent to my parents address, I haven’t had their address on my ID or on anything in years but for some reason it was sent there. Therefore my voting location is near their address which is halfway across the city for me, and would prefer to vote near my current address.

There is nothing online about wrong addresses and it basically says you have to vote in your designated electoral division.

Is anyone in a similar boat and were you able to vote elsewhere with proof of address? And/or is there more info on this?