Guy Boutilier

Guy Carleton Boutilier ECA (February 28, 1959 – March 8, 2024) was a Canadian politician, who sat as a member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta from 1997 to 2012.

He was elected as a Progressive Conservative, and served in several capacities in the Cabinet of Alberta under Premiers Ralph Klein and Ed Stelmach before being ejected from the PC caucus in July 2009; he joined the Wildrose Alliance Party after sitting as an independent for a year.

[4] Boutilier moved to Fort McMurray as a summer student with Syncrude and, according to friend and supporter Willie Hoflin, "fell in love with the place" and met his wife, Gail.

[6] He served in this capacity until April 1, 1995, when Fort McMurray lost its status as a city and was rolled into the new Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo.

[7] The incumbent Liberal, Adam Germain, was not seeking re-election, and Boutilier won by defeating John Vyboh by more than a thousand votes.

[7] As a backbencher, he moved several bills: the Mines and Minerals Amendment Act was a 1997 government bill designed to enable the implementation of a generic royalty regime for new development in the Alberta oilsands and streamline the process for land leases to oil and gas companies by moving administrative elements from legislation to regulation.

[18] The Act allowed municipalities to charge developers off-site road levies, a practice which had been common but which had recently been successfully challenged in court, and passed largely without controversy.

[19][20][21] Boutilier kept the municipal affairs until after the 2004 election (in which he was again re-elected handily, this time in the newly formed Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo riding),[22] when Klein transferred him to the post of Minister of the Environment.

[26] He was also at the forefront of his government's opposition to the Kyoto Protocol, at one point slipping his Quebec counterpart Thomas Mulcair a note during a United Nations conference on the subject in Montreal, which Mulcair interpreted as a request that Quebec soften its support of Kyoto in exchange for investment in the Montreal Stock Exchange by Alberta industry.

[35][36] Boutilier also became a vocal critic of the government for delaying the long-term care facility, and compared the treatment of Fort McMurray’s seniors at the Northern Lights Regional Health Centre to being kept in "holding cells."

As an Opposition MLA, Boutilier was a vocal critic of the PC government’s handling of education, health care, transportation, infrastructure and housing in Fort McMurray.

He quickly earned a reputation on council as a strong fiscally conservative voice who frequently criticized past administrations for hiring companies and consultants based outside Alberta.

After the 2012 provincial election, he was working as an urban planning and political consultant and submitted a "strategic roadmap" for projects approved by the previous council administration.

The report and invoice was leaked to the newspaper and showed Boutilier ran his consulting business out of a residential home in Edmonton.

Boutilier said he owned an Edmonton home because his son regularly had treatments related to his autism at the Glenrose Rehabilitation Hospital and he lectured part-time at the University of Alberta.

[46] Vargo wrote in his affidavit that Boutilier had moved to Edmonton shortly after Stelmach expelled him from the Progressive Conservative Party's caucus.

At the same time, Fort McMurray Today reported Boutilier had started looking for new jobs in the private sector as questions about his eligibility to sit on council were raised in the community.

[50][51] On the same day as his resignation, Boutilier purchased a membership with the Progressive Conservative Party's riding association for Fort McMurray-Wood Buffalo, leaving many to believe he would attempt to run as an MLA in the 2015 Alberta general election.

[2] Dan MacLennan, who served as president of the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees between 1997 and 2006, credits Boutilier for securing a northern living allowance for AUPE members in Fort McMurray.

[55][32] Shortly after the groundbreaking ceremony, Boutilier told Fort McMurray Today in 2018 he had no regrets about his actions that led to his expulsion from the PC caucus.