Council gives green light a 2nd time around for Wedgewood Park housing development in animated public hearing

Wedgewood residents pushed back against an affordable housing development, but council voted for the project to go ahead. Jeremy Thompson reports.

City council has voted against a proposal to look at alternative locations for affordable housing in a west Edmonton community after a tense public hearing on Wednesday, which was spurred by a judicial review.

A part of Wedgewood Park will now be sold to Treaty 8 First Nations for $1 in order to create a 60-unit residence, largely for those in lower-income brackets.

Council denied the motion to seek alternative spots for the housing project in a 9-4 vote after a lengthy public hearing from concerned Wedgewood neighbourhood residents who argued the project would impact green space.

In voting for housing, councillors cited the city’s need for realistic solutions to affordable housing needs as well as reconciliation efforts.

Background

In 2024, Edmonton city councillors voted to sell a portion of Wedgewood Heights’ only park space to Treaty 8 First Nations of Alberta well below the market value of the land to address a need for housing among lower-income households.

The northeast corner of Wedgewood Park was deemed a surplus site by school boards in 2009. The city has been eyeing it for housing ever since.

Treaty 8 First Nations Grand Chief Trevor Mercredi said his group had first signed up to purchase one of those surplus sites to both create vital subsidized housing for vulnerable people and establish themselves in Edmonton real estate.

Council’s decision to develop Wedgewood Park two years ago was made en masse with motions about 11 different surplus sites at once, prompting concerns from Wedgewood residents that they had not had a proper public hearing on the matter of the land being sold.

Leah Widynowski, a Wedgewood Heights resident, took council’s process to a judicial review.

In November 2025, the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta found the Edmonton city council did not properly host a public hearing to consider the 2024 motion to sell the Wedgewood land at below-market value, rendering the decision invalid and leading to council revisiting the issue on Wednesday.

The debate

Widynowski said she dedicated several hours to her cause – Save Wedgewood Park Community Group – including by making presentations for her neighbours.

The space in question is the west Edmonton neighbourhood’s only park area and has been in the community for nearly 40 years. Once built, the housing development would take up around half of available park space, according to Wedgewood residents.

Coun. Thu Parmar, whose ward covers the Wedgewood area, confirmed the approved development would most likely result in the loss of two baseball diamonds, a soccer field and a surface area used for skating.

“It really is a true community hub for our west end communities, and we believe it deserves to be preserved,” Widynowski said. “I think there’s plenty of other building sites within this city for development.”

With Widynowski saying the city should have never “pitted” community parklands against housing, Parmar said next steps after the vote are making sure the development is ultimately well-received.

“One of my major concerns is having an ‘us versus them’ mentality when we have these decisions ... I think everybody can agree that (the housing) is a good thing to have at the end of the day. We also want to make sure we can utilize that green space as much as possible,” she said after the vote.

Mercredi said Treaty 8 First Nations was looking to work with Wedgewood residents on a mutually beneficial way forward.

“Green space is important, however … housing is skyrocketing in price, and without proper housing, without adequate housing, that price is going to keep going up, which leaves our most vulnerable people at risk.”

Just before council’s vote, Mayor Andrew Knack spoke to the motion, saying there had been no alternative presented to replace the value of a site like Wedgewood, which he believes supports the city’s broader housing goals.

“This site in particular is a really tough one, because it’s a great green space ... but this is really the one site that allows us to provide more housing, in this case, specifically for Indigenous families that are at the greatest level of core housing need of anyone,” he told CTV News Edmonton after the vote.

Treaty 8 First Nations was required to obtain development and building permits before 2026, meaning the Wedgewood Heights development is already in its beginning stages. Timelines are at the developer’s discretion, according to the City of Edmonton website.

With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Jeremy Thompson