Chatham-Kent 'fighting back' as Alberta tries to lure skilled workers

An Alberta campaign to attract skilled workers to that province is being met with resistance by at least one mayor in southwestern Ontario.

The campaign features radio ads hoping to lure workers west.

That's why Darrin Canniff, mayor of Chatham-Kent, wanted to get a campaign of his own going.

"We were inundated with them and I know that a lot of people were rather agitated," he said.

"And I'm thinking why aren't we fighting back? Why aren't we out there letting people know how great our region is?"

Canniff said the municipality got to work on some radio ads that are now playing in Calgary.

"We picked out what we believe was attractive things, affordable housing," he said.

"The bigger cities that's much more expensive and just the quality of life here in southwestern Ontario and Chatham-Kent."

Eric Labadie, marketing and communications officer for Chatham-Kent, said the municipality doesn't have the same kind of financial backing the campaign in Alberta does.

"They're working with a $5 million budget," he said.

"We have nowhere near that. So we decided we would get one of our local broadcasters to use his golden voice to do a little kind of a response."

Labadie said media in Calgary have been reaching out to the mayor about the campaign and the hope is that will translate into interest from workers.

Warmer climate

Canniff admits this region can't compete with the Rocky Mountains, if that's what someone in Alberta loves about living there.

"We can compete on climate," he said, adding he found Edmonton's average low for the year is -1 C.

"A lot of people care about temperatures and that we have a lot longer summers, shorter winters and that's a big piece for a lot of people as well."

Peter Voyer, a marketing professor at the University of Windsor, said the competing campaigns have a lot in common.

But he questioned the efficacy of focusing the campaign on Calgary, and Alberta because of the perceptions people have about those places.

"Currently ensconced in many consumers minds is that Alberta for decades really has been the go to place to seek economic opportunity, jobs and financial benefits, so that is firmly established in the consumers minds," he said.

"Hence my recommendation to try to focus efforts for more on GTA or possibly Ottawa or maybe Vancouver or other areas that are known to be and perceived as being very high cost of living."

Canniff said Chatham-Kent is already drawing a lot of people from the GTA.

'We have to fight back'

Labadie said Chatham-Kent has already been focused on bringing people to the region.

"We've been doing talent and resident attraction for quite some time," he said.

Canniff said population growth is needed in Chatham-Kent and the surrounding area.

"We have major shortage of workers and when I talked to employers across the board that's their biggest need is in employees. And so we need to attract more people, to attract the industry and to just maintain the industries that we have.," he said.

"They're trying to steal our people so we have to fight back."