Red Deer City Councillors urged to focus on economic development

Editorial submitted by former candidate for City Council, Chad Krahn

Where is the focus?

“What gets measured, gets managed.”

As the father of management theory once said, the challenge is focus – where your time and attention go is where results will happen.

When it comes to Red Deer City Council, there has been little focus – and as a consequence even less results – on economic development.

In the last year a lot of focus has gone into social issues, like the location of the homeless shelter, and fair enough, we need a location for the shelter. But when virtually no attention has been paid to the economic health of the city, it’s no wonder that the lack of progress on this file speaks for itself.

In the last year and a half, there have only been two large private sector announcements. The first was the gondola across the Red Deer River, which has since been put on hold, and the second was the downtown casino’s move into the newly minted Red Deer Resort and Casino (formerly the Cambridge Hotel).

That certainly doesn’t speak to a vibrant, growing sector.

The Red Deer Economic Development Strategy was written in 2013 – making it over a decade old. Remember 2013? It was when CFL light bulbs were all the rage. So much has changed in the last ten years, and in the case of Red Deer, not for the better.

Since the Economic Development Strategy was written, the number of businesses in Red Deer has steadily declined from 4,040 in 2013 to 3,534 in 2022. While the number of businesses isn’t a perfect indicator of economic development, it is actually the metric chosen by Council as part of their strategic plan. Clearly, there is some work to do.

There are some things that Council can do and can prioritize right away to improve this situation.

The City tracks building permits, and those too have declined significantly in the last decade. In 2013, the City issued 2,068 building permits and that number has declined every year, so much so that, in 2022, only 903 building permits were issued. The City must work on modernizing the entire permitting system if they want to bolster this number – and make Red Deer more economically attractive.

There must be a guaranteed turnaround time on permits. Council must embrace automation to streamline the process where they can. If the City likes to use the number of permits as a benchmark for development, they can’t continue to be stuck in the status quo when it comes to getting them approved.

Taxes remain a sticking point and, while still competitive in comparison to other municipalities, Red Deerian’s taxes have gone up in the last decade. Even before this year’s new City budget and new tax rate come into effect, the commercial tax rate for Red Deer in 2022 was 14.8% – up from 12.23% in 2013.

Council has an opportunity to create new committees around its priorities. Currently, the City has committees for housing and homelessness, the library, public art, Gaetz Lake, and municipal planning, among others. Why not take the opportunity to create a new committee for Red Tape Reduction? Surely there are old bylaws on the books that could be revamped. Unfortunately, in government, it is always easier to add new laws rather than to take away old, defunct rules, but that’s no reason not to do it!

A committee on economic development is also needed, to begin the work of a new Economic Development Strategy. This committee would work to bring all the partners and economic drivers of the city and region together, and to find a way to present a clear vision of what this city has to offer in terms of economic opportunity. The economic advantages to those of us who live here are plain as day, but the message doesn’t seem to be resonating with those outside. Council needs to identify these advantages and work to convey them to potential investors, entrepreneurs, and would-be residents.

The City brands itself as an entrepreneurial one, and with a little more focus we could be the business testing grounds for Alberta. The city’s size and central location makes this an ideal site. Our city could be the launch pad for businesses for the whole country. Imagine how many more made-in-Red Deer success stories we could have.

We can be so much more – all we need is a little focus.

Chad Krahn is a former candidate for Red Deer City Council.

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Two states designate Muslim group as terrorist

Daily Caller / 27 mins ago

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International

Two states designate Muslim group as terrorist

Published on December 15, 2025

Todayville

From The Center Square

By Johnny Edwards

The governors of Texas and Florida have declared the nation’s largest Muslim advocacy group a foreign terrorist organization, but they may stand alone. None of their Republican counterparts in other states seem ready to follow suit.

The Center Square reached out to every other Republican governor whose state has offices of the nonprofit Council on American-Islamic Relations. Not one – from Alabama, Georgia, Missouri, Ohio, Oklahoma or Virginia – responded to inquiries about whether they plan to slap a terror label on the group, too.

“I don’t know why anyone wouldn’t want to designate CAIR a foreign terror organization,” Florida Republican Congressman Randy Fine, a fierce critic of the group, told The Center Square.

The 31-year-old, Washington-based civil rights organization strongly denies supporting terrorism, saying on its website it has “specifically opposed unjust violence perpetrated in the name of Islam.”

The U.S. State Department does not consider CAIR a foreign terrorist organization, though U.S. Rep. Fine introduced a bill this year that would direct Secretary of State Marco Rubio to review if it meets the criteria.

“Maybe other states are waiting to see how it goes,” Fine said of the governors’ non-responses. “CAIR is threatening litigation, which I think we all hope happens because that will require them to disclose the dark web of relationships that they have.”

Last month, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issued a proclamation accusing the group of ties to Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, an international organization bent on establishing Islam’s “mastership of the world.” The designation prohibits CAIR from buying or acquiring land in Texas.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis issued his own executive order last week, also designating both CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood terrorist groups. He called on state agencies to deny resources to them and directed the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and Florida Highway Patrol to keep tabs.

“CAIR was founded by persons connected to the Muslim Brotherhood,” DeSantis’ order says, “and was created, in the words of persons affiliated with CAIR, as ‘an official U.S. cover representing the Islamic community’ to conceal ties to Islamic extremist groups.”

CAIR and the Muslim Legal Fund of America have already sued in Texas, asking a federal judge to strike down Abbott’s order. CAIR has threatened to sue DeSantis, as well. The group says its pro-Palestinian stance has attracted the ire of “Israel-first” politicians.

“It seems to be a coordinated campaign to push back against anyone who spoke out against the genocide effectively,” CAIR spokesman Ibrahim Hooper told The Center Square.

In a letter to DeSantis last week, CAIR National Deputy Director Edward Ahmed Mitchell called the executive order “defamatory” with “no basis in law or fact.” The organization has never been an affiliate, offshoot, or subsidiary of any foreign group, he said.

“You do not have the constitutional authority to unilaterally declare any Americans or American institutions foreign terrorist groups, nor is there any basis to level this smear against our organization.” Mitchell told the governor. “We look forward to seeing you in a court of law, where facts and the law still matter.”

DeSantis said in an X post last week, “I look forward to discovery – especially the CAIR finances. Should be illuminating!”

According to its website, CAIR has chapters in Austin, Dallas and Houston. In Florida, it has a Tampa chapter.

At least 21 other states have chapters and satellite offices, six of which have Republican governors. There are branches in Birmingham, Ala.; Duluth, Ga.; St. Louis; Cincinnati, Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio; Oklahoma City; and Herndon, Va., the website says.

The Center Square contacted the offices of Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey, Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, Missouri Gov. Mike Kehoe, Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine, Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt, and outgoing Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin – asking if they’re planning to do anything similar to Texas or Florida or to comment on what Abbott and DeSantis did.

None answered.

“Most Americans recognize that Ron DeSantis is a failed politician,” Mitchell, of CAIR, told The Center Square, “who prioritizes the Israeli government over the people of Florida and is always looking for publicity stunts to stay relevant. I would not be surprised if other governors do not decide to take the leap with him and Governor Abbott, given they don’t want to end up in court and embarrassed.”

The Texas proclamation and the Florida order delve deep into the organization’s history to accuse it of ties to Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood, a transnational Sunni Islamist network with no centralized leader that pushes for Sharia law in all aspects of life. The Muslim Brotherhood also has not been designated a foreign terrorist organization by the State Department, though President Trump issued an executive order last month launching a formal process that could see some of its chapters labeled as such.

The Texas and Florida actions both cited CAIR’s role as an unindicted co-conspirator in the 2007-2008 federal trial of the Holy Land Foundation, Its leaders were found guilty of funneling funds to Hamas.

“Internal documents plainly identified CAIR as a subsidiary of the Muslim Brotherhood and a federal court eventually found ‘ample evidence to establish’ that CAIR was associated ‘with Hamas,'” Abbott’s proclamation says.

The Texas document also lists a half dozen staffers and associates as being criminally convicted or deported for financing or supporting terrorist causes, including Al Qaeda, the Taliban and Saddam Hussein’s government.

Anti-Muslim activist Amy Mekelburg, founder of RAIR (Rise Align Ignite Reclaim) Foundation USA, has been urging other states to join Texas and Florida with designations of their own.

“ALL Red states with CAIR offices must act NOW – before CAIR’s influence becomes irreversible,” Mekelburg said in an X post last week. “Every red governor. Every red AG. Every red legislature.” She did not respond to The Center Square’s attempts to reach her, and CAIR has labeled RAIR a “hate group.”

While no governors have gone as far as Abbott and DeSantis, other state legislatures passed non-binding resolutions introduced over the past decade telling law enforcement and other state agencies to stop cooperating with CAIR.

When he was still a state representative last year, Fine introduced a resolution passed in the Florida House encouraging state and local governments to cut off contacts with the group, just as the FBI did more than a decade ago citing alleged ties to Hamas.

“They’ve made themselves out to be the NAACP for Muslims,” Fine said. “And I think it’s a very interesting thing, because if they’re the NAACP for Muslims, what does that say about Muslims?”

Last week CAIR called for Fine’s resignation over an X post where he said of mainstream Muslims, “I don’t know how you make peace with those who seek your destruction, I think you destroy them first.”

And Mitchell said the tactics being used against CAIR do hearken back to the NAACP, when southern states tried to shut it down in the 1960s by accusing its members of plotting with communists and seeking access to finance records and membership lists. He called the allegations in the Texas and Florida orders either factually inaccurate, or “a true fact that has been manipulated to sound nefarious and much worse than it is.”

The Holy Land Foundation trial was “one of the most notoriously-flawed and widely-criticized excesses of the post-9/11, War on Terror, Bush era,” he said. And of Abbott’s list of criminal convicts, “Some of those people did not work for CAIR at all whatsoever. None of them did anything criminal in relation to CAIR at all. And some of them were wrongly convicted of things they did not do.”

“CAIR is probably target number one for anti-Muslim bigots. They absolutely hate us because we defend the Muslim community, and we’re very, very good at it,” Mitchell said. “The NAACP was not a communist agent. We do not have any connection with any foreign entity. We’re an independent American organization, and Ron DeSantis is going to find that out.

Johnny Edwards

Investigative reporter

Daily Caller

Chinese Billionaire Tried To Build US-Born Baby Empire As Overseas Elites Turn To American Surrogates

Published on December 15, 2025

Todayville

From the Daily Caller News Foundation

By Melissa O’Rourke

A growing number of ultra-wealthy Chinese nationals are turning to U.S. surrogates to have children on American soil, taking advantage of America’s largely unregulated market and birthright citizenship, The Wall Street Journal reported Saturday.

In one such case, Chinese video game billionaire Xu Bo has sought parental rights for at least four unborn children in Los Angeles, having already fathered or arranged surrogacy for at least eight additional children, according to the WSJ. The trend coincides with intensifying debates over the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of U.S. citizenship for anyone born in the country, a policy the Trump administration has sought to reinterpret.

Xu appeared in a 2023 confidential court hearing by video from China, telling the judge he hoped to have about 20 U.S.-born children, with a preference for boys, to inherit his business, the outlet reported. Several of the children were reportedly being cared for by nannies in Irvine, California, while awaiting paperwork to travel to China.

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Last month, Xu’s ex-girlfriend claimed in a post on Chinese social media platform Weibo that he had 300 children living across multiple properties in different countries, according to the WSJ. Duoyi Network, Xu’s company, disputed the 300 figure but confirmed that through years of U.S. surrogacy, Xu has “only a little over 100” children.

“The boss does not accept interview requests from anyone for any purpose,” a representative for Duoyi Network said in an email to the WSJ, adding that “much of what you described is untrue.”

Neither the Duoyi Network nor Xu could be reached for comment.

Xu is far from alone.

In May, police launched a child abuse investigation into Chinese national Guojun Xuan and his wife after a two-month-old in their care was hospitalized with a head injury. The Los Angeles Department of Children and Family Services subsequently removed 21 children from the couple’s custody, including some born to surrogates.

Notably, Xuan served as a senior Chinese government official for at least two decades with the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region People’s Congress, responsible for repressive policies contributing to ongoing genocide against Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities, a Daily Caller News Foundation investigation found in July.

Nathan Zhang, founder and CEO of IVF USA — a network of fertility clinics in the U.S. and Mexico catering to wealthy Chinese clients — also told the WSJ that a growing number of extremely wealthy foreign clients are commissioning dozens, or even hundreds, of U.S.-born children to create what he described as an “unstoppable family dynasty.”

One Chinese businessman reportedly sought more than 200 children at once through surrogacy. Zhang said the individual was “speechless” when asked how he planned to raise all the children, according to the outlet.

Another California surrogacy agency owner said he had helped fulfill a request from a Chinese parent seeking 100 children, with the “order” spread across multiple agencies.

Wang Huiwu, another Chinese executive, reportedly used U.S. surrogates and egg donors to father ten girls, with the intention of marrying them off to influential men. He purchased dozens of eggs from models, a finance Ph.D. and a musician at costs ranging from $6,000 to $7,500 each, people familiar with his company told the WSJ.

The CEO of a New York IVF clinic helping connect Chinese parents with surrogacy agencies said that when a client requests three or four simultaneous surrogacies, agencies — which typically receive $40,000 to $50,000 per surrogacy, in addition to payments to the surrogate carriers — often respond enthusiastically.

“I’m getting positive feedback from the surrogacy agencies, they’re like, ‘This is a big one! I want to do this!’” the CEO told the outlet.

U.S.-based surrogacy arrangements involving foreign nationals more than quadrupled from 780 carrier cycles in 2014 to 3,240 cycles in 2019, accounting for nearly 40% of the U.S. total, researchers from Emory University found. Between 2014 and 2020, 41% of international surrogacy clients were from China.

Following reports of Chinese national Guojun Xuan’s abuse of children in his care, Republican Sen. Rick Scott of Florida introduced the Stopping Adversarial Foreign Exploitation of Kids in Domestic Surrogacy Act, which would ban the use of surrogacy in the U.S. by people from certain foreign countries, including China.

“America’s surrogacy system is meant to help individuals build families – it should never be the avenue to allow abuse, neglect, or deceit of innocent women and babies,” Scott said in November while introducing the bill. “And it’s terrifying that this might be at the hands of foreign adversaries with the sole intent of having a child that is a U.S. citizen.”

The Supreme Court is expected to consider President Donald Trump’s executive order limiting birthright citizenship in early 2026.