In Crowsnest Pass, small-town struggle may be a canary in Tory coal mine

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Crowsnest Pass, a mountainous stretch of Alberta that manages to be both scenic and decrepit, is key to Jim Prentice's self-styled image. Mr. Prentice plays up the seven summers he laboured in the area's coal mines, getting dirty and working hard just like you.

But here, residents are not buying his pitch. They find it hard to believe Mr. Prentice, once a powerful federal cabinet minister and former senior executive vice-president and vice-chairman at CIBC, is in danger of suffering from the black lung.

"He might have grown up that way, but that's not who he is now," Lois Timms says over coffee at the Cinnamon Bear Bakery Café in Coleman."That doesn't connect. No, because he's a politician now."

Mr. Prentice, the Progressive Conservative Leader trying to persuade Albertans to extend his party's 43-year dynasty on May 5, needs support from people like Ms. Timms. Crowsnest, which includes a string of small towns on the side of a highway in southwest Alberta, is part of the Livingstone-Macleod riding. Here, it will likely come down to whether voters are conservative or really conservative.

"We're not certain who to vote for because the party we like – we don't like the provincial leader," says Ms. Timms, who drives a bus for employees of the coal mines. She is talking about Mr. Prentice, but rarely says his name. "Is he just out to further his own career, or does he care about the people?"

Her husband, Charles, favours strong black coffee and true-blue conservatives. He is supporting the riding's incumbent, Wildrose's Pat Stier. "I won't vote PC. They are more Liberal than PC," he says.

Ms. Timms is undecided. Her husband, a bit of a card, thinks otherwise. "She'll be Wildrose. Otherwise, just shoot her."

Alberta's NDP under Rachel Notley has emerged as the Tories' biggest threat, polls show. Combine that with Wildrose's hold on southern Alberta and Mr. Prentice's political future is wobbly. Calgary's ridings will be the final fight of the campaign for the three main parties this weekend, but areas like Livingstone-Macleod remain important as the PCs and Wildrose vie for the conservative seats. PC candidate Evan Berger represented this riding before Mr. Stier took it in 2012. Mr. Stier secured 48.1 per cent of the vote, while Mr. Berger captured 41.4 per cent.

The Rocky Mountains cuddle Crowsnest Pass, popping up at its eastern boundary. A dead tree – the Burmis Tree – marks the eastern entrance. The naked limber pine is named after Burmis, a coal-mining town that no longer exists. The tree stands, with the help of a cable and support from the provincial and federal governments, according to its roadside heritage sign. It has been there for 700 years, the sign says. Further west, the highway cuts through Frank Slide, a massive stretch of rubble that crushed part of the town of Frank when the northern face of Turtle Mountain collapsed in 1903. Some experts calculate 100 million tonnes of rock, mostly limestone, ripped over the area. That is the equivalent of a wall one metre wide and six metres high stretching between Victoria and Halifax, the Alberta government says. Some of the chunks in the slide are the size of small buses. More than 90 people died and 500 survived, the government says. The old coal town remains a roadside village in Crowsnest. The area is known for defying prohibition.

Mr. Prentice says he put himself through law school working summers at the Coleman Collieries between 1974 and 1978, and at Byron Creek driving a coal truck in 1979 and 1980.

Adam Emblau lives above the bar in Coleman's old Grand Union Hotel, down in the valley. He is outside the historic building having a smoke and railing against the PCs. He says he is a life-long Liberal, plumber, pipe-fitter, gas-fitter, and spent 17 years in the coal mines. The 63-year-old first voted when he was 18.

"My mother took me by my ear and said, 'Put your X by the red,' " he says. "And who am I do defy my mother? That's why I'm a Liberal."

He believes the Tories are short on compassion and adequate social programs.

"Everybody, they seem to think everybody is a bum or after something," he says. Mr. Emblau also dismisses Mr. Prentice's reliance on his coal-mining roots. "Someone that worked summers for seven years – he's no coal miner."

And then there is Kris Peterson and his wife of five minutes, Belle. They just got hitched in a church the size of a bathroom, not counting the steeple. They fixed up the old thing themselves, painting it white and blue to match their wedding colours. They live in Lethbridge, east of the Crowsnest Pass and outside Livingstone-Macleod, but want to make this their home. They are expecting triplets. Mr. Peterson just left the oil patch and is working for himself. He is voting NDP.

"Cutbacks are going in the wrong places with health care and education," he says of the current government's budget. "But the oil companies didn't get hit."