With five frontrunners established, who are Calgary’s other four mayoral candidates?​on September 24, 2025 at 9:44 pm

“I want to do something that matters,” he said. “I’m 47 now and have complained a lot but have never put my hat in the ring.”

Having worked most of his career in the oilpatch, Prior said there’s a preconceived notion when people meet him that he’s running on a conservative platform. Perhaps ironically, he said, most of his ideas skew toward the other side of the political spectrum. He wants the city to tax foreign real estate speculators and large conglomerates more and provide tax breaks for small local businesses.

While some of Prior’s ideas may fall under the purview of higher orders of government and less on city council, he said his platform is inspired by wanting to support working-class people. He calls his approach to politics “human-centered capitalism,” that puts people ahead of profits. “Tax wealth, not work” is one of his campaign slogans.

On a ballot with nine names, Prior is not the only shoestring-budget mayoral candidate this election.

Sarah Elder may disagree that she’s considered a long-shot candidate. She’s been politically active for years, is the founder of the Madame Premier fashion brand, and was a former board member of Ask Her YYC — an organization that aims to boost female representation in Calgary politics. She pointed out that her number of Instagram followers is on par with Thiessen’s.

While she was previously announced as the co-chair for Farkas’ campaign in August, Elder resigned from that role shortly before announcing her own candidacy.

But Elder acknowledged that as an independent, “non-establishment” candidate with no previous council experience, the odds of becoming Calgary’s next mayor are heavily stacked against her. She noted that Thiessen, the only member of the five front-runners to not previously serve on council, has been able to boost his public recognition by including his name and face on all of the Calgary Party candidates’ campaign material.

“It’s been two weeks (since I announced my candidacy) and I continue to hear from Calgarians that they’re very frustrated and disappointed with the other candidates, attributing them all to being part of the same problem,” she said.

“My message to anyone who feels frustrated or is tired of politics-as-usual is that I’m 100 per cent the person they should be looking at.”

Another candidate for mayor this election is Jaeger Gustafson, a doctor of acupuncture and massage therapist.

He co-owns an acupuncture and massage clinic in the southwest as well as a post-secondary institute in the northwest called the Yue-Gustafson School of Health Professions. He said he also has a background in both private and public post-secondary education regulation.

After a long career as a wellness practitioner, Gustafson said his decision to run for mayor was based on a desire to help people.

The fringe candidate received 429 votes out of 390,383 in the 2021 election, or roughly 0.1 per cent. He later sought a judicial review of the election results, but his bid was shot down unanimously by a panel of Alberta Court of Appeal judges in 2023. He had attempted a similar review following the 2017 election, which was also rejected by the courts.

While Heather previously used to regularly attend city council meetings as a spectator, he was kicked out of council chambers in 2016 when he refused to leave the podium during a public hearing, after his allotted five minutes to speak. He was issued a two-year ban from Calgary’s municipal building as a result.

Last year, he unsuccessfully sought a legal challenge for the city’s safe and inclusive access bylaw, after he was ticketed for holding an “Anti-Reading with Royalty” protest outside of the central public library. He claimed the bylaw violated his Charter right for freedom of expression.