Calgary's next civic census set for 2028
Council voted to delay the count by a year after struggling to find a contractor, now planning to use in-house staff instead.
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Calgary will hold its next civic census in 2028, following a council vote Tuesday—a one-year delay from the originally planned 2027 count.
The postponement came after city administration reported it couldn't find a suitable contractor to carry out the census in 2027. The city is now planning to use in-house staff and custom-built software to conduct the count.
Calgary's last civic census was held in 2019. The following year, council cut the annual door-to-door count as a cost-saving measure during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2024, council directed administration to consider reinstating the census every two years, beginning in 2027, with a budget of $10.7 million spread between 2025 and 2030.
Since the census was discontinued, the city has relied on population data from the 2021 federal census, which indicated Calgary's population was around 1.3 million. The city currently estimates Calgary's population at 1.6 million based on projections using building permits and other growth metrics.
"With the unprecedented growth we have seen in Calgary since our last civic census, restarting the program will provide important data on how our communities are evolving on a more granular or ward by ward level," said Yousaf Shah, the city's census program co-ordinator.
Council voted 10-5 to amend the plan with regular progress updates starting in October. It voted down a request to conduct the census every five years instead of every two years. The final vote was 13-2 in support of the 2028 start date.
