Questions surround Village of Barons municipal practices

Sunny South News Photo by Kristine Jean. CHANGES: Village of Barons Councillor Kyle Prince is speaking out about the Village’s municipal practices and hopes it will bring some needed changes to the municipality.

By Kristine Jean
Sunny South News

EDITOR’S NOTE: A follow-up article in an upcoming edition of the Sunny South News will feature an interview with Village of Barons Mayor Clinton Bishop, who responded to the SSN inquiry regarding the reported allegations and concerns raised by Village of Barons Councillor Kyle Prince. 

In recent months, several discrepancies regarding the Village of Barons municipal practices have been under scrutiny by one Village councillor, who is now speaking out with hopes of correcting the long-standing situation to help restore public trust.  

Village of Barons Councillor Kyle Prince has raised serious questions about the Village’s municipal practices in past years and ramped-up his inquiries over the last several months, bringing his concerns to both the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and the media, after he says his concerns were ignored by the Village council.   

Prince has raised questions involving budget and spending concerns, grant funding audits, municipal accountability – including town staff, inconsistencies with various municipal practices such as proper implementation of policies and bylaws, use of his signature without his permission on waivers of notice, which was reported to the RCMP and Ministry of Municipal Affairs.  

One other concern Prince has relates to an Organizational Meeting that was held for the Village of Barons in June 2026, following a May by-election. While the meeting did not violate the Municipal Government Act, the timing of it was questionable he noted, pointing out Organizational Meetings are expected to held at the same time every year and are not to be changed for a by-election.

It was a move that Prince questioned, as an attempt to oust him as the current Village of Barons Mayor. He was appointed Mayor by council in a vote following the October 2025 general municipal election. Prince believes he was targeted for removal as mayor because he was asking too many questions.  

“Getting elected in October 2025, I wanted to go in and make sure everything was done (correctly),” said Prince. “But during the budget meeting, while looking over our budget we had $100,000 allotted for land sales under our revenue. That makes absolutely no sense because we have no land to sell and we’ve been alotting this $100,000 for five years in a row.”  

Evidence and examples of some of the issues have been shared by Prince on his website, http://www.barons.buzz where he details what he says are several inconsistencies and questionable practices – everything from financial reporting,  budget concerns and a council recording ban to several Village issues, policy and bylaw reviews and a workplace harassment complaint that he said was filed against him for asking too many questions. 

“How does council provide effective oversight when any question of irregular or improper action is deemed workplace harassment,” Prince said in a post to his website dated Sept. 8, 2026.  

Prince spoke about the Village of Barons workplace harassment policy – Policy #78, and noted that policy, along with other policies and bylaws that pertain to council behaviour or conduct in Alberta, has been repealed as of May 15, 2025. These changes came into effect at that time as part of Bill 50 (Municipal Affairs Statutes Amendment Act, 2025). 

Therefore, there is currently no policy or bylaw in place to address the workplace harassment complaint.  

“Section 146 (of the Municipal Government Act) is the new councillor code of conduct framework that allows the Minister to bring in a code of conduct, which they’re working on right now,” said Prince, noting under the changes, Municipal Affairs would investigate all code of conduct violations. Those changes are expected to be completed sometime in the next year. 

In ‘blowing the whistle’ and speaking out, Prince hopes to bring some much needed change to the way Village of Barons Council conducts business matters like reviewing bylaws and policies and changes to its procedural bylaw. 

“Council is supposed to be putting in the work – we are ultimately responsible for all policies we pass,” said Prince. “We’re responsible for our bylaws, we’re responsible for overseeing everything that happens in the municipality and we should be doing our jobs.” 

Prince also pointed out that a lack of honesty and transparency between council and village residents has contributed to a shaky relationship between them.    

“That’s one of the biggest issues we face in Barons right now, is the lack of trust in council,” said Prince, adding it’s an uphill battle to earn back that trust if council is not 100 per cent transparent with the public.    

Prince said he welcomes a municipal inspection or investigation if it’s necessary to bring about the needed changes. The last municipal inspection of the Village of Barons was completed in late 2020 with a Municipal Accountability Program (MAP) report released on Feb. 11, 2021.  

Prince contacted the Ministry of Municipal Affairs earlier this summer and was told that a scheduled inspection of the Village of Barons was not set to take place until late 2027 or sometime in 2028. After he contacted the Ministry with his concerns about municipal practices in Barons, he was told that an inspection under the Municipal Accountability Program was moved up to Oct. 7, 2026. 

The Municipal Accountability Program stipulates that all towns, villages and summer villages under a certain population must have an inspection done every five years to ensure they are keeping up with current regulations.  

After several emails and phone calls to the Ministry of Municipal Affairs, the Sunny South News did receive a response to our inquiry regarding the Village of Barons, but it did not answer all questions that were asked, and instead provided limited information and general details surrounding the MAP inspection of Oct. 7, 2026.

“The Municipal Accountability Program’s purpose is to assist municipalities with their knowledge of mandatory legislated requirements under the Municipal Government Act (MGA), aid municipalities in achieving legislative compliance with the MGA and other legislation under the purview of Municipal Affairs, and to provide a collaborative partnership between the ministry and municipalities,” read a portion of the email regarding background information only, that was provided on Oct. 15, 2026. 

It continued “MAP reviews are generally scheduled once every five years for municipalities under 2,500. The Village was slated for their next review in the 2027-28 cycle however, were moved up due to workload balancing for the ministry MAP team.”

It also stated that to commence a MAP review, “a Municipal Affairs Advisor conducts a review a municipality’s bylaws, policies, and procedures for compliance with the MGA.”

In doing so, the process involves an advisor downloading available bylaws, meeting minutes, and other documents from the municipal website. The advisor then sends a document request to the municipality for any additional items they may need to complete their review. Once the inspection is complete, an interview is scheduled “to review draft findings and go over any areas where the municipality wishes to provide more information or correct any factual errors,” read the email from the Ministry of Municipal Affairs. 

Following this interview, the advisor finalizes the report and submits it to the municipality. The municipality has one year to complete any compliance gaps identified in the report but are able to request additional time if needed. 

“Once the gaps are addressed, the process is concluded,” read the email.  

The ministry’s reply also stated that “through publicly available records, the ministry is aware of a workplace harassment investigation occurring.”