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Opinion: A small budget cut with a big impact on Alberta’s heritage

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A provincial decision to cut operational grants and strip the Alberta Genealogical Society (AGS) of its provincial heritage organization status is sending shock waves through Alberta’s heritage community.

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The loss of this funding impacts our community in several critical ways:

Preservation of history: The AGS maintains extensive databases and a physical library with holdings that are often not found in public libraries or the Provincial Archives;

Community education: Through its many branches, the society provides affordable workshops and research assistance that foster a sense of belonging and identity;

Economic impact: Genealogical research is a significant driver of “heritage tourism,” bringing people into our province to visit ancestral sites and local archives;

Volunteer mobilization: The AGS manages thousands of volunteer hours to support archival research and historical preservation.

The volunteer-driven organization warns the move could seriously undermine the work it has done for over five decades to preserve and make accessible the province’s historical records. What makes the decision especially striking is the extraordinary return on that modest investment.

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In 2025, AGS received $29,000 in provincial funding. That small grant ignited a 20-to-1 return in volunteer mobilization. Society members contributed more than 31,000 hours — valued at roughly $620,000 — supporting archival research, historical preservation, and public access to records across the province.

AGS was founded in 1973. For over five decades, AGS volunteers have been quietly building tools that researchers across Alberta rely on. Since 1989, volunteers have worked weekly at the Provincial Archives of Alberta creating searchable indexes to major archival collections, including Alberta homestead and land records. Those resources help families trace their roots and are frequently used by applicants to the province’s Century Farm and Ranch and 125-Year Farm Recognition programs.

Researchers are regularly directed to these indexes because they make otherwise complex archival records far easier to navigate. The ministry that is defunding AGS acknowledged the value of this work with a provincial Heritage Award in 2022.

The society also maintains specialized genealogy libraries across Alberta, including the only publicly accessible working copy of the Charles D. Denney Métis and Red River genealogical collection. While a protected copy is held at the Glenbow Museum and not available for research, AGS’s working collection allows Albertans to document Métis ancestry for citizenship applications to the Métis Nation of Alberta.

AGS supports research across many communities through 11 special-interest groups, including one dedicated to French-Canadian genealogy. The group provides French-language resources, translation assistance, workshops, and webinars, helping researchers access records created in Canada’s second official language.

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The organization also works actively to make heritage accessible to the broader public. AGS partners with another defunded organization, the Historical Society of Alberta, during Open Doors celebrations. These events invite the public behind the scenes of historic buildings and collections, sparking curiosity and connecting people with the stories of their communities.

Heritage engagement isn’t limited to older generations. Over the past 11 years, 1,832 students have earned certificates through AGS’s Genealogy4Youth program by researching their family history. In each of the past five years, more than 45 student posters highlighting Indigenous or immigrant family stories have been displayed for a month each spring at the Art Gallery of Alberta.

Behind it all is an extraordinary community of volunteers who contribute tens of thousands of hours each year to make Alberta’s heritage resources accessible to the public. A relatively small investment from the province has enabled those volunteers to leverage thousands of hours of research, indexing, and public education. Without that support, much of this work— and the access it provides to Albertans — will be at risk.

This budget cut carries outsized consequences for the people preserving Alberta’s past. It represents the end of a partnership between government and citizens working together to protect Alberta’s shared history. Losing that partnership would be a loss not just for the organization, but for Alberta’s heritage itself.

Lynne Duigou is past-president of the Alberta Genealogical Society.

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