Tara Sawyer, former chair of Alberta Grains, has been elected to the Alberta Legislature as the new MLA in the riding of Olds-Didsbury-Three Hills.
She earned 9,362 votes, more than tripling her closest competitor, Bev Toews of the NDP, at 3,063. Republican Party of Alberta candidate Cam Davies, who had resigned his membership with the United Conservative Party, finished in third with 2,708 votes.
Sawyer replaces UCP MLA Nathan Cooper, who resigned to become Alberta’s senior representative in Washington, D.C. Cooper had served as the MLA for the region for a decade.
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Sawyer, a wheat, barley and canola farmer from Acme, was elected as Alberta Grains’ inaugural chair in 2023 after the amalgamation of the Alberta Wheat Commission and Alberta Barley. She took a leave of absence from her position to campaign for the MLA position in mid-May.
Sawyer also held the distinction of becoming the first woman to hold the position of chair of the Grain Growers of Canada when she was elected to the executive of the national organization in December of 2024. She stepped down from that role earlier this year to pursue her political campaign.
The other two byelections within Alberta were won by NDP candidates in the ridings of Edmonton-Ellerslie and Edmonton-Strathcona.
