Len Bracko
Quick Facts
Biography
Leonard Bracko (born 1943) is a current municipal councillor in St. Albert, Alberta and a former member of the Legislative Assembly of Alberta.
A high school social studies teacher by profession, Bracko entered politics by running for the Alberta Liberals in the 1989 Alberta provincial election in the riding of St. Albert. He finished second to Progressive Conservative Dick Fowler, a former mayor of St. Albert. Later that year, Bracko ran for St. Albert City Council and was elected as alderman. He served one three year term in this capacity, but did not run for re-election in 1992, preferring to take on Fowler in the following year's provincial election.
Bracko won a 1500 vote victory over Fowler, who was by this time Minister of Justice and Attorney General. As a member of the Liberal official opposition caucus, he served as Municipal Affairs critic. In the 1997 provincial election, he lost his seat to Progressive Conservative Mary O'Neill by sixteen votes in the election's closest race. Bracko challenged O'Neill unsuccessfully in the 2001 provincial election, losing by a more decisive two thousand vote margin.
In 2001, Bracko made a return to municipal politics by being elected to St. Albert's council. Bracko was the only member of his council to support the Ray Gibbon Drive alignment for the west regional road - the rest of the council's members favoured the west bypass alignment that had earlier been rejected. In light of this, Bracko soon dropped his opposition to the bypass alignment. He was re-elected in 2004, 2007, and 2010.
Bracko and his wife, Barb, have been active with Habitat for Humanity and travelled to Nepal in 2002 to help build houses. Len Bracko is also an honorary chief of the Maasai tribe, an honour that was bestowed on him in 2004 when he travelled to Mozambique on Federation of Canadian Municipalities business.