“Should taxpayers fund poetry or potholes?”

Since my appointment as Calgary’s poet laureate, I have heard versions of this question more than once. Invoking taxpayer outrage is a familiar way of questioning public support for the arts.

When cities face pressure over roads, housing, transit, taxes and public services, culture is often framed as an optional extra: something nice to have after the “real work” of city-building is done.

That framing is tempting because it sounds practical. But it rests on a false divide. Cities need roads, pipes, transit systems and emergency services. They also need memory, language, celebration and care. They need ways to hold grief and to help strangers live together.

Poet laureates occupy a curious position in civic life. They are sometimes treated as ceremonial figures: invited to read at official events, compose occasional poems or represent a city’s cultural aspirations.

But across Canada and elsewhere, the role has increasingly expanded beyond literary symbolism. Poet laureates now work in libraries, schools, transit systems, community centres, festivals and are concerned with public conversations about history, identity, reconciliation, climate grief and belonging.

Poetry belongs where people gather

In Vancouver, former poet laureate Fiona Tinwei Lam developed the City Poems Project starting in 2022 that encouraged public engagement with poetry connected to historical, cultural and ecological sites throughout the city.

In Victoria, the poet laureate program combines civic readings with community poetry initiatives and mentorship of the city’s youth poet laureate.

Edmonton’s Arts Council describes the role as helping residents reflect on........

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