Todd Loewen & Danielle Smith

EDMONTON — An environmental group warns last week’s changes to the governing United Conservative Party cabinet could threaten protections for Alberta’s parks and wildlands. In her first cabinet since becoming premier, Premier Danielle Smith divided responsibility for parks and so-called “protected areas” between two different ministries. The Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society says the changes mean that almost 94 per cent of Alberta’s parks, recreation areas and wildland parks will be managed by the Ministry of Forestry, Parks and Tourism. Alberta Environment will manage protected areas — only five per cent of the lands it used to. “When you’re putting the vast majority of the land base we call parks and protected areas in with forestry and tourism, it could change the management intent of those places,” society director Katie Morrison said Wednesday.