Saskatoon Churchill–Wildwood

Saskatoon Churchill–Wildwood covers established residential neighbourhoods in Saskatoon's south end, including Wildwood, parts of Adelaide/Churchill, and surrounding areas. Lisa Lambert of the Saskatchewan Party had held the seat since its creation in 2016 and won re-election in 2020, making her a two-term incumbent seeking a third mandate. During the 29th Legislature, she served as deputy whip and as legislative secretary to the Minister of Education. The NDP targeted the riding as part of its strategy to sweep Saskatoon's urban seats and nominated Keith Jorgenson, a candidate whose dual background in education and small business gave him a distinctive local profile.

Candidates

Keith Jorgenson (NDP) — Jorgenson spent two decades working as an educator and school administrator, specializing in supporting students with complex needs. He simultaneously built a Saskatoon bakery into the largest independent bakery in the province, an enterprise through which he supplied more than 400,000 food items free or at cost and raised over $100,000 for charitable causes. His campaign emphasized hands-on community investment and the practical consequences of underfunded public services. After his election, he was named the NDP's shadow minister for seniors and associate shadow minister for health.

Lisa Lambert (Saskatchewan Party) — Lambert spent more than three decades at CTV Saskatoon before entering politics, and served four terms as a Catholic school board trustee. First elected in 2016, she had built a constituency presence through community association work and her role in the legislature. She was acclaimed as the Saskatchewan Party candidate for 2024, entering the race as the riding's only incumbent to have ever held the seat.

Morgan McAdam (Green Party) received less than two per cent of the vote.

Local Issues

Education policy was a flashpoint in a riding with a large concentration of families with school-age children. The Saskatchewan Party government's Parents' Bill of Rights — Bill 137, passed in October 2023 using the notwithstanding clause — required parental consent before students under sixteen could change their preferred name or pronouns at school. The legislation divided opinion in the riding's suburban households. Lambert, as legislative secretary to the education minister, was closely associated with the policy, while Jorgenson's background as an educator gave him credibility in arguing that the bill undermined trust between students and school staff.

Healthcare staffing and emergency room pressures carried particular weight in south Saskatoon, where residents relied on nearby hospitals that were operating well beyond capacity. Saskatoon City Hospital's average emergency wait for an inpatient bed stretched beyond fifty-five hours between September 2023 and March 2024, and Royal University Hospital and St. Paul's Hospital faced similar strain. Jorgenson's appointment as associate shadow minister for health after his election reflected the prominence of these concerns during the campaign.

The broader urban-rural divide that defined the 2024 election played out in microcosm in Churchill–Wildwood. Lambert's defeat marked the end of the Saskatchewan Party's presence in one of the few Saskatoon seats it had managed to hold through multiple election cycles, as the NDP's city-wide sweep left the governing party with only a single urban seat in Saskatoon.