Whatever it is, it continues to work for Brenda Leigh, now about to enter her (can it be?) 8th term as the Director.
Although I don't live in area D, I drive through it on the highway several times a week on my way to and from Courtenay. This year I thought, once again, she might be in some trouble.
Particularly as, although she got out in front of the fight against amalgamation of part of Area D with Campbell River early, she was clearly not in control of the overwhelming rejection that the referendum produced.
Brenda's opposition this year was obviously well-organized and well-funded. They started with a sign campaign in September featuring large, well-designed, high-visibility signs in prominent locations, mixed with a saturation of smaller versions of that sign; by the end of the campaign they were also running large 4-colour ads featuring their attractive candidate in the local papers.
Maybe a month before the election date, Brenda's crew started putting our her now-familiar small black-and-white signs along the highway. A few weeks later these were joined by a number of larger signs stressing her experience. There may have been newspaper ads, but if there were they didn't strike me, hence I'd say not very effective.
Brenda won with 56% of the vote.
That's some machine!
On reflection, maybe it wasn't the smartest thing in the world to put those prominent “Honig” signs on some of Area D's most-obviously expensive properties at Bennett's Point!
Just sayin'.
2 For the past three years Campbell River has had a mayor in open warfare with most of his council much of the time. Consequently, he was on the losing side of most of the significant issues that council dealt with.
So this election he offered us a choice: elect me, elect my slate, and we'll rein in the bureaucracy and cut taxes dramatically. They advertised together, and spent a significant amount of money
Among the people I know at all well, the mayor was a pretty constant source of embarrassment for three years. Comparisons were made to Rob Ford. (minus the drugs, of course) Nobody I talked to believed much in the platform. He did not have the local papers on side.
He lost to a popular councillor, but only by 121 votes.
None of the slate was elected.
I'm hereby formally registering a sigh of relief.
The new council has two returning councillors, Larry Samson and Ron Kerr. The former tended to side with the majority; the latter with the mayor.
It also has Charlie Cornfield, a former mayor who sat out the last term for personal reasons, started to run for mayor, then spotted (or was persuaded) that this would result in the return of the incumbent and consequently ran for council instead. He topped the polls.
It also has Michelle Babchuk, a former School Board Chair (I'd be surprised if she doesn't have her sights set on eventually succeeding Claire as our MLA; if that's the case a session or two on council will surely help hone her skills!)
The last two places go to Marlene Wright and Colleen Evans. I clearly don't move in the right circles to know why they were elected, but suspect ties to the business community.
I voted for the new mayor and the top 3 vote-getters, so I'm optimistic, at least for the moment.
The one real surprise for me was that Claire Moglove, a lawyer who was clearly the most effective voice on the past Council and often appeared to be effectively the mayor, lost by 410 votes. Payback? I don't know.
3 The School Board returned essentially the same crew as before, although adding Richard Franklin, a well-respected former Elementary principal.
But really, what's the point? All BC school boards can do is try to mitigate the damage Victoria does, and deflect the anger of parents, teachers, and support staff. There must be better ways to spend the money they cost.
4 Rachel Blaney was elected the NDP candidate for North Island-Comox-Powell River last weekend. Congratulations to her and her team! They worked hard and won handily.
So why am I grumpy about it?
--not because the election had already been decided by mailed ballot before we got to the convention.
--not because the speeches were tedious and irrelevant.
--not because the average age in the room must have been well over 60, and all those under 40 appeared to be children or relatives of the candidates.
--not even because I voted for the wrong person, which I didn't.
I'm grumpy because neither candidate offered anything more than talking points. Furthermore, one is apparently confused about which are federal and which are provincial issues. The other started well but doesn't know when to stop talking. By the time we left to count votes, all the energy had been sucked from the room. I left realizing that neither had presented any coherent vision of what an NDP member of Parliament might actually do for the constituency.
I'm grumpy because I didn't hear anything that would suggest we've learned from previous elections, which, if I may remind my readers, the Conservatives won, on both sides of the new riding. The fact that John Duncan (John Duncan!) isn't running here doesn't mean that we're going to win. There are any number of scenarios available in which the Conservatives or the Liberals win, especially if the Liberals run a credible candidate. Which is exactly what Peter Schwarzhoff is...
I'm grumpy because I don't know how I'd deal with my despair after another majority Conservative government. And especially if we let them have this constituency.
Again.
On the optimistic side, we've got a year to get it right, and no, the usual people (myself included) are now too long in the tooth and can no longer be relied on to get results.
Recruiting a team that can must be job one.
