” … celebrate the progressive socialist history of Vancouver City Hall, as championed by Harry Rankin, the most popular civic politician in Vancouver history, the most outspoken political figure in our city’s history, a man who inspired a whole new generation of socialists and activists, including the candidates running with COPE in the 2018 Vancouver civic election.”
Prior to the matinée screening of Harry Rankin: Legacy of a Radical, after the doors of the Rio Theatre open at 1pm, you’ll have an opportunity to interact with COPE’s 2018 candidates for civic office …
City Council candidates, Order of Canada recipient and respected anti-poverty activist Jean Swanson (one of the warmest, friendliest people you’d ever want to meet — and you do want to meet Jean, and speak with her, as one of our city’s great listeners and community activists); beloved former COPE School Board trustee and Vancouver City Councillor, Anne Roberts, who will emerge as the ‘can do, get things done’ social conscience of our next City Council; and Derrick O’Keefe, our very own Kshama Sawant, Ben Isitt, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and John Sewell, all wrapped up into the soon-to-be City Councillor, who will become the most beloved political figure in our city and our province when he is elected to Vancouver City Council on Saturday, October 20th;
School Board trustee candidates Diana Day and Barb Parrott, who don’t view themselves as caretakers of a public education system in Vancouver that, for years, has suffered and continues to suffer economic distress, the two activist School Board candidates in this civic election who will be on the side of children enrolled in our city’s school system, and who will fight for more and better in Vancouver, including the restoration of the band & strings programme, who will fight for better educational outcomes for our indigenous students, more English as Second Language & French Immersion teachers, and more speech pathologists & support staff to meet the needs of Vancouver’s special needs students;
Park Board candidates, Gwen Giesbrecht and Dr. John Irwin, two of the finest people you’d ever want to meet, longtime advocates for Vancouver’s beleaguered, and woefully underfunded, parks and recreation system, who will fight against a 12-foot-wide asphalt bike path through Kitsilano Beach, and the construction of a destination Olympic pool and hockey rink that would take over the entirety of Kitsilano’s Connaught Park, while shutting down the existing Kitsilano Community Centre and hockey rink, who recognize maintenance, growth and proper funding of our parks and recreation system represents a class issue for many, many families for whom our parks are their back yard, and for whom our community centres are a second home.
Following the screening of the film, a panel discussion will be held from 3:30pm til til 4pm, with panelists and attendees provided with a second opportunity from 4pm til 4:45pm to formally (and informally) meet, interact and question COPE’s candidates for office, and where candidates want to hear what your priorities issues are in the 2018 Vancouver civic election.
The Rio Theatre, southwest corner of Commercial Drive and East Broadway, doors open at 1pm, screening at 2pm, a chance to get out of the rain, and where a good time is guaranteed for all amidst some of the finest people our city has ever produced. Tickets are $10 in advance, or $12 at the door.
On Thursday evening, September 20th, the Kerrisdale Community Centre hosted an all-candidates meeting for 20 of the City Council candidates who are seeking office & tenure at City Hall in the 2018 Vancouver civic election.
Unlike the Council all-candidates forum hosted by the Residents for Community Control — where almost all members of the audience were associated with candidates speaking at the front of the hall — the audience for the Kerrisdale Community Centre forum was 80% local residents, who arrived at 7pm on a dark and inclement Thursday evening not to get out of the rain, but to listen to candidates with whom they were unfamiliar, their community attendance an information seeking venture.
One similarity between the two Council all-candidate events: there were no panelists present from the governing Vision Vancouver party, nor for the second night in a row were there any panelists from Hector Bremner’s nascent and seemingly invisible Yes Vancouver civic party.
On this surprisingly vibrant and engaging Thursday evening, there were no panelists from the Coalition Party, either, although Coalition Party Mayoral candidate Wai Young and her Council candidate colleague, Glen Chernen were present, and standing at the back of the auditorium — both of whom who told this reporter that contact had been made by their civic party with the Kerrisdale Community Centre forum organizers requesting participation in the night’s event. But to no good effect, it would appear.
For the second night in a row, the two most effective and well-received candidate speakers of the evening were the Vancouver Non-Partisan Association‘s generational candidate, Sarah Kirby-Yung, and the Green Party’s phenomenally lucid Pete Fry, although OneCity Vancouver City Council candidate Christine Boyle gave them both a run for their money, and in the humanity and connection sweepstakes had all other speakers beat hands down — which is what you might reasonably expect of a once-in-a-lifetime civic political candidate, destined to become the most beloved political figure in Vancouver’s long, gloried and celebrated civic history. Vancouver Non-Partisan Association Council candidate Melissa De Genova was her regular charmingly feisty self, while her NPA colleague Colleen Hardwick got better as the evening went on — but please, if there’s a god in the heavens, make her stop talking about her family’s history in civic politics and focus on what she would bring to the Council table — which she finally managed to achieve by meeting’s end. So there is a god, after all. The Green Party’s Michael Wiebe — who we’re now moving into the must-elect column — emerged as the most dynamic speaker of the evening, his command of & his focused ability to speak to the issues both unparalleled on this particular evening and in the election generally — his current Park Board Commissioner colleague, Sarah Kirby Yung, has done a fine job of mentoring Mr. Wiebe, the two getting along like a house on fire, Michael Wiebe’s respect for Ms. Kirby-Yung palpable and endearing, she providing the voice of reason and experience to Mr. Wiebe’s focused youthful vitality.
In a Vancouver civic election where 71 candidates have come forward seeking office as a City Councillor, Thursday evening was more a look-see evening than an event designed to address the issues of the day — because, let’s face it, there’s only one issue in this election: affordable housing and co-and-co-op housing within the rubric of neighbourhood consultation, with the recognition that we’re in the midst of a housing crisis in Vancouver, and we don’t want more study (consultation, yes; study, no), we want action, and we want action now, not in some distant future.
Five candidates — each of whom you can see and hear speaking in the video at the top of today’s column — emerged on this electoral evening as the candidates capable of getting things done, and getting ’em done now …
OneCity Vancouver’s transcendently lovely and transformationally inspiring Christine Boyle (just wait til she’s elected … your socks are going to be impressed right off, we’ve never seen anyone like her in Vancouver municipal politics, and that’s all to the good for us);
Pete Fry, the city builder extraordinaire in this election, the must, must, must-elect in 2018, and a man possessed of much wisdom, knowledge, and unending kindness, the candidate you can count on every day;
Anne Roberts, the voice of reason and the voice of experience, who’s been elected to civic office before, which means that she knows how to get things done for us, much sooner, and the Councillor who will emerge as the quietly effective social conscience of the next Council;
Independent City City Council candidate, and the democrat in the Council group, Erin Shum — which means not only that Erin Shum will be the Councillor who will listen to you, but act on your concerns, who will never back down; don’t be fooled by her youth, Erin Shum is an old soul;
and right-out-of-left field …
Michael Wiebe — a current Park Board Commissioner, who has served well and with distinction for four years now — who, when you watch the video above (you can see and hear Michael Wiebe at the 11:20 mark in the video) you’ll find yourself saying out loud, “I want this young Kennedy-esque man on Vancouver’s next City Council, and I’ll be telling all my neighbours, friends and colleagues about him, too. Now where do I go about donating money and volunteer hours to his campaign?”
So there you have it: the 2018 Vancouver civic election is coming into clearer focus, with City Council candidates emerging from the primordial muck to carry us to the Promised Land, and a better, fairer, more just and transformative future, where the needs of everyone can and will be met.
The next awe-inspiring all-candidates event: S.U.C.C.E.S.S and the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs Sunday afternoon, September 23rd Vancouver Mayoral debate, which will take place in Chinatown, at 28 West Pender.
On Wednesday evening, the Residents for Community Control held the first City Council all-candidates forum of the 2018 Vancouver civic election.
Two hundred hardy souls came in out of the rain to listen to and question City Council candidates from most of Vancouver’s civic parties.
We write most, because two of Vancouver’s mainstream municipal parties were unrepresented at Wednesday night’s forum: the Vision Vancouver ruling party, despite a half dozen pleading contacts with representatives of Vancouver’s governing party — who failed to respond to any of the organizer’s entreaties, for any one of their half dozen Council candidates — and OneCity Vancouver, who apologized to organizers (and attendees) for their non-attendance, as OneCity Vancouver candidates Christine Boyle and Brandon Yan — two of the must-elects in the current civic election — found themselves at the well-attended SFU Harbour Centre Broadbent Institute-sponsored Bringing Racial Justice to Local Democracy forum.
The Green Party of Vancouver was well-represented, with three of their serious-minded candidates for Council in attendance: incumbent Adriane Carr, Michael Wiebe and must-elect Pete Fry. The Vancouver Non-Partisan Association’s Colleen Hardwick and must-elect Sarah Kirby-Yung did their party proud, as did must-elect COPE Council candidate, Anne Roberts.
Otherwise, the also-ran right-wing parties were in attendance: Jesse Johl for Vancouver First; Raza Mirza for Pro Vancouver; James Lin for Coalition Vancouver — but, as it happened, no Council rep from Yes Vancouver.
The questions that you might expect to come up were featured front and centre: affordable housing, those damnable bike lanes (alas), development and which parties were in the developers’ pockets, parks and recreation and adequate funding for public facilities, the Downtown Eastside (but not homelessness), reining in City Hall’s budget or at least prioritizing expenditures differently than has been the case with Vision Vancouver, and the need for a new city plan for each of Vancouver’s 23 neighbourhoods.
In 2014, the Mount Pleasant Council all-candidates forum, held at Heritage Hall at 15th and Main, was the most raucous and engaged all-candidate debate of the entire 2014 Vancouver election season. In stark contrast, Wednesday night’s well-attended City Council all-candidates forum was muted in comparison: too many representatives from too many civic parties, with too many utterly unknown Council candidates participating, with only one City Council incumbent in attendance — the Green Party’sbeloved communicator and City Councillor extraordinaire, Adriane Carr.
By forum’s end four things were clear: forum attendees possessed a universal visceral hatred for Vision Vancouver; the Green Party in all its humility, good cheer, humanity and intelligence is absolutely and utterly beloved, at least by those in attendance and more probably by a broad spectrum of potential Vancouver votes; the Green Party’s Pete Fry and the NPA’s Sarah Kirby-Yung — two of the must-elects in this election — were by far the best speakers of the evening, the best informed with a broad grasp of the issues, and the most well-received of all the candidates at the front of the room (the Greens’ Adriane Carr & Michael Wiebe arrived a bit late — important civic business, given that both are current electeds in civic governance — and chose to remain as a part of the audience); and voters are hankering for change, and not more of the same old, same old.
Looking like the cat that ate the canary, independent Mayoral aspirant Kennedy Stewart on Wednesday morning — despite VanRamblings formally endorsing independent Shauna Sylvester for Mayor — was formally endorsed by the members and the Board of OneCity Vancouver as their ‘certain-to-be-elected‘ (they feel), and ‘someone they want to work with and have confidence in’, Mayoral candidate of choice.
For the record, OneCity Vancouver is, by far, VanRamblings’ favourite feminist, woman-driven civic party, the only party with a consistent & well-thought-out political analysis in the 2018 Vancouver municipal election. Now, we’re not saying that we don’t think Shauna Sylvester wouldn’t make a first-rate Mayor for Vancouver — we believe that with all our heart, and to the depth of our being — rather, we’re saying that Alison Atkinson, Anna Chudnovksy, Cara Ng, Kyla Epstein, Mia Edbrooke, Marcy Toms, Adi Pick, Claudia Ferris, Helesia Luke, Abby Leung, Joey Hartman, Sharon Yandle, Thea Dowler, Jennifer Reddy, Carrie Bercic, Erica Jaaf, Christine Boyle and a host of other change-making, action-oriented, difference-maker women of conscience may, just may mind you (and, most likely do), know more than that VanRamblings fella who writes these posts on this blog, and that in choosing Kennedy Stewart as OneCity Vancouver’s Mayoralty candidate of choice, these fine women are smart political cookies, and probably (okay, certainly) much smarter than the writer of this blog.
And wouldn’t you know, no sooner do the good folks involved with OneCity Vancouver formally endorse Kennedy Stewart as their Mayoralty candidate of choice, than the Vancouver Sunpublishes a story that reads …
Independent candidate Kennedy Stewart is pulling ahead in the race for Vancouver’s top job after Ian Campbell’s departure, according to the latest poll.
The Research Co. found that 36 per cent of respondents say they will vote for Stewart in next month’s election, up 11 points since the company’s last poll in July. The poll shows Stewart with an 11-point lead over the NPA’s Ken Sim, who is in second place at 25 per cent.
Among female voters, Stewart holds a 23-point lead over Sim, while Sim is slightly ahead of Stewart (32 per cent to 29 per cent) among decided male voters. Sim is followed by independent candidate Shauna Sylvester with 17 per cent, Hector Bremner of Yes Vancouver at seven per cent, and David Chen of ProVancouver with four per cent support.
Word on the street is that Kennedy Stewart was unwilling to give up his cushy $168,000-a-year job as a Member of Parliament, unless he could secure both the support of labour, and the provincial NDP.
And since OneCity Vancouver is pretty much the civic farm team for the provincial NDP — again, for the record, as a life long member of the New Democratic Party, VanRamblings loves the provincial NDP, and just about every galldarn, cotton pickin’ one of the party’s provincial and federal members — so OneCity Vancouver‘s affiliation, affection and support for the New Democratic Party is just darn fine by us.
We’re sure that the terrifically intelligent folks in OneCity Vancouver are well-aware that every Union local in Vancouver, and every one of the 50,000+ Union members who reside in the city of Vancouver and call our paradise by the sea home, are working their buns off volunteering for Kennedy Stewart, and the candidates endorsed by the Vancouver & District Labour Council (hey, we’re also a life long Union member and an anarcho-syndicalist, so the support of labour for political candidates of conscience, that’s just fine — more than fine, if we’re being truthful — by us, too).
And we’re pretty darn sure that folks associated with every one of the New Democratic Party Vancouver constituencies are working overtime volunteering — on their own time, on their own dime — for Kennedy Stewart (well, at least the ones that are not over-the-moon for Shauna Sylvester, among which number VanRamblings must count ourself) and all the VDLC-endorsed candidates for OneCity Vancouver, the Green Party of Vancouver and the Coalition of Progressive Electors, and a few of the Vision Vancouver candidates, too. It’s a party — a party of the socially conscious.
If the OneCity Vancouvermust-elect candidates, each one of whom VanRamblings is head-over-heels in love with — Brandon Yan and Christine Boyle for City Council, and Carrie Bercic, Erica Jaaf and and the downright spectacular Jennifer Reddy for School Board — can ride into office on Kennedy Stewart’s coattails, well that seems like a pretty darn good thing.
Just wait til Christine, Brandon, Erica, Carrie and Jennifer are all elected to office come the evening of Saturday, October 20th — you’ll become as smitten with each one of them as everyone who knows them has, and is.
Imagine. Being in love with the people you’ve elected.
Elect OneCity Vancouver’s Christine Boyle, Brandon Yan, Erica Jaaf, Carrie Bercic & Jennifer Reddy, and that’s exactly what’s gonna happen to you!
And, finally, for today’s VanRamblings post, first this … for the folks who are anxious to get to the advance polls to cast their progressively-minded Council ballot of conscience for the transcendently lovely Christine Boyle, Brandon Yan, Anne Roberts, Jean Swanson, Derrick O’Keefe, Pete Fry, Michael Wiebe, Adriane Carr, Catherine Evans and Heather Deal, and their School Board ballot of conscience for Erica Jaaf, Carrie Bercic, Jennifer Reddy, Erin Arnold, Aaron Leung, the extraordinary Allan Wong, Diana Day and Barb Parrot and Janet Fraser, and their all-important Park Board ballot of conscience for Stuart Mackinnon, Gwen Giesbrecht, John Irwin, Camil Dumont, Dave Demers, Shamin Shivji and Cameron Zubko …
And then this, where VanRamblings hopes to see you tonight (we’re going to try to remember to bring along our tripod, which’ll make for less shaky video … and yes, we’ll be the annoying guy “filming”) …
Earlier today, respected civic affairs reporter Frances Bula published a story in the Globe and Mail, writing that …
Facebook has shut down two accounts linked to Vancouver’s civic election, declaring the accounts violate its policies and that the company has placed a priority on preventing election interference.
Facebook took down one account that was promoting mayoral candidate Hector Bremner, under the name Vancouverites for Affordable Housing. Another account disparaging the Non-Partisan Association (NPA) candidate with the page name Vancouver Deserves Better Than Ken Sim was also taken down.
Here are just two of the unsavoury ads the groups have been running …
Later in the day, Press Progress published a story with the heading, “Elections BC is Investigating a Right-Wing Group Running Anonymous Ads Attacking Electoral Reform“, with the sub-headline “Why is an unregistered group with links to a right-wing Vancouver political party running ads attacking electoral reform?”
One would think that we’re living in Trump’s America when social media ads like the ones above — which have flooded Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and other social media feeds for the past week, before being taken down today — are considered necessary and par for the course by extremist right-wing groups bent on importing the Alex Jones and Rush Limbaugh style of ugly, untoward, fear-mongering, unsubstantiated and untrue style of take down ads that are the purview, in Canada, of Ezra Lavant’s Rebel Media Group.
Ms. Bula quotes NPA campaign strategist Mike Witherly, as follows …
“This is honestly just the nastiest election cycle ever. The party complained about both of the Facebook pages that were ultimately taken down. I think people are getting ideas as they see the investigation into Russian interference [in the American elections]. It’s giving people a sense of its effectiveness and prompting people to try it.
Press Progress takes the Facebook group, the Kitsilano-based right-wing group Wake Up Vancouver, run by Mary Lavin and Fiona Brodie, to task. Formerly called Concerned Kitsilano Residents, the two changed the name of their fearmongering group to Wake Up Vancouver in November 2016.
Meanwhile, as we’ve written previously, both the right and the left spent a good portion of the summer engaging in a vicious and unwarranted take down campaign of OneCity Vancouver City Council candidate, Brandon Yan, the latest salvo a civil claim that has been filed before the B.C. Supreme Court by anti-SOGI 123 activists and 2018 Coalition Vancouver School Board candidates, Ken Denike and Sophia Woo.
Perhaps, in aide of creating a fairer 2018 Vancouver civic election, those hate-mongering reactionaries on the right side of the political spectrum might consider adopting the humanist perspective of OneCity Vancouver Board member Anna Chudnovksy’s elementary school-age students …
