Tag Archives: kareem allam

#VanPoli | Mayoral Candidate Kareem Allam To Address Food Insecurity

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Each month, the Greater Vancouver Food Bank supports 15,000 families directly and another 20,000+ families through 119 community partner agencies (shelters / transition houses) in Vancouver, Burnaby, New Westminster, and the North Shore.

Separate organizations handle outer cities, such as the Friends in Need Food Bank serving Maple Ridge and Pitt Meadows, and local groups covering Surrey, Langley, and Richmond independently.

Food Banks BC reported that over 113,000 unique individuals utilize food banks across British Columbia in a single month, marking a sharp 44% surge compared to pre-pandemic levels.

  • Children: Make up roughly 25% to 31% of direct food bank clients in the region;
  • Seniors: Account for about 16% to 17% of individuals seeking food assistance;
  • Employment: Up to 30% of urban food bank clients in Vancouver report being currently employed, struggling with high housing and living costs.

Should they win power on October 17th, the Vancouver Liberals have committed to implementing a food security programme in the City of Vancouver.

This programme would address the issue of food insecurity for the thousands of families in need across Vancouver who make regular use of the Greater Vancouver Food Bank, a programme not unlike the food security programme currently being implemented by New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, and the University of British Columbia’s Community Food Hub Programme.

That is what today’s VanRamblings column is all about. Good on the Vancouver Liberals for addressing a critical need for so many families across our city.

Vancouver Liberals’ Mayoral candidate Kareem Allam sits down with Will Lich, founder of UBC’s Community Food Hub, to discuss food insecurity, and what might be done to address the issue

Vancouver Liberals’ candidate for Mayor, Kareem Allam, has developed a full-fledged plan to address food insecurity in the City of Vancouver.

Development of the Vancouver Liberals’ Food Insecurity Relief Plan would include implementation of a Community Food Hub with, over time, more than one such Food Hub Market to be located in neighbourhoods throughout Vancouver.

The development of Food Hub Markets across the city is but one facet, or feature, of the Vancouver Liberals’ Food Insecurity Relief Plan, about which VanRamblings will write at greater and in-depth length on another day.

At the University of British, the Community Food Hub is a campus-wide initiative designed to tackle student food insecurity through affordable groceries, educational workshops, and community-building.

The primary feature of the Community Food Hub is the UBC Food Hub Market, which operates out of the Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability building, located on the UBC campus.

The programme offers several key resources and initiatives:

  • The Food Hub Market: A low-cost, at-cost grocery store for the campus community;
  • Workshops & Outreach: Educational sessions on food literacy, nutrition, and hands-on food skills.;
  • Food Prescription Programme: A pilot programme running at the Gateway Health Building allowing healthcare providers to screen for food insecurity and prescribe personalized food support.;
  • The Acadia Food Hub: Located in the Acadia Park Residence, this location offers food and baby supply distribution for families on campus.

The Food Hub Market is a not-for-profit community space offering affordable grocery essentials while fostering community social connection.

The Market is dedicated to improving access to affordable and culturally diverse grocery staples that support food security and meet the everyday needs of those who make use of the facility within a welcoming and inclusive environment.

The Community Food Hub also provides hands-on food skills workshops, community events and educational outreach on food literacy and nutrition. These programmes promote food literacy and food skills, helping the community navigate available food security resources, and strengthen community connections.

The Vancouver Liberals’ Food Security Programme is woven into the party’s broader agenda on affordability, economic opportunity, neighbourhood services, and community well-being.

Food Security Through Affordability

In part, the Vancouver Liberals approach to the issue of food insecurity emerges as a consequence of the rising cost of living. Throughout the Vancouver Liberals’ platform, Vancouvers’s newest civic party argues that Vancouver City Hall must focus on restoring affordability so families have more disposable income available for necessities such as groceries.

Kareem Allam has repeatedly framed the Vancouver Liberals’ broader objective as creating “a city where young people are able to stay and raise a family,” arguing that municipal government should measure every policy against that standard.

Within that framework, food security becomes one key element of overall household affordability. If housing costs, transportation costs, and municipal taxes consume less of a family’s income, residents will be better able to afford nutritious food.

The Principal Tenets of the Vancouver Liberals Platform

  • 1. Lower the cost pressures on households 

    The Vancouver Liberals argue that controlling property tax increases and improving fiscal management will leave residents with more money available for everyday expenses, including groceries. They contend that City Hall should concentrate on efficient delivery of core services rather than expensive capital projects that do not directly improve residents’ quality of life;
  • 2. Build an economy that supports working families 

    Kareem Allam frequently links food affordability with employment. His speeches emphasize attracting better-paying jobs and ensuring young people can remain in Vancouver rather than being forced to leave because of living costs. In the party’s view, food security is strengthened when residents have stable employment and rising incomes;
  • 3. Strengthen neighbourhood infrastructure 

    The party proposes significant investment in community centres, parks, libraries, and other neighbourhood facilities. While these proposals are not described specifically as food security initiatives, such facilities often serve as locations for community kitchens, seniors’ meal programmes, food distribution initiatives, and neighbourhood support services;
  • 4. Improve frontline municipal services 

    The Vancouver Liberals propose hiring 400 additional frontline unionized employees to improve municipal services. Their argument is a better-functioning city creates healthier neighbourhoods and stronger communities capable of supporting vulnerable residents.

Vancouver Liberals’ Mayoral Candidate Kareem Allam’s Perspective

Kareem Allam consistently argues that municipal government should concern itself with whether ordinary families can successfully build their lives in Vancouver.

Kareem’s public messaging repeatedly returns to several themes:

  • Vancouver must once again become affordable for young families;
  • Municipal spending should prioritize essential public services;
  • Economic growth is necessary to sustain strong social programmes;
  • Public investment should focus on practical improvements rather than prestige projects.

Vancouver Liberals’ Council Candidate Jessica Walton’s Contribution

Jessica Walton brings perhaps the strongest personal connection to food affordability within the Vancouver Liberals.

Her candidate biography highlights several experiences directly related to food insecurity and rising living costs:

  • Working retail jobs from the age of 15 while helping support a family member living in poverty;
  • Experience in restaurants and service-sector employment;
  • Advocacy for a fair and livable wage;
  • Concern that rising food costs are forcing students and young people to leave British Columbia;
  • Frontline government work connecting residents with public services.

Jessica’s biography specifically identifies “rising food costs” as one of the major pressures facing younger generations. Rather than presenting food insecurity solely as a charitable issue, Jessica Walton frames it as part of a broader affordability crisis affecting students, workers, and young families.

Ms. Walton also emphasizes accessibility, inclusion, and ensuring government programmes are understandable and reachable by those who need them most. Her experience helping residents navigate government services informs her belief that municipal programmes should be practical and accessible.

Relationship With Existing City Policy

The Vancouver Liberals’ emerging approach differs from the City of Vancouver’s long-established food policy framework. Vancouver already operates a comprehensive food strategy supporting community food networks, urban agriculture, food access programs, and local food system planning.

The Vancouver Liberals have not proposed eliminating these initiatives.

Instead, their emphasis has been on improving affordability, strengthening neighbourhood infrastructure, and restoring confidence in municipal governance.

As the October 17th Vancouver Municipal Election Approaches

Kareem Allam presents food security as inseparable from creating a city where working families can afford to remain and prosper. Vancouver Liberals’ candidate for Vancouver City Council Jessica Walton reinforces that message from personal experience, speaking about poverty, rising grocery costs, fair wages, and the barriers confronting students and young families.

The Vancouver Liberals are dedicated to publishing  a definitive food security platform in the lead up to this autumn’s civic election campaign that will expand on the provision of specific municipal initiatives and measurable policy commitments.

#VanPoli | An Insight into the Top 3 Candidates Seeking the Mayor’s Office in Vancouver in 2026

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There are only three serious-minded candidates seeking to become Vancouver’s next Mayor in the 2026 Vancouver civic election: COPE’s Stephanie Allen, the Vancouver Liberals’ Kareem Allam, and the Green Party of Vancouver’s Pete Fry.

Today we’ll turn our focus to those three outstanding candidates for civic office.

First up, the true change candidate in 2026, COPE’s Stephanie Allen, who is running on a platform committed to re-establishing the Renters Office; increasing the Empty Homes Tax; set to follow the lead of Montréal’s municipal government in establishing a programme that would — with the aid of senior levels of government — purchase purpose-built rental apartment buildings across the city, converting these buildings into permanently affordable public housing and housing co-operatives; in an age of increasingly powerful storms, forest fires, heat domes, and other extreme weather events, develop and implement a climate defense strategy; work towards fully-funded and free-to-ride public transit for all, starting with the expansion of free public transit for youth under the age of 18; support the expansion of active transportation and Vancouver’s cycling infrastructure; establish a lobbyist registry; protect and empower the office of the Integrity Commissioner; prioritize citizen participation in decision-making at City Hall; expand and democratize the City’s Advisory Committees; make public access to City Council chambers easier; improve livestreams of City Council meetings; and, overall, improve and transform transparency of governance at Vancouver City Hall, because democracy matters.

Given her years of service to the people of British Columbia in her role as a well-respected, ‘can do / get ‘er done‘ Vice-President of BC Housing — committed to the construction of social and affordable housing across our province — a Mayor Stephanie Allen would hit the ground running on her first day in office, as she works with Council towards transforming civic governance by putting power back into the hands of those of us who call Vancouver home, and not the billionaire class all Mayors of Vancouver this century have dedicated their political lives to bringing to fruition, at your expense and amoral degradation.

Just wait till you see and hear Stephanie Allen at next month’s and October’s Mayoral debates, those must-attend civic forums set to take place in neighbourhoods across our city. We guarantee Stephanie Allen — that mesmerizing voice, a powerful and resonant voice that envelops you — will simply knock your socks off, as the candidate of change you have longed for at the head of Vancouver’s civic government, ready to serve you each and every day, to make your life easier, better and more fulfilling — because that’s what an elected Mayor and Vancouver City Council committed to change for the better can and will do for you.

Make sure you read the Vancouver Liberals’ platform of change that will enhance your quality of life

What is the change that the Vancouver Liberals’ candidate for Mayor, Kareem Allam, the peerless, achingly intelligent and capable beyond all human understanding candidate for Mayor of our fair city, and his first rate slate of Council and Park Board candidates — and soon to announce School Board candidate slate — are committing to you, should the Vancouver Liberals form government following election night, this upcoming autumn evening, Saturday October 17th.

Kareem Allam and the Vancouver Liberals are committed to extending the Millennium Line to UBC

In a century when very little of consequence has occurred in Vancouver — other than serving the avaricious interests of developers and their unwholesome, phallocentric commitment to building unlivable towers across our city while displacing residents from their affordable homes — finally, in Kareem Allam, we have a candidate for Vancouver Mayor whose sole interest is serving your interests, and the interests of your family, neighbours, friends and associates, your extended family, your co-workers and everyone, every single person you care about.

The Vancouver Liberals have committed to making $1.35 billion available through Vancouver’s well-funded capital budget — citizen approved monies that are readily available for construction purposes — in an investment over the next four years of a Vancouver Liberals-led civic administration that would renew the city’s aging parks and neighbourhood community recreation centres, reverse an unconscionable Park Board funding decline that began with the election of a Vision Vancouver civic administration in 2008 — monies that have never been restored to the Park Board budget — protect Vancouver’s elected, independent Park Board, build a new aquatics infrastructure, including a 50-metre Olympic size pool, as well as construct community pools in neighbourhoods across our city, and finally — after citizen capital expenditure approval at the polls in 2008, 2011, 2014, 2018 and 2022 — build the long-awaited, egregiously overdue Marpole Community Centre, which would be the first new community centre approved by a Vancouver civic administration in more than 20 years.

Having worked with the federal and provincial governments in senior policy implementation positions, as well as working in Metro Vancouver regional civic governments in a ‘can do’ administrative capacity, there is no individual seeking the Mayor’s office in 2026 who is more qualified, who better understands the intricacies of civic government decision-making and implementation strategy than the achingly bright and monumentally well-qualified Kareem Allam.

When Kareem Allam tells you he’s going to get something done you’ve been longing to see done at the municipal governance level, you can take it to the bank Kareem Allam is 100% guaranteed going to deliver for you, to get that project completed on time and under budget, for all the citizens of Vancouver.

A Kareem Allam-led Vancouver City Council will: restore public library hours; keeps annual property tax increases to 3.8%, or less — rather than the 26% property tax increase implemented by Ken Sim and ABC Vancouver over the past four years; ban foreign travel for Councillors and staff; focus on accountability, affordability, public safety, by delivering results people can actually see in their communities; promote transparency at City Hall by reducing the cost of Freedom of Information requests; put a referendum before the people of Vancouver at the next civic election, asking us if we want neighbourhood representation (sometimes called a ‘ward system’) at City Hall — as is the case with every village, town and city in every province and territory outside of British Columbia.

Remove all parking meters in front of beaches and community centres throughout the city; crack down on Bitcoin ATMs that are commonly linked to money laundering, fraud, organized crime, and drug trafficking; support proper staffing, long-term funding, and transparent deployment planning to ensure firefighters have the resources they need to keep Vancouver safe; work to ensure the Millennium line extension to UBC begins construction next year; protect local businesses during transit expansion by reducing property taxes by 50% during construction; deliver an effective food security programme in Vancouver (which VanRamblings will write about next Monday); and, reduce taxes on medical clinics.

On Day One, a Vancouver Liberals’ administration commits to reversing Ken Sim’s cruel ban on supportive housing to ensure our most-vulnerable citizens receive the supports they need to live a safe, secure and fulfilling life; tackle Vancouver’s rat problem, because rats are a major reason for the spread of disease and are a public health risk to citizens; introduce a tree canopy strategy in every neighbourhood across our city that is not treed, where our city’s west side is treed, and our east side neighbourhoods are not.

Bring back our city’s once thriving Festivals scene by legislating affordable policing for all community events; stop Ken Sim’s cynical plan to sell off our parks; protect Vancouver’s industrial land to keep jobs in Vancouver; create North America’s first Artist Land Reserve; modernize zoning and business rules to support small businesses, and the next generation of Vancouver’s economy, building a city where innovation is encouraged, not regulated out of existence.

Maybe this whole hopey changey thing that both COPE’s Stephanie Allen and the Vancouver Liberals’ Kareem Allam are promising is just a bit too much.

Maybe, the people of Vancouver don’t want a woman as Mayor — uh, yeah, we do! — or, maybe, the people of Vancouver don’t want some random Muslim-appearing guy, no matter how qualified he seems to be, as our city’s next Mayor.

Again, uh, yeah, we do!

Maybe we just want another white-appearing guy sitting in the Mayor’s chair.

After all, Vancouver has had 41 Mayors since it’s founding, and only one of those Mayors — and man, oh man did the first non-white guy to be elected Mayor of our city prove to be a bust (yeah, we’re talkin’ about you, Ken Sim) for those of us who give a good gall darn about our city.

What a walking disaster this Sim guy turned out to be.

Maybe Vancouver voters want to play it safe, maybe we don’t want change, maybe we have no interest in getting things done, maybe we could give a good gall darn about the state of our parks and recreation system, and we don’t care at all about the unhoused — yeah, that’s the ticket (not!) … like, get a job, will ya — maybe we simply want another kind of good lookin’ white-appearing guy.

How bad could it be, really?

No question: Pete Fry has name recognition. Eight years on Council, on the evening news almost every night, a good-spirited guy.

Look at the reassuring picture of the smiling Green guy in the photo above. Like, who wouldn’t want to cast their ballot for this warm-hearted guy?

Plug-in solar panels on your balcony to offset your electricity bills and power the myriad electrical devices in your home. Licensing mini electric shuttles in the downtown area. Bring back the Renter’s Office. Restore lifeguards at key Vancouver beaches. Hire a city comptroller to ensure transparent budget efficiency, and asset management. Enact a landlord licensing by-law to flush out bad landlords.

Restore essential postal services in Chinatown. Amend the Vancouver Charter to allow 16- and 17-year-olds to vote in municipal elections. Protect the Champlain Heights forest trail network. Bring back the Stanley Park bike lane. Strengthen Vancouver’s code of conduct legislation to restore public trust in decision-making at Vancouver City Hall. Phase out in-sink garbage disposals. Build more public washrooms across the city. Build a Japanese Canadian interpretive centre at Hastings Park. Re-introduce a Vancouver by-law that would forbid the use of methane gas to heat new buildings. A lobbyist registry. Climate action.

The decision is yours to make.

Come early October when Vancouver’s municipal election advance polls open, or during the course of Election Day on Saturday, October 17th, cast your ballot for the Mayoral candidate — and a few of the folks s/he is running with — who you believe represents your best interests, who will build the city in which you want to raise your children, make a living for yourself and your friends and neighbours, and when the time comes, retire in, to live out your life in peace.

Take back your power! Your vote is critical to building the city you love!

#VanPoli | Lakewood Terrace Housing Co-op 2026 Mayoral Debate

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L-R, 2026 Vancouver Mayoral candidates: Colleen Hardwick, TEAM for a Livable Vancouver; Rebecca Bligh, Vote Vancouver; William Azaroff, OneCity Vancouver; Stephanie Allen (standing), The Coalition of Vancouver Electors (COPE); Kareem Allam, Vancouver Liberals; Pete Fry, Green Party of Vancouver.

On Saturday, July 25th, Lakewood Terrace Housing Co-op held a Mayoral Debate.

The main issue before those gathered in the Co-op’s Common Room: housing.

An overflow crowd of Vancouverites attended the July 25 Mayoral debate at Lakewood Co-op

The first speaker of the afternoon was Colleen Hardwick, representing TEAM for a Livable Vancouver, under whose banner she was unanimously endorsed as the party’s standard bearer.


Colleen Hardwick, TEAM for a Livable Vancouver

As per usual, Ms. Hardwick was heartbreakingly articulate in her presentation, with a solid command of the housing issue — a critical tenet of TEAM’s platform document and, in reality, the raison d’être of the civic party — as Ms. Hardwick argued housing co-ops represent the best answer to the provision of affordable housing in Vancouver, and across the vast land we call Canada.

Sadly, as articulate as Ms. Hardwick is on a myriad of civic issues, as we have written previously, she is an imperfect messenger for TEAM’s various policy proposals. There is about Ms. Hardwick a meanness of character, a distinct lack of joy, or as a friend said recently “an offputting sharpness that would make it difficult, if not impossible for me to cast my ballot for her as our city’s next Mayor.”

Ms. Hardwick comes into the campaign with “baggage” — not the least of the concerns expressed by many her lack of a general appreciation of the “trans issue” — which translates into a utter lack of respect (never mind support) for the too often marginalized members of the trans community, that while a central tenet of the platform of right-of-centre B.C. Conservative Party leader Kerry-Lynne Findlay, hardly seems resonant with the views of the majority population of Vancouverites who will go to the polls this October.

Transphobia. The bane of TEAM for a Livable Vancouver Mayoral candidate Colleen Hardwick’s existence, an issue likely to dog her second Mayoral bid.


Adrienne Smith, transgender human rights activist

The following is a quote by Adrienne Smith, a prominent Vancouver-based transgender human rights activist, social justice lawyer, and litigation director at the Catherine White Holman Wellness Clinic.

“The chair of the City’s own LGBTQ advisory committee was asked in open Council by Councillor Hardwick, after their submission, what their sex assignment was at birth. This is an incredibly invasive, inappropriate question. I’m going to give Councillor. Hardwick the benefit of the doubt that she learned something, but I’m still angry about that specific question.”

“Certainly, she’s had time to familiarize herself with some of the elements of contemporary transphobia and focusing on people’s sex assignment. Asking the Chair of the LGBTQ advisory committee about their surgical status, interrogating whether their gender identity is valid, is a central feature of transphobia.”


Andrea Reimer, former Vancouver City Councillor

Anti-reconciliation acknowledgment commentary by Colleen Hardwick.

Andrea Reimer, who sat on Council from 2008 to 2018 with Vision Vancouver, tweeted that her heart hurts and her head is angry over Councillor Colleen Hardwick’s vote against receiving a City report written by Katelyn Crabtree, the City’s Manager of Indigenous relations, and a specialist in Indigenous law.

“In 9 years of purposeful work in reconciliation, we achieved 100% unanimous votes on every single item brought forward,” Reimer says. “There was a lot of tough work — all of it involved land and money, because that’s what colonialism is all about.”

Councillor Hardwick also voted against City Manager Sadhu Johnston’s recommendation that Council direct staff to include in its Reconciliation Report an analysis of the status of  Vancouver’s reconciliation commitments — as well as recommendations for building on these commitments, as Ms. Hardwick openly questioned whether it is appropriate for the local level of government to “spend taxpayers’ money on reconciliation,” or if the issue  is the responsibility of senior levels of government. Ms. Hardwick also expressed her opposition to Council opening their meetings with a reconciliation acknowledgement, as recommended by Murray Sinclair, the author of the 2015 Truth and Reconciliation Report.

Rebecca Bligh, Vote Vancouver, and William Azaroff, OneCity Vancouver

   
Vote Vancouver’s Rebecca Bligh; and OneCity Vancouver’s Mayoral candidate William Azaroff

We are combining both Vote Vancouver  Mayoral candidate and sitting Vancouver City Councillor Rebecca Bligh, and OneCity Vancouver Mayoral candidate William Azaroff together given their polling numbers, at present, are in the basement, and the likelihood that either Mayoral candidate ascending to the Mayor’s office would seem remote, at best.

Rebecca Bligh. We are befuddled that the two term Vancouver City Councillor — and recent President of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, which represents the interests of Canadian cities vis-a-vis the federal government — is polling at a mere 0.5%. Wrenchingly articulate on the issue of housing during the course of the debate at the Lakewood Terrace Housing Co-operative Mayoral forum held on the afternoon of Saturday, July 25th, there was no Mayoral candidate addressing those gathered who argued as articulately and well for the construction of housing co-ops on City-owned / Crown land on a 99-year leasehold basis that afternoon than Councillor Bligh.

“To provide safety and truly affordable homes for struggling families who reside across all 23 of the neighbourhoods that comprise the city we all love.”

Yet, Councillor Bligh finds herself mired at dead last in support by those polled by the Pallas Data polling company. We’re confused.


Click on the link for further insight into the Pallas Data civic poll conducted on July 30, 2026

Subsequent to the meeting, as Councillor Pete Fry and VanRamblings were walking towards East Broadway and Commercial Drive, Councillor Fry wondered aloud as to why Councillor Bligh had come forward to seek the Mayor’s Chair, when from all reports she is polling terribly, and the chance that she might be Vancouver’s next Mayor would seem, at best, remote if not an impossibility, the two of us agreeing that in putting her name forward as a Mayoral candidate, Ms. Bligh was simply “bowing out of politics with grace.”

William Azaroff. OneCity Vancouver’s Mayoral candidate, endorsed by the Vancouver & District Labour Council, given his fiscal history working for the Vancity Credit Union, and since 2019, the CEO of Brightside Homes, a non-profit which builds affordable housing, Mr. Azaroff would seem to be a first-rate candidate for Vancouver Mayor. Not so, according to the Pallas Data polling company, and certainly not so if the response he received from those gathered for the forum on that Saturday afternoon is any indication.

Mr. Azaroff was hardly afforded an opportunity to speak, as each time he opened his mouth, he was heckled by one or another member of the audience, who questioned him as to why Brightside Homes so readily evicted their tenants on the thinnest possible evidence, and why Brightside — given so many of the tenants are vulnerable seniors — made it near impossible for residents to install air conditioners to mitigate the effects of Vancouver’s hot weather.

On a side note, if there is one candidate running for Mayor in 2026 that a surfeit of members of COPE, the Coalition of Progressive Electors are vehemently opposed, it would be the poor, woebegone Mr. Azaroff.

Polling at 2.3% — yep, seems just about right.

COPE, the Coalition of Progressive Elector’s Mayoral candidate Stephanie Allen (standing)

Quite simply, Stephanie Allen (standing, addressing the audience) walked away with the debate on that somewhat chilly, overcast Saturday afternoon, by far the most dynamic and engaging speaker of the afternoon, a charismatic presence at the front of the room, and the long sought saviour of COPE — the too often confused Coalition of Progressive Electors  …

A personal aside: Just what the hell is COPE Councillor Sean Orr doing when he floats the idea of bringing back the Villages Plan in the next term of Council … whose side is he on, anyway? … developers, or the community who spoke up so vehemently against the developer-initiated Villages Plan designed to enrich themselves at the expense of those of us who live in one of the 14 Vancouver neighbourhoods designated as “density friendly”, Councillor Orr seemingly ignoring the wishes of the hundreds of folks, the Vancouver residents who turned up to address Council on why the Villages Plan constituted non-consultative, top down, autocratic city planning, that utterly failed to take into consideration the wishes of the residents who have long called these neighbourhoods home, where we raise our families …

We don’t mean to be unduly harsh in our criticism of COPE Councillor Sean Orr, who has stepped up to the plate, put in the hours, making himself available to the public in every neighbourhood across our city after being elected as the top candidate voters cast a ballot for in the April 5, 2025 by-election, securing 34,448 votes, the highest among all the candidates running for Vancouver City Council.

Not to mention, the utter ugliness of the allegation made by Mayor Ken Sim about Councillor Orr, that Mr. Orr had distributed illegal drugs on the DTES over the December 2025 holiday season, an utterly specious and unfounded allegation, given that in reality Councillor Orr was visiting friends and family on the Sunshine Coast when he, according to Mayor Sim, allegedly was distributing drugs. Having spoken with Councillor Orr about the matter, we are quite aware that Sean was emotionally devastated by the allegation made by Mayor Sim, that sought to damage Mr. Orr’s hard earned reputation for integrity.

All said, thank goodness that COPE Mayoral candidate Stephanie Allen is the most knowledgeable Mayoral candidate on the issue of affordable housing, given her past role as the respected Vice President of BC Housing, who brings herself forward as the democratic socialist candidate in the 2026 Vancouver civic election, with a strong a commitment to the democratic participation of Vancouver residents on the issues that dominate their lives, and her long held belief that democratic socialism is the only true cure for the ills that impact the alienated and disenfranchised majority population of Vancouver, who for so long have been locked out of decision-making at Vancouver City Hall, as one autocratic civic administration after another assumed power at City Hall.

Make no mistake, a Stephanie Allen-led City — ably aided by Shawn Vulliez, who we expect would be her outstanding Chief of Staff — is committed to the democratic participation of the residents of Vancouver on the decisions taken at Vancouver City Hall that impact their lives, no autocrat she, but rather a democrat, and a democratic socialist of the first order.


Kareem Allam, Vancouver Liberals Mayoral candidate

Kareem Allam, Vancouver Liberals.

In a word, tepid.

One of the worst presentations by a candidate for office that we’ve witnessed over the course of our lifetime. When members of the audience repeatedly demanded that Mr. Allam “speak up, we can’t hear you,” you know there’s trouble in his candidacy for Mayor that must be addressed before the current Vancouver municipal election truly gets underway next month.

The above said, although to some extent for us “the bloom is off the rose” in respect of Mr. Allam’s Mayoral candidacy, our continuing and heartfelt belief that Kareem Allam would make the best Mayor of Vancouver the residents of our city would experience in a generation, as the only action-oriented candidate for Mayor who has a plan of action for change that will transform civic governance which truly represents the interests of all of us who call Vancouver home, both Kareem Allam and Stephanie Allen have our full-throated support as the two of them fight tooth and nail to become Vancouver’s next Mayor.

Mr. Allam has to recognize he’s the candidate, not a behind-the-scenes campaign manager, who must up his game if he is to become Vancouver Mayor.

At one point in the afternoon, Kareem mentioned — in passing, while addressing those gathered at the Lakewood Terrace Co-op — that he was the only Mayoral candidate who “grew up living in a housing co-operative”, after which he let his statement lie dormant, seemingly without meaning, as he addressed a crowd consisting mostly of housing co-op members !!! … before moving on to discuss his, for this crowd anyway, his utterly irrelevant personal family history, rather than waxing poetic on the salutary role living in a housing co-op afforded him, the sense of community imbued living in a housing co-operative, where opportunity was afforded him that might not otherwise be available to an immigrant family attempting to make a new life for themselves in Metro Vancouver.


Councillor Pete Fry, Green Party of Vancouver

Pete Fry is the status quo candidate, the avuncular and well-regarded opposition to the corrupt ABC Vancouver civic administration that has ruled Vancouver for the past four interminable years, under the unsteady thumb of an often too absent Mayor Ken Sim.

Were Pete to become Mayor — mark my words, we’d soon be referring to him as Mayor Pete — there is little doubt he’d bring back the Renter’s Office, and in time would re-instate the Livable Wage Programme at Vancouver City Hall that the Sim administration jettisoned early in their term of office.

Mayor Pete wouldn’t look to get much done, rather he’d be a caretaker — a sane and caring caretaker, unlike the current incumbent — of the Mayor’s office. An upside? A Mayor Pete would be much more available to the public than any Mayor in Vancouver’s recent history, a kind of Mayoral energizer bunny, who would be everywhere in the public weal throughout the entirety of his term in office.

VanRamblings harbours a concern that Emily Lowan, the current democratic socialist leader of the Green Party of British Columbia — who has endorsed Stephanie Smith for Council, the accomplished and sophisticated ‘woman of the people’ who is running under the Green banner for the second time (we’ll be endorsing Stephanie, whose voice and presence we need on Council) — would not endorse Pete Fry in a month of Sundays.

Maybe that’s what the citizens of Vancouver want: someone they know, someone they trust who won’t upset the apple cart, but dedicate himself to taking care of the basics (garbage pick up, recycling, road  maintenance. etc.) while keeping taxes down.

Although, we’re not so sure.

Research Co. and Angus Reid have recently published polling asking  Vancouver voters what they want. The answer according to 56% of those polled: change, significant and even radical change, not the status quo.

Change is in the air.

Pete Fry, for all that he’s a good guy would not in any way, shape or form be the Mayoral candidate of change for whom a majority of Vancouver voters would seem to wish to cast their ballot as the next leader of our beloved city, come this early autumn October. Or, so it would seem this early in the 2026 campaign for Vancouver municipal office.

On Thursday, VanRamblings’ intends to publish a thoughtful, reflective column on what the three serious-minded candidates to become Vancouver’s next Mayor — that would be COPE’s Stephanie Allen, the Vancouver Liberals’ Kareem Allam, and the Green Party of Vancouver’s Pete Fry — would mean for those of us who live in Vancouver, and call our respective neighbourhoods and our city, home.

 

Mayoral Candidate Kareem Allam’s Bid to Rebuild Vancouver’s Social Fabric

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Kareem Allam, 47, Vancouver Liberals’ Mayoral candidate  | Photo credit: Katie Hyslop, The Tyee

For over two decades, Kareem Allam has been the man behind the curtain in Canadian politics.

Kareem is a self-described “policy nerd” and a master campaign strategist who has navigated the highest corridors of municipal, provincial, and federal power.

Yet, for all his time spent steering others to victory, in 2026 Kareem Allam has stepped out from the shadows of backroom strategy to mount his own campaign.

As the founder, leader, and Mayoral candidate for the newly formed municipal party, the Vancouver Liberals, Kareem Allam is running a well-funded, high-stakes campaign to unseat Mayor Ken Sim, in the October 2026 civic election.

Kareem Allam’s transition from kingmaker to candidate marks a massive shift in Vancouver’s civic landscape.

In 2022, Kareem Allam was the mastermind who successfully guided Ken Sim and the ABC Vancouver party to a historic sweep of City Hall, the Park Board, and the School Board. After steering ABC Vancouver to a sweeping majority at all three levels of civic government, he served briefly as Mayor Sim’s Chief of Staff before a highly publicized falling-out led to his departure in February 2023.

@jessforvancouverWe are still in a housing crisis – but we have a real solution to get Vancouver out of crisis mode. #vanpoli @vancouverliberals♬ original sound – jessforvancouver


Now, disillusioned by what he views as a broken social contract and a deeply divided city, Kareem Allam has built a political vehicle of his own.

With a platform focused on a massive infrastructure injection, an aggressive front line service plan, and a return to consensus-driven, big-tent governance, Kareem Allam aims to execute an activist civic agenda not seen since the 1970s.

Upbringing, Roots, and the Great Canadian Social Contract

To understand Kareem Allam’s political philosophy, one must look to his family history, which he frequently cites as the bedrock of his world view.

Born in Vancouver and raised in Richmond, Kareem is the son of an Egyptian colonel — who spent 11 months as an Israeli prisoner of war — and a Sudanese mother whose family was expropriated during a revolution. His mother spent two grueling years living in a refugee camp in Lebanon before arriving in Canada.

Though his father, Mahmoud Allam, would eventually return to Egypt to manage the Al Ahly football club, the family’s formative years in the Lower Mainland left an indelible mark on Kareem.

Speaking with reporter Katie Hyslop for an extensive feature profile in The Tyee, Kareem Allam reflected on how Vancouver served as a safe harbour where his family could heal, plant roots, and ultimately thrive:

“My family history defines a lot of how I perceive this place… [Vancouver] was a welcoming place, a place of refuge and a place where they were able to thrive, raise their children. It wasn’t always prosperous. But over the arc of time, the family has done well.”

This personal history forged Allam’s deep belief in what he terms the “great Canadian social contract” — the idea that a booming economy must directly fund world-class social programming, and that each generation bears a strict responsibility to build winning conditions for the next.

Kareem Allam’s formal education took him away from the West Coast for high school and graduate studies, including a stint in Ottawa where he cut his political teeth working on Parliament Hill for the federal Canadian Alliance party.

But the pull of Vancouver was permanent.

Outside of politics, his career spanned public, private, and non-profit sectors. He served as the Director of Public Policy for the Vancouver Board of Trade, sat on the Fraser Health Authority’s Board of Directors, worked with major energy corporations like TransCanada and FortisBC, and served on the TransLink screening panel and the College of Massage Therapists of B.C.

Professionally, his primary focus for the last two decades has been as a partner at Richardson Strategy Group (formerly Richardson Strategies), working closely alongside prominent Indigenous leaders like Haida nation leader Miles Richardson on complex title, rights, and economic development negotiations.

The Campaign Veteran: 40 Races and the Road to Kingmaker

Before launching his own mayoral bid, Kareem Allam compiled a legendary résumé as a political strategist, managing or advising on roughly 40 political campaigns across the ideological spectrum.


Kareem specializes in taking complex policy ideas and distilling them into simple, powerful promises that resonate with everyday voters.

His track record as a backroom general is elite:

  • The 2005 Surrey Municipal Race: He helped guide Dianne Watts to an upset victory as Mayor of Surrey, reshaping the politics of BC’s fastest-growing city;
  • Federal Conservative Leadership (2020): Kareem Allam played a critical role in successfully securing the federal Conservative Party leadership for Erin O’Toole, navigating a complex, multi-ballot ranked voting system.;
  • Provincial BC Liberal Leadership (2022): He served as the campaign manager who secured the leadership of the provincial Liberal party (later renamed BC United) for Kevin Falcon;
  • ABC Vancouver Municipal Sweep (2022): In his most (in)famous local victory, Mr. Allam masterminded Ken Sim’s mayoral campaign. He engineered the easily digestible pledge to hire “100 police officers and 100 nurses,” a message that fundamentally shifted public safety discourse and handed ABC a total majority.

However, Kareem Allam’s political alignment experienced a dramatic shift.

In the 2024 British Columbia provincial election, the lifelong conservative strategist publicly broke ranks to endorse and re-organize and energize the BC NDP campaign — steering the party and their moribund campaign for re-election, from an almost certain defeat to majority status — stating to The Tyee’s Katie Hyslop that the modern center-right movement had abandoned its traditional values of climate action, reconciliation, and social cohesion, veering instead toward populism.

“I’m not sure that I left the center-right movement,” Kareem Allam observed. “I think the center-right movement left me.”

The Vancouver Liberals and the Fight for a Council Majority

The Vancouver Liberal Electors Association — commonly known as the Vancouver Liberals  — was officially founded on July 3, 2025. The Vancouver Liberals are a strictly municipal political party, entirely independent of both the federal Liberal Party of Canada and the former provincial B.C. Liberals.

Kareem Allam’s strategy for the 2026 election hinges on building a true coalition party that rejects extreme polarization. He has intentionally recruited high-profile candidates from across the political spectrum to build a team capable of seizing a majority on the 11-member Vancouver City Council.

Vancouver Liberals 2026 Civic Team (Key Figures)

├── Mayoral Candidate: Kareem Allam

City Council Candidates:

Dr. Moira Stilwell, a Vancouver Liberals Council candidate, one of VanRamblings two favourites in 2026

│ ├── Dr. Moira Stilwell (Physician; former B.C. provincial cabinet minister)
│ ├── Jessica Walton (Front line government worker, socialist, NDP stalwart)
│ ├── Michael Wu (30-year entrepreneur & former RCMP Auxiliary Constable)
│ ├── Devin Clemens (UBC Graduate Programs Manager, School of Economics)
│ └── Armor Valor (South Vancouver community advocate, front line worker)
│ ├── Victoria Jung (current Vancouver School Board Chair)

└── Park Board Candidates:

Shayla Bird, Vancouver Liberals candidate for Vancouver Park Board

├── Brennan Bastyovanszky (Sitting Park Board Commissioner)
├── Scott Jensen (Sitting Park Board Commissioner; first Indigenous Chair)
├── Mark Halyk (transformed Park Boards concession services for the better)
└── Shayla Bird (Educator, consultant, Black public Historian)

By bringing over sitting heavyweights like Victoria Jung, Scott Jensen, and Brennan Bastyovanszky — who actively opposed Ken Sim’s efforts to dismantle the democratically elected Park Board — Kareem Allam has positioned the Vancouver Liberals as protectors of civic democracy and neighbourhood infrastructure.

The Mayoral Platform: From Infrastructure to Pest Control

Kareem Allam’s platform represents a highly activist approach to municipal government. Rather than scaling back, Kareem proposes using the city’s financial levers to aggressively address long-ignored public deficits.

Service to the People of Vancouver: Rebuilding Civic Infrastructure

The centre-left anchor of Kareem Allam’s platform is a monumental $1.35 billion capital fund commitment aimed at thoroughly renovating 11 Vancouver community centres.

These facilities were explicitly flagged by City Auditor General Mike McDonnell as being in an advanced state of disrepair. Kareem Allam argues that by neglecting neighbourhood pools, libraries, and community hubs, the current administration is eroding the literal spaces where social cohesion is formed.

As part of this infrastructure push, Kareem Allam has rejected “half-measures,” pledging to build brand-new hockey rinks and aquatic facilities — headlined by a premium 50-meter Olympic-standard swimming pool designed to train future Canadian athletes, rather than standard 25-meter alternatives.

Ridding Vancouver of Rats That Are Infecting Every Neighbourhood

On the public works front, Kareem Allam has targeted a quality-of-life crisis that many politicians avoid: the city’s exploding rodent population.

With regional data frequently placing Vancouver among the most rat-infested cities in Canada, Kareem Allam has made a firm mayoral commitment to implement coordinated, science-based eradication strategies across all city neighborhoods, treating pest control as a core public health responsibility of City Hall.

Core Policy Positions: Decentralization, Compassion, and Anti-Laundering

Kareem Allam has carved out distinct, highly detailed policy positions on the most polarizing crises facing Vancouver today:

Homelessness and the Downtown Eastside (DTES)

Kareem Allam has been a vocal critic of the encampment clearances on East Hastings Street executed by the current administration.

In an interview with CBC, Kareem Allam publicly apologized for his own past role as Chief of Staff during the early stages of those policy discussions, noting that the final execution violated a fundamental commitment to not decamp vulnerable residents without providing adequate, permanent housing.

 

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A post shared by Kareem Allam (@kareemformayor)

Kareem Allam argues that forced decampments simply push the crisis into surrounding neighborhoods and sever the vital connections between unhoused individuals and healthcare workers. His strategy shifts away from displacement, focusing instead on collaborating with non-profits and utilizing surplus city land to build supportive housing networks.

Mr. Allam’s deep ties to the front lines are underscored by his volunteer work on the Board of the Overdose Prevention Society (OPS) in the Downtown Eastside.

Countering Our City’s Food Security Crisis | Kareem’s Civic Food Strategy

To counter the food security crisis, Kareem Allam has proposed a municipal food strategy modeled directly after the UBC Food Hub.

Rather than using taxpayer funds to purchase commercial grocery stores, Kareem Allam’s plan involves donating unused city buildings and surplus municipal land to non-profit organizations to distribute low-cost, high-quality groceries directly into underserved communities.

Crypto, Bitcoin, and Money Laundering

Kareem Allam has positioned the Vancouver Liberals firmly against alternative financial systems that complicate public safety.

Labeling money laundering as the financial engine of international drug cartels operating out of luxury downtown penthouses, Kareem Allam’s platform includes an outright ban on Bitcoin ATMs across Vancouver.

His policy pledges to gradually eliminate unchecked private currency exchanges and actively replace predatory payday loan shops with trusted, community-focused institutions like Pigeon Park Savings.

Furthermore, Kareem Allam has explicitly mocked what he terms “ridiculous, tech-bro ideas” championed by political opponents, such as attempting to heat public swimming pools using commercial Bitcoin servers, arguing that public spaces must remain focused entirely on community utility.

Prose Poetry: A Fit for Activist Office | The Architect of Change

To look upon Kareem Allam is to see a man forged in the crucible of institutional statecraft, an operative whose life has been an extended masterclass in the levers, gears, and quiet pulleys of Canadian governance.

Kareem Allam does not approach City Hall as a starry-eyed idealist or a corporate outsider fluent only in the language of balance sheets; he arrives as an architect who knows exactly where the foundational pillars are buried.

His decades spent navigating the fierce currents of federal ministries, provincial cabinets, and complex Indigenous title negotiations have granted him a rare, battle-tested wisdom. He understands a city is not a business to be managed down to the lowest dividend, but a profound, living trust that must be fiercely protected.

Should Kareem Allam emerge as Mayor on the evening of October 17th, Vancouver will witness its most radical, activist executive since Art Phillips and the TEAM movement revolutionized local politics in the 1970s.

Like Art Phillips — who created the south False Creek neighbourhood of co-operative and social housing, watefront parks and pedestrian pathways; introduced neighbourhood planning and advisory committees, public consultation, and community involvement in major planning decisions; protected parks and public waterfronts; restructured municipal governance by making elected officials — not unelected administrators—the primary drivers of policy, Kareem Allam possesses the rare, panoramic vision required to build a grand coalition from a fractured electorate, drawing voices from the left, the right, and the forgotten centre into a unified civic project.

Kareem Allam is the only Mayoral candidate in the current Vancouver civic election, who recognizes that true strength lies not in top-down edicts or institutional closures, but in rebuilding the public squares — the community centres, the Olympic pools, the local libraries — where citizens of every race, age, and economic station cross paths and recognize their shared humanity.

Kareem Allam stands uniquely equipped to wield the power of City Hall as an instrument of profound social repair.

Kareem Allam is a leader who wakes up hungry for the complex, grinding work of structural reform, ready to deploy a billion-dollar capital fund with the precise, sweeping ambition of a true city-builder.

In an era defined by division and retreat, Kareem Allam’s Mayoral bid represents an audacious return to bold, interventionist municipal leadership — a promise to restore the fracturing social contract and ensure that Vancouver remains, above all else, a sanctuary where future generations can truly belong.

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