Tag Archives: #vanelxn

#VanElxn2022 | Andrew Johns’ Coastal Front Election Pundit Panel

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Above, a pundit panel gathered by Coastal Front’s Andrew Johns, featuring …

  • The eminence gris / the doyenne of Vancouver civic affairs reporting, Frances Bula — who has covered the civic scene dating back to 1994, first for the Vancouver Sun (where she worked for 20 years), and since then for The Globe and Mail,  as a “stringer”. For awhile now, Ms. Bula has written for Vancouver Magazine, where she is a featured columnist. In addition, Frances Bula is a past Chair of the Journalism Department at Langara College, where she continues to teach, and is also an adjunct professor in the School of Journalism at the University of British Columbia. Phew, we know — where does she get all that energy, and just how many hours are there in a day that affords Ms. Bula the opportunity to be such a productive citizen, and invaluable member of our community? Fortunately (or is that, unfortunately) the no-nothings, the disrespectfuls, the “basket of deplorables” in our community gain much pleasure in their meaningless lives by deriding the incredibly humane Ms. Bula online, and sometimes in her appearances on panels, unlike the one above.
  • Then there’s the first of the two good guys: multi-term Non-Partisan Association (NPA) — when Vancouver’s oldest municipal party was a functioning civic party, a party mostly beloved by Vancouver citizens — Vancouver City Councillor, George Affleck. At one time an on-air host with the CBC and, for many years the CEO of Curve Communications, a successful full service digital marketing agency, Mr. Affleck is the president and CEO of the agency. Politics: between 2011 & 2018, Mr. Affleck served as a Councillor at Vancouver City Hall. Yes, we’re talking accomplished. Did we mention that he’s a bright guy, a kind guy, an engaging guy, and a politically adept fellow, possessed of a wry sense of humour? Well, he is, as well as many more good things.
  • That handsome, erudite fellow of good cheer, and much élan — by far the hardest working, best researched and most humanely engaging “podcaster” in British Columbia — we have the multi-talented and engaging Mo Amir. Possessed of a Bachelor of Business Administration, and a Master of Arts in Political Science from Simon Fraser University, Mr. Amir launched the This is VANCOLOUR podcast in 2018, as an exploration of culture and politics in Vancouver and B.C. — and what a massive hit this ‘must listen to’ (and now, must-watch on CHEK-TV) podcast has become.

You couldn’t ask for a better informed, more engaging, more erudite and — when you get right down to it — more non-partisan panel of civic election pundits than the accomplished Frances “don’t try to put one over on me” Bula, George “hey, let’s get real … you can’t be serious” Affleck, and Mo “I may appear affable, but I’m not going to let you get away with a darned thing” Amir. So, that’s what we’re presenting for your edification today — where the 2022 Vancouver civic election campaign is at, how the Mayoral candidates and the civic parties they’re running with are faring, and predictions as to how this whole meshuggeneh election will turn out!

#VanElxn2022 | Mayoral All-Candidates Forum | False Creek at Creekside

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False Creek Residents Association Vancouver Mayoral All-Candidates forum, held on Wednesday, September 21st, 2022 at the Creekside Community Centre, located in the heart of the Olympic Village

On Wednesday evening, the False Creek Residents Association — you know, one of those residents associations Vancouver City Councillor Christine Boyle insistently derides as an “extra legal” form of government, that by their very existence challenges the elected officials who sit within Vancouver City Hall’s Council chambers — held a Mayoral all-candidates forum, where the turnout was tremendous and, as you will see, those present, and now you, can learn about: Non-Partisan Association (NPA) Mayoral candidate Fred Harding, TEAM … for a Livable Vancouver’s Colleen Hardwick, Progress Vancouver‘s Mark Marissen, and ABC’s (A Better City) Ken Sim.

Judge for yourself while watching the 21-minute video above, but from VanRamblings’ perspective, we thought all of the Mayoral candidates presented well, as passionate and informed advocates for the citizens of Vancouver.

For us, ABC Mayoral candidate Ken Sim proved somewhat of a surprise — thus far, Mr. Sim has missed all but one Mayoral forum — as he appeared self-assured and self-confident, familiar with and convincing on the issues of most concern to Vancouver voters in 2022.

NPA Mayoral candidate Fred Harding was his usual articulate self, a superior public speaker and commanding presence, who focused on the core issue of his campaign for the Mayor’s suite — public safety, so as to alleviate the concerns of all Vancouver residents. Progress Vancouver’s Mark Marissen was his usual avuncular and impassioned self, looking ever inch the Mayoral candidate for whom Vancouver voters will cast their ballot next month, on Election Day.

Without wishing to sound too partisan, VanRamblings believes that TEAM … for a Livable Vancouver’s Mayoral candidate, current Vancouver City Councillor Colleen Hardwick, won the night, so utterly informed was she about the minutiae of government, what it takes to be a successful Mayor, so compelling was she in her presentation of what Vancouver could be — what it must be — if Vancouver is to thrive, and continue as home to the cultural, ethnic and demographic dynamic that we know Vancouver to be, what we risk losing should voters cast their ballot for anyone other than Colleen Hardwick and her TEAM … for a Livable Vancouver.

Take a gander at the video above. See if you don’t agree with our assessment.

There is an upcoming Mayoral all-candidates forum where the near invisible, hiding out (or, so it would seem) current Mayor in absentia, Edward Charles Kennedy Stewart is bound to attend … which is this Saturday morning’s Chinatown Mayoral all-candidates town hall — a failure to show would exhibit such an egregious lack of respect for Vancouver’s Chinese community that his absence could very well be interpreted as a declaration that he is throwing in the towel, that he doesn’t want to continue to be Vancouver’s Mayor.

Not to mention, failure to show at a Mayoral debate moderated by the doyenne of Vancouver civic affairs reporting could very well have the uncompromising Ms. Bula writing the Mayor’s political obituary, as early as this Saturday afternoon.

#VanElxn2022 | In 2022, Donate To The Vancouver Civic Party of Your Choice

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Here we are, just a tad more than three weeks away from Vancouver’s most consequential election in 50 years.

As a friend was saying to us at lunch yesterday, “No one wants towers built across our city. We want livable neighbourhoods, parks and recreation centres, schools and plazas, restaurants like this one where you can sit on the patio in the middle of the day and enjoy an afternoon repast with a friend. Towers? No thank you!”

Political campaigns rely on volunteers to go door knocking, work in the party’s telephone room, participate in burmashaves — that’s when you see a bunch of folks holding and waving campaign signs at you, when you’re heading off to work, or coming home — staff the campaign office, and work to secure the donations that campaigns for office require to create campaign literature, lawn signs, pay for the office, and fund the myriad aspects of a civic political campaign for candidates working towards being elected to one of Vancouver’s three civic bodies: Vancouver City Council, Vancouver Park Board, and Vancouver School Board.

As we have seen in recent days, there are those Vancouver civic parties who are well-funded by the billionaire developers in our city, who would presume to build 3,000 towers across the city if their civic parties gain office at Vancouver City Hall: ABC (A Better City), Forward Together (the Mayor’s party) OneCity Vancouver, Progress Vancouver and Vision Vancouver — which held power at Vancouver City Hall, from 2008 to 2018 — and the troubled Vancouver Non-Partisan Association.


Incumbent COPE Vancouver Park Board Commissioner, Gwen Giesbrecht, hosted a fundraiser / birthday party for herself and her friends — and COPE —  on Saturday, September 17, at Riddim & Spice.

Then there are those Vancouver civic parties who mean good for our city, do not take real estate developer donations, and are seeking to represent you, not the billionaire real estate developers who would seek to destroy the city we love.

Those Vancouver civic parties who mean well, who need donations from you …

The 2022 Vancouver municipal election is critical to our collective future, and the choices to be made are stark: give the city away to the greed of developers and those developer-funded civic parties who are more than eager to sell us out.

Or support — and donate to — the Vancouver civic parties who mean well for our city (you can see those party’s names listed above), and their working class candidates of integrity who are seeking office in this year’s civic election.

 

 

Or, run the very real risk of destroying the future of the city you love, the treed neighbourhood where you live, the neighbourhood park just down the street, or the nearby community recreation centre, and the lush, green home that our city has been for decades — and may be no more should you not cast your ballot wisely — the city where your children and your grandchildren play, where your neighbours, friends and colleagues gather for picnics, or to play tennis or pickleball, rugby, or soccer, or who enjoy a friendly pick up game of hacky-sack, or baseball.

Just kiss the city of Vancouver you love and have loved for so long, good-bye … because that’s what’s at stake in the 2022 Vancouver municipal election should you not donate, and go to work for, and put up campaign signs for the Vancouver civic parties and their candidates of integrity, who mean well for the future of our city.

#VanElxn2022 | Anomie, Alienation, Chaos Carry The Day in #VanElxn22

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Truth to tell, VanRamblings despairs over the 2022 Vancouver civic election.

Not that Vancouver’s 2022 municipal election differs all that much from the Vancouver civic elections of 2011, 2014 and 2018: same partisan sniping, same crass behaviour from supporters — whether paid, or otherwise — emerging from the various parties, as well as the candidates themselves.

Among the electorate, anomie would seem to be the order of the day, with polls showing upwards of 40% of Vancouver’s electorate either undecided as to which party and which candidates they’ll be supporting as voting gets underway in as little as three weeks from now —  if those citizens intend to vote at all, so alienated and cynical are they about the prospects of any of the parties, or their candidates, acting to build affordable housing for the average wage earner in Vancouver, or remedying an increasingly disturbing public safety issue in our city, where —  as was broadcast on Global BC, recently —  upwards of 1500 random, unprovoked attacks on innocent victims have occurred in Vancouver since the outset of the year.

Forward Together & ABC Vancouver Prepare to Knock Each Other Out

VanRamblings is being inundated with assurances that Stanley Q. Woodvine “finding” Forward Together’s donors list last week was not serendipity, but a planned attack by those behind the ABC Vancouver campaign to wipe out their main competition. VanRamblings has been told “it’s all too coincidental“, that it was planned, and we’re naïve if we believe any differently.

Bad blood, and greed. Meanwhile, VanRamblings has also been told the development industry supporters of the Mayor’s Forward Together party hired a team of investigators awhile ago to dig up dirt on ABC Vancouver and the party’s Mayoral candidate, Ken Sim —  and the party’s Council candidates seeking election, or re-election —  which material when released will devastate the ABC Vancouver campaign for office, while severely prejudicing this second newly-formed municipal party’s chances for success at the polls next month.

VanRamblings was advised the developer backers of ABC —  Rocky Mountaineer railroader, Peter Armstrong, and Lululemon founder, Chip Wilson —  don’t want to share the wealth with the likes of Vancouver Canucks’ owner Francesco Aquilini, Concord Pacific’s Terry Hui, and all of the other developer supporters of our city’s beleaguered incumbent Mayor, Kennedy Stewart.

Vancouver civic politics: a tangled web has been woven in the 2022 civic election that could knock out both leading developer-backed municipal parties.

Internal Party Polling: ABC Vancouver Leading, Forward Together Flailing

When VanRamblings arises from our slumber, we like to take a shower to wake us up. We have a shower radio to accompany us while showering, so we can listen to music. Of late that’s proven more and more difficult. Here’s why …

We have the radio tuned to 104.3 The Breeze. Turn on the radio: Ken Sim ad. Switch the station to Move 103.5. Ken Sim ad. Next up: 94.5 Virgin Radio. Ken Sim ad. Z95.3 FM. Yep, another Ken Sim / ABC Vancouver radio ad. Little wonder that Ken Sim and his ABC Vancouver team are leading in the polls, given that they’re the only civic party running saturation radio ads across every demographic, while placing their increasingly sophisticated television ads on local evening news programmes.

Here’s what the latest internal party rolling polls are showing …

If the above polling is correct, that leaves Vision / One City, the Greens, COPE, and Vote Socialist sharing anywhere between 7% and 23% of the vote.

VanRamblings has been informed incumbents, the NPA’s Melissa De Genova is languishing at 13th, while OneCity’s Christine Boyle is mired at 16th.

The only Council candidates whose names we have been given that are in the top 10, and a shoe-in for election, or re-election: ABC’s Sarah Kirby-Yung and Mike Klassen; COPE’s Jean Swanson; TEAM’s Bill Tieleman (currently lodged at 6th); and, the Greens’ Adriane Carr and Pete Fry.

Otherwise, ABC’s Rebecca Bligh and Lisa Dominato have been bouncing in and out of the top 10, as has TEAM’s Sean Nardi, whose name appears first on the Council ballot voters will receive next month, and COPE’s Breen Ouelette, whose name appears second on the voters’ Council ballot.

Note should be made, as well, that standout Non-Partisan Association Council candidates Arezo Zarribian — one of VanRamblings’ very favourite candidates for office in 2022, whose name will feature prominently on our Women Council Candidates Endorsement List, in early October — and her very able, accomplished running mate, Cinnamon Bhayani (who we’re also pretty darn high on, for her integrity and élan), and our friend and longtime associate, Ken Charko, have also been featured in Council’s Top 10 candidates for election list sporadically, but quite often.

As is almost always the case when covering an election, there is far too much gamesmanship in the coverage and practice of politics throughout the election cycle, and too much reporting on the horse race aspect of media coverage.


Mayoral candidates, l-r: Kennedy Stewart, Colleen Hardwick, Ken Sim, Mark Marissen, Fred Harding

In an election, though, where voters don’t know where to place their vote, reporting on the placement of candidates for office, derived from both the leaked internal party polls, and the public polling you see reported online, on the radio, or during the evening news has a function — which is, the reporting of numbers and the foofaraw of the various shenanigans that help to define the election, generates voter interest, even if its prurient interest and not directed towards policy, or serious consideration of the issues that will determine the future of our beloved city.