OneCity Vancouver co-founders, Christine Boyle, Cara Ng, and Alison Atkinson (Anna Chudnovsky missing from photo) working during last year’s Vancouver civic by-election
The attribute of OneCity Vancouver’s Christine Boyle we most admire is her humility, the bedrock foundation of her hopeful candidacy for City Council.
While what childcare advocate Sharon Gregson has to say about the socially just Christine Boyle is true, as Ms. Boyle herself has written on her campaign website reflects her values and commitment to our city, that …
“It’s time to tackle Vancouver’s deepening wealth gap, ensure that homes are for housing people rather than profits, and strengthen community and democracy, to change the direction Vancouver is headed, and make ours a city where people can live and belong for generations to come”…
… what is also true is that she is not alone in her recognition of the role humility plays, if one is to both achieve elected office and prove an effective community leader. Note should be made that humility is not a decision made by a political aspirant to gain success, but rather an essential part of the very nature of those who are seeking, or already hold political office, an essential element to their success in the common weal of public life.
The building blocks, and the foundation of electoral success: humility and service
In Vancouver, politicians who bring immense humility to the endeavours of political life are legion: the very bright democrat of conscience, Sarah Kirby-Yung at Park Board, who will seek a seat on Council this upcoming autumn as a candidate with the Vancouver Non-Partisan Association; her equally generous and bright colleague of conscience and integrity, John Coupar, an NPA aspirant for Mayor — and for that matter, all of the Commissioners who sit on our Vancouver Park Board: coach and Park Board Committee Chair, Casey Crawford; the ‘he’s so articulate and compassionate that he will bring you to tears’ Green Park Board Commissioner, Stuart Mackinnon; Erin Shum, perhaps the hardest-working member of Park Board, who folks like Ainslie Kwan, the President of the Killarney Community Centre cannot find words superlative enough to describe Erin’s humanity, her ‘gets thing done’ ethos, and her ability to not just listen, but really hear what is being said, and act on what she has heard; and the reasonable and reasoned, quietly powerful force of nature on our beloved Vancouver Park Board, Catherine Evans, who is also seeking to win a seat on Vancouver City Council this upcoming autumn season …
Michael Wiebe, Green Party Park Board Commissioner, and 2018 City Council aspirant
Perhaps the most pleasant surprise of this past electoral term is recent Park Board Chair, Green Party of Vancouver Commissioner, and now aspirant for an elected position on Vancouver City Council, Michael Wiebe (we like that he’s now calling himself “Michael”, rather than Mike — affords him the well-earned gravitas that has emerged this past four years of his political life), who can be seen everywhere across town, as the owner-operator of the eight 1/2 Restaurant Lounge, the President of the Mount Pleasant BIA, and the co-founder of the recently formed Vancouver Art House Society (VAHS), a non-profit with a mandate to preserve the city’s rapidly-disappearing arts and culture spaces (think: the Rio Theatre, as but one example).
Whether it’s retiring City Councillor Andrea Reimer, or her Green party colleague, Adriane Carr; or OneCity Vancouver’s Carrie Bercic at the Vancouver School Board, or her Green party colleagues on the Board, Estrellita Gonzalez and Janet Fraser, and Vision Vancouver School Board trustees, Joy Alexander and Allan Wong, the innate nature of these successful, hard-working, dedicated and respected elected persons of conscience carry within them a sense not just of service, but of the virtue of humility, an appreciation of oneself, of one’s talents and skills, and a commitment to integrity, and the effacing of oneself to noble pursuit: the achievement of better & more, not for themselves, but for us, for all of us.
To be a respected, successful and admired politician, one must know what one stands for, what one is fighting for, the electoral aspirant must know how to go about achieving the ends promised to voters during the course of a campaign for office, how to work with others, be a voice for change for the better, and always, always remember that theirs is a life of service, one sometimes with no reward other than the knowledge one is doing good and performing their very best, all the while keeping deep within them a humble nature, in recognition that no matter the inducements of office, that it was humility and perseverance that elected them to office, and humility that will sustain them, and provide the foundation for their service.
