Christy Clark used a card from Gordon Campbell’s book to draft candidates — she plucked them from city councils around the province.
As a result, about a dozen new MLAs will be leaving their jobs as mayors and city councillors to sit in Victoria. Here’s my story from this week on what a few of them had to say about their priorities. TransLink ranks high on the list.
I’ll be waiting to see how they exert their influence (if they have much as newbies). As a few reporters/columnists around town have noted, here and here, there are a lot of municipal issues at the table.
I note that former Sam Sullivan staffer Daniel Fontaine keeps twitting (yes, double meaning intended) Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson about having to now plead his case for transit and housing with Sullivan and Suzanne Anton, his former municipal foes.
But I’m wondering if he will. The Vision team established pretty solid connections with Christy Clark’s people in the last two years. And, when it comes to transit, my guess is that it will be the developers, who have turned into the biggest transit fans ever, who will be joining forces with the mayor for a Broadway line.
And let’s not forget who handed Clark the biggest electoral defeat of her life: Anton and Sullivan, who more or less called her a carpetbagger with a nasty bunch of Liberal campaigners behind her when she ran for the mayoral nomination back in 2005.
Liberals build a new municipal brain trust
Published Wednesday, May. 15, 2013 10:17PM EDT
Last updated Wednesday, May. 15, 2013 10:20PM EDT
B.C.’s new government will include a group of people with some very specialized expertise.
They know the gritty details of garbage, transit and sewers, and the impact of funding cuts on little arts groups. And they will bring some of those local concerns to Victoria.
They are the unusually large group of mayors and city councillors elected as part of the B.C. Liberal team, accounting for nearly a fifth of the new caucus.
They include high-profile politicians from the Metro Vancouver region with strong views on transit funding, affordable housing and other issues that have been priorities for local governments. In that group: City of Langley mayor Peter Fassbender, a vice-chair of the TransLink mayors’ council at one point; Surrey councillor Marvin Hunt, chair of Metro Vancouver’s zero-waste committee; former Vancouver mayor Sam Sullivan, and former city councillor Suzanne Anton.
Those new MLAs will be joined by others from their political level, such as Linda Reimer, Scott Hamilton and Linda Larson, councillors in Coquitlam, Delta, and Oliver; and Mike Bernier, Dan Ashton and Jordan Sturdy, the mayors of Dawson Creek, Penticton and Pemberton, respectively.
“We have an in-depth understanding of the pain of all those local issues,” Mr. Hunt said. “There are a lot of issues that need to be addressed [in municipalities] and it will help when there are now so many municipal voices at the table.”
Mr. Hunt’s main concern is finding a better method for running TransLink. The Lower Mainland transportation agency has been in limbo for the past two years, deadlocked with the provincial government on how to pay for transit improvements.
“It’s the biggest one we’ve got to solve. It dominoes through the whole province. And it’s one of my hopes for this election that we can find some ways to change how the provincial government does things.”
Mr. Sullivan, who won the Vancouver-False Creek riding, also said all cities and towns in B.C. will benefit from having so many former municipal politicians in the provincial government.
One of his priorities is stable funding for local arts groups, something that was a flashpoint for many after the Liberal government under Gordon Campbell drastically cut funding in 2009.
“We do need a real sense of stability and certainty in the arts.”
He said he is also hopeful that, as an MLA, he can pick up a project that he started as mayor: a streetcar in central Vancouver.
“The streetcar follows the contours of my riding. That’s a natural.”
Mr. Fassbender simply said he hopes the municipal presence will help the province learn to communicate better and develop solutions collaboratively.
None of the three who spoke to The Globe and Mail promised to fight for extra funding, but talked instead about finding “creative” or “innovative” solutions to problems without adding to provincial debt.
“We know there’s not a lot of money around in the next four years,” Mr. Hunt said.
Metro Vancouver chair Greg Moore, a former provincial politician who is now the mayor of Port Coquitlam, said he is hopeful about the new city-minded crop of MLAs.
“It’s a really good thing. I know from dealing with Terry Lake [the former Kamloops mayor who is the MLA for that region now] that there’s a deeper understanding of what we’re going through at the local level. They know the challenges.”
Mr. Moore said the region is anxious for the provincial government to find a new deal with cities to pay for big projects like waste-treatment facilities.
Transit is another priority that he will push. Mr. Moore said he believes this group understands that improved transit is not about just making people in the Lower Mainland happier.
“If it’s not working, it hurts the whole economy.”
And, he said, Metro Vancouver will work to persuade the new provincial government it needs to help encourage developers to build apartments.
“We want some commitments to build rental stock.”