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It’s polling day in BC’s municipal elections! The polls have closed and the results are coming in.
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Incumbent Kennedy Stewart has ceded the Vancouver mayor’s chair to Ken Sim. Sim was defeated leading an NPA list against Stewart in 2018.
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After midnight, the ABC Vancouver mayoral candidate leads with 69,677 votes compared to Stewart’s 41,624. Ninety-six of the 106 surveys have been counted.
“ABC Vancouver was born out of a desire for change, a desire to do politics differently,” Sim said in his victory speech. “It was born with the promise that decisions in government should not be made on the advice of pollsters, lobbyists, activists or whatever is trending on Twitter.
“But instead, it should be done on the advice of parents and educators and scientists and health care providers, and what’s going on in town halls and community coffee shops and some local pub,” he said with a laugh. .
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The ABC’s list of seven councilors led by Sarah Kirby-Yung were also in the top spots, followed by the Green Party’s Adriane Carr, OneCity’s Christine Boyle and the Greens’ Pete Fry in 10th and last place. And ABC candidates are also leading the polls for the park board, which Sim once talked about disbanding before deciding to run, and the school board.
In his concession speech from a downtown Vancouver hotel ballroom, Stewart acknowledged he was “sad” to give up the mayoral seat, but insisted the city had made progress on the matter of housing during the last four years. “I think we’ve really turned the tide of the housing crisis we have in the city,” he told supporters, citing a shift from building mostly investor condos to rentals and social housing.
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He also noted that Vancouver was the first major city to decriminalize drugs and provide safe supply.
Locke eliminates McCallum at Surrey
In Surrey, Brenda Locke maintained a substantial lead over incumbent Doug McCallum all night, although her margin of victory with all polls counted narrowed to less than 1,000 votes, 33,311 to 32,338.
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A key to Locke’s election promise to keep the RCMP in Surrey hinges on whether his Surrey Connect slate wins a majority on council. Their Surrey Connect candidates took four of the council’s eight seats. Gordie Hogg’s Surrey First, which promised a police transition overhaul, took two places and McCallum’s Safe Surrey Coalition sat in seventh and eighth. This means that Locke has the power to break any potential tie in a civic vote on the issue.
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Changes at the top in other BC cities
Change was a theme in British Columbia’s other big cities on Saturday, with new mayors elected in Victoria, Kelowna, Kamloops and Penticton.
Victoria mayoral candidate Marianne Alto, who was among eight candidates seeking to replace outgoing two-term mayor Lisa Helps, easily won with more than 50 per cent of the vote.
In Kelowna, Tom Dyas unseated incumbent Mayor Colin Basran. In Kamloops, Reid Hamer-Jackson defeated former councilors Dieter Dudy, Sadie Hunter and Arjun Singh with 31.6% of the vote to become the city’s next mayor. And in Penticton, Julius Bloomfield edged out Jason Reynen for mayor, beating out incumbent John Vassilaki, who finished third.
New civic party Contract With Langley now dominates Langley Township politics. Eric Woodward was elected mayor along with five party council candidates. Former BC Liberal MP Rich Coleman’s return to politics was short-lived as he finished third as the mayoral candidate for Elevate Langley.
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Check out our extensive coverage and results for these Lower Mainland municipalities:
• Vancouver• Surrey• Burnaby• New Westminster• North Vancouver and West Vancouver• Coquitlam, Port Coquitlam and Port Moody• Langley
The latest from Port Moody: Meghan Lahti, a longtime councilwoman, managed to win a promotion to the city’s interim mayor, capturing 4,940 votes to challenger Steve Milani’s 3,953 with only mail-in ballots to count . Lahti said the results indicate voters wanted change at city hall.
And he intends to bring about “a big, big change in the way meetings are conducted and how governance is viewed. You know, it’s not about one superiority. It’s not about politics division”.
Milani campaigned to limit growth, saying “no to towers” and felt his opponent was too close to the development industry. Lahti, however, said, “I’m not advocating much more growth than we’re already on track to get,” but said the results indicate citizens want development, especially around their two stations. SkyTrain and West Coast Express stop.
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In Coquitlam, Richard Stewart won re-election handily, garnering 14,105 votes — 70 percent of the ballots — to Adel Gamar’s 5,367. Third place candidate Mark Mahovlich only garnered 818 votes.
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And in New West: Patrick Johnstone replaced outgoing mayor Jonathan Cote, and his Community First New Westminster party will lead a slate of four councilors and six school councillors.
With all polls reported, the former councilman finished with 6,676 votes, a 1,449-vote margin over second-place New Westminster attorney Ken Armstrong, who received 5,227 votes.
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Back in Vancouver, unofficial results, including voter turnout, didn’t start coming out until 9:05 p.m., not 8:00 p.m. like in all other municipalities. This is because John Oliver’s polling station was kept open for an extra hour due to an earlier power cut.
Vancouver election reporter Dan Fumano is in Kennedy Stewart’s headquarters, and this time he’s an unusual choice. Here’s what Dan had to say just as the polls were closing:
In 2018, when former NDP member of parliament Kennedy Stewart ran for mayor of Vancouver as an independent, his election night event was in the basement bar of the Waldorf Hotel in East Hastings, near from the port of Vancouver. The modern East Van basement venue seemed right for Stewart, who used to play in rock bands. This year, as Stewart seeks his second term as mayor, it’s a very different place with a very different atmosphere: the grand ballroom downtown at the Paradox Hotel, probably even better known to most Vancouverites as the old Trump International Hotel and Tower.
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Here’s Derrick Penner in Port Moody:
Early polls, leads 1 & 2 are in @CityofPoMo , Meghan Lahti leads mayoralty, 1,246 over Steve Milani with 902. Newcomer Callan Morrison leads council race with 1,205 votes, next Diana Dilworth with 1,155. @VancouverSun #portmoody #apples
— Derrick Penner (@derrickpenner) October 16, 2022
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Action at the Port Moody Recreation Center polling station was “very busy,” according to a poll worker who was still greeting a light but steady flow of traffic in the final hour of voting at the third largest community in the Tri-Cities.
Port Moody’s is possibly the most intense election in the region, with incumbent Coquitlam Mayor Richard Stewart up for re-election and popular Port Coquitlam Mayor Brad West reinstated by acclamation.
In the third city, two former councilmen, Meghan Lahti and Steve Milani, are vying to replace outgoing Mayor Rob Vagramov. Development and protection of Port Moody’s back-to-nature character were key issues for voters coming to the polls near the end.
“The community is definitely growing and I think we need strong people to (support) the growth,” first-time voter Anastasia Sergiannidis said. “We’re definitely keeping our roots, but we need housing.”
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Port Moody is a “young, vibrant community,” where everywhere is “three minutes from nature,” said 14-year resident Lionel Prince, and he’s voting to keep it that way. “I voted all against people who want to grow, let’s say, a negative fashion,” Prince said.
A key issue for him is stopping a proposed road through Bert Flinn Park to a potential development in neighboring Anmore, which is “practically our backyard”.
Still quiet at the Kennedy Stewart and Forward Together event here at the Paradox Hotel (the former Trump Tower), for now it’s just staff getting set up and reporters sipping coffee (I’ve already spilled a fair amount on my shirt). #vanelxn22 #vanpoli pic. twitter.com/O7Opf32XGE
— Dan Fumano (@fumano) October 16, 2022
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Calm before the storm at mayoral candidate Ken Sim’s polling station in Vancouver…
With just under 90 minutes to go until the polls close in Vancouver, all is quiet at Ken Sim’s election night headquarters in southeast Vancouver. Credit: Douglas Quan Photo by Douglas Quan/PNG /jpg
Catalina Dinu (left) and his wife Mirela Rotaru were excited to vote in Canada for the first time since immigrating from Romania six years ago. “We are excited to vote for the first time, for the opportunity and the right, and we hope for the best for our community,” Rotaru said. pic.twitter.com/LJharD4mYS
— SusanLazaruk (@SusanLazaruk) October 16, 2022
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From Surrey election reporter Glenda Luymes shortly before the polls closed:
Thirty minutes before the polls close, the Surrey banquet hall where supporters of mayoral candidate Doug McCallum gather fills with people, including many families. The atmosphere is light as people dine and children play in front of the empty stage.
A large banner behind the podium reads “Doug McCallum Does It.”
Other mayoral candidates Brenda Locke, Gordie Hogg, Sukh Dhaliwal and Jinny Sims have their own close matches.
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It’s election day
British Columbians head to the polls to vote for their mayors, councillors, school counselors (and, only in Vancouver, park board commissioners).
At the end of the night,…