Volatility key word to describe campaigns in Surrey and Langley

Doug Elford threw the Surrey council election campaign into some chaos when he decided to abandon Surrey Community Alliance (of which he was president), joining forces and running for council with former mayor Doug McCallum's Safe Surrey Coalition slate. His decision led SCA to throw in the towel.

Volatility is the reigning description of the municipal election campaigns in Surrey and Langley, thus far.

In Surrey, it appears there is some attempt underway to consolidate slates, as at least six of them planned to run candidates for Surrey council in October.

Doug Elford, president of Surrey Community Alliance, which had five announced candidates for council and two for school board, has left SCA. He will run for council with the Safe Surrey Coalition slate being put together by former mayor Doug McCallum.

As Elford was among SCA’s most prominent candidates, due to his activism in the Newton community, this was a body blow to SCA. Campaign managers Gord Savard and Sharon Goldberg said in a release sent out Aug. 11 that SCA is withdrawing from the race.

Imtiaz Popat, one of the council candidates, said “we are looking at other options to continue our campaign.” At this point, it isn’t clear if the six remaining candidates will run as independents, step out of race, or find another slate.

The reality is that six slates contesting a municipal election in a city the size of Surrey is very confusing for voters. If each slate ran eight candidates for council, that would add up to 48 candidates for starters – just for the eight councillor positions. That number would not include any independents. It is quite likely that there will be more than 50 names on the ballot for council in the October election.

Having six slates also makes it very hard for each slate to get its message put. To run in a city the size of Surrey and actually connect with voters, a large amount of money is needed to pay for targeted advertising, polling, signs and many other details that are part of campaigns. Savard and Goldberg said SCA was nowhere near the $30,000 in donations they felt was necessary to take care of pre-election expenses.

Raising money is much harder in this election, as candidates and slates can’t accept donations from businesses or unions. It is very hard to get many individuals to contribute to municipal campaigns. Donations aren’t even tax-deductible, unlike donations to federal and provincial campaigns.

While the ruling Surrey First slate has some problems of its own, it has a huge fiscal advantage. Veteran councillor Tom Gill is running with three first-term councillors at this point in time. Other Surrey First  councillors are either retiring or running with a different slate. Councillor Bruce Hayne is running for mayor, with longtime councillor Barbara Steele running for council as part of the Surrey Integrity Now slate he is putting together.

Surrey First undoubtedly collected hundreds of thousands in donations before the new campaign rules were enacted last year. In 2014, it spent more than $1 million on its campaign. Most of the money came from developers and other people in the real estate business.

Name recognition usually is a very powerful factor in winning a council seat. This is particularly true for the councillor positions, as candidates for mayor get a lot of attention and thus have more name recognition. They also have many fewer opponents.

The moving and shaking in the backrooms in Surrey will continue over the next month or so, but by early September, voters should have some idea just how many candidates they will be choosing from.

Meanwhile, in the race for Surrey Board of Education, there are already 14 candidates from four slates running for the six Surrey seats. This includes the six incumbent trustees from Surrey First Education.

Independent Laurae McNally is running for another term in White Rock, which has one seat on the board. She is the longest-serving politician in Surrey and White Rock by far, and her years of experience have been very helpful to the board as it continues to do its best to deal with the pressures placed on the education system by Surrey’s unceasing growth.

Here's a link to the list of candidates for Surrey council and board of education, as of Aug. 17.

Only one other local politician has more experience. Delta Mayor Lois Jackson is stepping down after more than 45 years on the local political scene. In Delta, there are already 26 announced candidates – with three very well-known candidates running for mayor. I will do a post on the Delta election in the next few weeks.

In Langley, recent developments show that there is a lot of candidate volatility. The latest list of Delta candidates can be found here.

When former Langley City mayor Peter Fassbender announced July 30 that he was going to seek his old job back, it didn’t take long for one of the other candidates for mayor to back off. Paul Albrecht, who is finishing his first term as a councillor, announced Aug. 3 he would instead run for councillor again.

Albrecht, who ran unsuccessfully several times before winning a seat in 2014, is showing more pragmatism than politicians often do. He would rather be at the table making decisions than on the outside looking in. Four years is a long time to wait for the next election. He should have a better chance at retaining a councillor’s seat.

On Aug. 15, Langley Township Councillor Kim Richter, who announced in November she would run for mayor against incumbent Jack Froese, also showed a pragmatic streak. She is no longer running for mayor, but instead is seeking a councillor’s seat again.

Her announcement on Facebook received a lot of positive feedback from her supporters. A common sentiment was that they would rather her voice was at the table. Richter does have a reputation for bringing up issues that other councillors are often reluctant to touch, and many voters appreciate that.

In some ways, she is like the late Muriel Arnason, who was legendary for taking provocative stances and bringing up issues that no one else was paying attention to.  In her earliest days as a Township councillor (she was the first woman ever elected to council), she was often vilified by some of her fellow (male) councillors. Often their retorts to her were personal and gender-based, which would be a complete no-no in today’s political climate.

Both announcements will have a significant ripple effect. Some of the candidates who have announced already will now be realizing that there is one less “open” seat – one vacated by a sitting member of council. In Langley Township, it appears that seven of the eight incumbents are running again, although not all have announced their intentions yet. In Langley City, it appears that at least five of the six councillors are running again. First-term Councillor Val van den Broek is still in the mayor’s race, and is the only one seeking a different office at this point in time.

In addition, two former City councillors who stepped aside in 2014 are running again – Teri James and Rosemary Wallace, who has been a school trustee for the past four years. As the city election results are often very close, it is entirely possible that several incumbents could lose their seats this year.

In the Township, a number of newcomers have stated they are seeking council seats. If there is only one “open” seat (Councillor Chartlie Fox is not running again), there will be very stiff competition. The incumbents usually have an edge, but as in the City, two former councillors are seeking to get back on. Steve Ferguson and Bev Dornan were both defeated in 2014.

This year’s municipal election is very different from all those which have gone before. It is the first with rigid spending limits and a prohibition on donations from businesses and unions. Candidates are limited in how much of their campaigns they can self-fund. The election is, for the first time, taking place in October and candidates generally have more questions than answers about how and when to start vigorously campaigning.

As for the Langley Board of Education election, there have been many rumours about challengers to the existing trustees, but little of substance has been publicly announced. It is entirely possible that the race for trustee will be the most hard-fought of the three separate local government campaigns, due to controversy over the sexual orientation and gender identity (SOGI) curriculum.