(I don’t think attracting crowds was the strategy, by the way. This initiative comes largely from a couple of guys, former TEAM member Bill McCreery being the leader, who haven’t been active in the party before. In fact, I’ve heard members grumbling that these newcomers were sucking up energy the party didn’t need to waste on their efforts to turn the NPA into TEAM or some facsimile thereof.)

There were a few passionate speeches. McCreery noted that 76 per cent of people who voted in the online survey showed a preference for choices other than Non Partisan Association. Among other choices: Vancouver First, Vancouver Citizens’ Alliance, New Progressive Alliance, One Vancouver, New Progressive Association, and New Positive Action. Former NPA park commission Diane Ledingham supported him, saying that a new name would mean “the NPA can evolve into something new. Vancouver has changed rapidly and this would allow us to move forward into a new name that speaks more of inclusivity.”

On the other side, one-time aldermanic candidate (Class of ’82) Paul McCrea said that he was around after the NPA was whomped by the Mike Harcourt-led group in 1981 and everyone fretted back then that they should change the name. The party “went on to three sweeping victories” after that, he reminded everyone. As well, as someone who’s worked in advertising, he also pointed out that “it takes a lot of money and a lot of time to impress a brand name as well known as this one.”

Charles Flavelle of Purdy’s Chocolates said that, if his company had fallen on hard times, “I would have changed the direction, not the name.”

And Councillor Suzanne Anton, in a campaign-style speech, listed everything wrong with the current Vision administration (park board doesn’t actually even believe in independent park boards; school board has no faith in the school system; city council has politicized city hall and is spending its time fighting another order of government. She wrapped up with a stirring “It is important that we rebrand our image but we do not need to rebrand our name.”

The party broke up while it was still light out. I didn’t see whether any attendees drifted over to the Moira Stillwell party going on in another part of the building. But I doubt it, as NPA people keep telling me that only Vision and COPE work in suspicious lockstep with the provincial NDP.

And now, on to the election. I didn’t note it in a previous post, but the NPA are planning to nominate a first round of candidates in November, a year before the 2011 election, presumably to get some strength on the ground that is hard for them to maintain now, with only one city councillor, two school trustees, and one park-board commissioner

This is the follow-up to a membership meeting a couple of months ago where there was extended debate on whether to change the name, as part of an effort to renew the party, and whether to create political-party-style policy stances on various issues. Members agree to consider the first, but not the second, saying the association has a long tradition of not being a political party and not tying its elected representatives to fixed policy. (Well, except for the vaguely Chamber of Commerce-ish type principles that are part of the association’s constitution.)

So … Vancouver First. What do you think?

Me, I’m wondering if they have to ask Dianne Watts’ permission. As you’ll recall, she created a unique party (me and people on council I agree with, no members, no voting) out in  Surrey called Surrey First. Perhaps this is kicking off a string of franchises.

(Someone once said being a journalist is like having homework the rest of your life. How true.)

Vision Vancouver: West End protesters outside the downtown BCIT building, handing out pamphlets claiming darkly that “huge subsidies are being offered to private developers” as they continue their battle against two towers proposed under Vision’s ambitious STIR program. For those who don’t recall, that’s the program Vision brought in quickly after being elected, aimed at boosting the stalled construction industry while creating some permanent (as opposed to investor condo rentals) rental apartments in the city.

Inside, about 200 people all feeling the love. As Jeremy Osborne said, when he made his pitch to be elected to the executive, “I’ve been getting more excited about the city since Gregor’s elected. When I see all the stuff that’s going around on Facebook and Twitter, that makes me proud.” Someone posed a gentle question to the mayor about the STIR program, which has generated significant opposition in the West End, and he said there were going to be community consultations set up. End of dealing with difficult issues.

Gender breakdown: Hard to get an exact count, but I’d say women represented slightly more than half.

Over at the Museum of Vancouver, it was nothing but painful issues, as the 80 people at the NPA meeting struggled with whether to initiate a search for a new name and whether to go out into the community and talk to them about possible NPA policies that should be developed.

The room was split on both issues, both of which prompted heartfelt speeches about whether the NPA is a dead brand that needs to be changed if the party is going to have any hope of winning an election again or whether it’s an honourable brand that has a long history and, yes, maybe needs some refreshing, but shouldn’t be abandoned.

In the end, the group voted to strike a committee to look at possible new names, some with the same NPA initials and some without. But voters rejected the idea of going out to talk about policy with communities, because, they said, that would violate the spirit of the NPA founded in 1937. The party has never really been a party, said the faithful. It’s a group aimed at nominating the best possible candidates, fundraising for them, and running an election campaign.

Sample quotes:

“I question whether the brand is something we should move forward on.” Cindy Burton

“This party has elected 11 of the last 17 mayors. We’ve been up and we’ve been down. I don’t think we should be so quick to throw out that legacy. It is the most successful, longest-lasting civic party in Canadian history.” Sean Bickerton, NPA council candidate 2008

“We’ve got more media attention for this name change than we did for anything else we did in the in the last 18 months. My marketing mind says this is good.” Mike Klassen, political organizer, one part of the two-man team at citycaucus.com

“I have to tell you, I have some trouble figuring out what we are selling as the NPA.” Mike Davis, NPA president, public-relations specialist

“If we pass this, we’re essentially saying the NPA is going to change as an organization. We’re going to be a policy-debating organization and then there will be all kinds of arguments about whether we’re in line with the NDP or the Liberals.” Manjot Hallen, NPA vice-president

“I’ve got a news flash. We got trounced in 2002, squeaked through in 2005, and got trouned in 2008. We’ve got to change and we are a party. We vote as a bloc. Let’s admit that and stop trying to kid ourselves.” Peter Ladner, former councillor, defeated mayoral candidate 2008

“We need to be looking forward to young people. They can’t subscribe to an ideology. We can communicate ourselves as a multi-partisan party.” Simon Jackson, environmental activist

“One of the things I have valued most is my ability to say in a highly politicized environment is to say I am non-partisan. But how do we reach out to the public with that principle in mind.” Carol Gibson, NPA school trustee

“A surprisingly large number of people think we are a party. Worse still, they think we are the Republican party.” Michael Geller, development consultant, NPA council candidate 2008 (For his analysis of the meeting, go to his blog.)

And, the capper from former city councillor B.C. Lee, who made the best political speech of his life that I’ve heard.

“The next election is coming within months. We should be focusing on what is the new substance for the next election. Our energy should be going into what should we present to the citizens. If every time we were defeated, we changed names, I would have changed my name two dozen times already. We should be be going out saying ‘I am not who I am but I am who I am.’”

Gender breakdown: Out of the 75 people I counted in the room, 13 were women.

What did I think of it all?

- The NPA has been going round in circles on this “should we have more clear-cut policy, should we re-brand ourselves” for eight years now and I don’t see any movement beyond this. It all feels like a waste to me. Whether they like it or not, most people see them as a party. Their own principles from their 1937 consitution says they believe in basic things like the following.

• Municipal levels of government should act for the benefit of the people and should allow every individual the freedom of worship, assembly, opportunity and initiative.
• Individuals have the right to enjoy the fruits of their labour, and to own private property, and individual enterprise is generally preferable to government intervention.
• Civic progress and stability can only be achieved by upholding the law, accepting social responsibilities, and accomplishing change by intelligent planning.
• Elected civic representatives should make decisions based on the viewpoint of many individuals and organizations, and not be under obligation to policies or platforms of political parties.

They need to get on with the real issues. Instead of pretending that they’re not a party and that their party doesn’t primarily appeal to people on the right and centre-right, they should accept what they are and get to the work of figuring out what being centre-right means these days and how to sell their ideas to the public.

They can stay with the same name or ditch it, they’re still going to get the 30,000 faithful right/centre-right voters. But they need to figure out if they have anything to say to people beyond that group. It’s time to end the academic discussions. And the white guys in suits thing has got to go.

As for Vision, well, it might have been nice to hear a real debate there, some discussion about what Vision does actually see itself standing for, besides being the biggest green non-profit in the city. There are a lot of confused people out in the city, wondering if Vision is actually COPE Lite or whether it’s really NPA Lite. It wouldn’t hurt to have a painful discussion about who they are.

The biggest danger ruling parties always have, in my centuries of experience here on Planet Earth, is that they tend to hear from two groups.

One is the people who absolutely love what they’re doing and encourage them to continue down the same road (“Great the way you busted up those unions, buddy” on one side; “I love the bike trial on Burrard. Why don’t we close the whole downtown to traffic” on the other) and the other is the people who loathe what they’re doing, who tend to get dismissed as a bunch of out-of-touch cranks.

What ruling parties don’t hear much of is people who say “I sort of like what you’re aiming for, but I have to wonder about some of the decisions you’ve made” or “I support you but this was totally the wrong thing to do” or “You’ve really turned me off.”  Those people stay quiet. Or they’ll say polite, evasive things, rather than piss off the guys in power. They only realize how many of those people are out there when they lose elections.

The people who turned out to the Vision meeting look like an intelligent, diverse bunch capable of having a challenging debate about their party. I’d like to hear that.

This seems to be part of the NPA’s effort to slooooowly crank into first gear in preparation for the 2011 election (it’ll be here before you know it) that has been accompanied, since late June, by a series of news releases about various Vision Vancouver misdeeds (bungling the shelter stuff) and NPA initiatives (pushing for a 125th birthday celebration for Vancouver to get people out of Olympic Games post-partum depression.

Charlie Smith had this analysis to offer on the NPA’s fate, which, except for the tax issue, seems to encourage the party to take up a bunch of left-wing causes. Can’t say I see that really working for them. He is right that the NPA is in a bad position, with the Liberal government now in place til 2013 — a situation that generally encourages city voters here to vote for whomever they perceive to be the non-Liberals locally. But it’s not impossible. Sam Sullivan managed to pull off a narrow victory, in spite of the Libs being ensconced in Victoria.

What the NPA really has to do is hope that Vision Vancouver helps them out by doing things that people perceive as too flaky and idealistic. It’s an accusation leftie-type governments are always vulnerable to, whether they’re flaky and idealistic or not. The city’s centrist voters aren’t going to swing to the NPA because they think Vision Vancouver has been too heavy-handed with civil liberties or hasn’t supported the LGBT community enough.

They will swing there if the NPA is successful in portraying the party as loonie lefties who allowed chickens in backyards and put a community garden on the grounds of city hall but didn’t do much else. (Doesn’t matter that dozens of other cities also allow chickens or that the Obamas put a garden on the grounds of the White House — what matters is how people here judge that as kooky.)

I also wouldn’t count the NPA out just because they’re seeming kind of moribund right now. It’s amazing how the political parties in this town can appear to be near death and then suddenly they rise up from their caskets. Remember when COPE was completely shut out of council altogethe rin 96-99, then went from two councillors to a near-sweep? Then the NPA was reduced to Sam Sullivan and Peter Ladner and it came back to win majorities at council, school and parks?

The thing about these parties is that they only start gearing up in the final six-12 months, so you can’t really judge how strong they are until they start pulling themselves together at that point.

NPA moves to reduce membership fee

Vancouver­—The Board of Directors of the Vancouver Non-Partisan Association (NPA) will recommend to its membership that they drop their current general membership fee of $20 per year to $10 per year.

NPA President Michael Davis says the motion is part of a number of moves the NPA is taking to make the association more accessible to Vancouverites interested in how the city is run.

“The whole purpose of the NPA is to bring together the best and brightest people from the widest range of communities,” says Davis. “Lowering our membership fees will help make us accessible to everyone.”

Davis says the NPA wants to engage all groups in the city: “We are working to re-build the broad coalition we’ve had in the past, so we must attract young people, different ethnic communities, different income brackets and people from all areas of the city.”

Davis believes lowering the membership fee is a small but important component of building that broad coalition. “The broader the range of people we can get involved, the better the quality of candidates we will field in the next election,” adds Davis.

The motion to reduce the membership fee must be passed by the NPA membership at its Annual General Meeting, October 14, 2009.

It’s actually not too early to start planning for that — a bare year and a half away, really, or only 18 Critical Mass rides, before parties need to start getting their ducks lined up for the 2011 civic election.

Vancouver elections, if you’ll recall, have rarely involved mayoral nominations. Usually the parties agree in the backroom who the mayoral candidate will be (Larry Campbell, Jim Green, Philip Owen, Jennifer Clarke of years past) or are sent out as sacrificial lambs to do their duty for the party (David Cadman, Jean Swanson, Carmela Allevato, et al).

The first real mayoral nomination in recent memory was between Sam Sullivan and Christy Clark in 2005. Neither filed disclosures saying how much they had spent, to my knowledge. (And I’m not even sure anyone asked, we were all so agog in the media with the novelty of the race.)

This time, because of the many rumours about how much various parties had spent — Sullivan, Louie, De Genova, and Gregor Robertson — it became much more of an issue. In spite of that, there is no clear city requirement that mayoral candidates, whether winning or losing, have to file accounts of their campaign donations or spending.

In any case, here at least, Raymond Louie’s disclosure here: Raymond

And Allan DeGenova’s disclosure, remarkable for how much information is blacked out, here: de-genova-mayor

P.S. I notice that my tireless conspiracy-theory friends over at city caucus think my posting of these docs is all part of some “backscratching” between me and Vision. Life really is easier if you never make a phone call to check anything, I guess. Anyway, ALL reporters who asked for these docs from Vision got them. I posted them because I have had requests for me to do so — okay, one request, from Kennedy Stewart. I presume others didn’t because they reported on them extensively/couldn’t be bothered/don’t have blogs. I’ve had them since all other financial disclosures were filed (as have EVERY OTHER REPORTER who asked for them) but due to my staggering technical ineptitude, only put them up now.

Vision Vancouver spent almost $2 million, as I report in the Globe this morning. (The documents will be filed with the city later today and likely put up on the website Monday, for those who want to study the entrails closely.) The NPA, as I reported earlier, says it raised and spent $1 million, but mayoral candidate Peter Ladner raised and spent $240,000 (of which $40,000 was transferred to the party) and the other 10 mayoral candidates must have raised and spent at least another $300-500,000 among them. It’s a bit hard to figure out the NPA finances in a quick scan because there are money transfers among the candidates and from candidate to party. As well, their documents don’t say what they consider their election-financing period to be.

It looks like close to $1 million was spent by the five candidates who ran for mayoral nominations for their parties: $240,000 for Raymond Louie, almost $200,000 for Gregor Robertson, $74,000 according to Allan DeGenova’s preliminary but never finalized numbers (which everyone thinks are much higher), $158,000 for Peter Ladner at the NPA and then an amount we’re never likely to know from Sam Sullivan, who has not been required to file by either his party or the current rules at city hall.

I found Raymond Louie’s disclosure the most surprising. I think, given the level of baying about his campaign expenses here and there, that people were expecting he’d been bankrolled by the development community. Certainly, many developers I’ve talked to felt like they knew Raymond better than Gregor and liked his understanding of the development industry. Instead, it looks like his quarter-million-dollar mayoral campaign (ouch) was funded heavily by many Chinese community members who don’t normally get involved in politics.

A Fred Wang, whom Raymond described to me as a businessman who has worked with the Taiwanese cultural festival, gave $80,000. Another Taiwanese festival/businessman type, Charlie Wu, gave $10,000. Two other donors, former bankers in the community, Brian Lo and Chong Yeung, each gave $10,000. Raymond’s mother, Sue, put in $20,000 and Raymond himself put in $10,000. What I spotted from the developer set in my scan: Concord Pacific ($5,000); Rize Alliance ($7,000); Joe Segal($3,000), architect James Cheng ($5,000), the Walls, under various company names ($4,000). On and Raymond’s union, the Communication Energy and Paperworkers, put in $5,000.

And the answer is, once again: Mostly the development industry for the two major parties. Unless Vision Vancouver surprises us on Monday, with the news that the bulk of its money has come from organic carrot farmers, yoga-mat producers, and graphic designers.

VV’s details on its rumoured $1.5 million campaign aren’t in yet — deadline is Monday. Nor are those of the Coalition of Progressive Electors, which has said it spent $300,000 on its campaign. (By the way, that works out to a cost of just under $100,000 per successful candidate for VV and a bargain basement $50,000 per successful candidate for COPE.)

But the Non-Partisan Association filed its disclosure today, as have a few of the candidates, notably Peter Ladner, Kim Capri and Elizabeth Ball. You can look at the documents here, which the city has helpfully — thanks to a motion last May — started providing on the web this year instead of requiring us to down to city hall dressed like Queen Victoria and copy out the numbers with quill pens, as was the previous practice. (Sorry, I just had a beer with dinner and am feeling silly.)

All very helpful, except that the NPA has many documents laid out in such a way that you have to turn your head sideways to read them and keep scrolling back and forth to figure out which development company donated $10,000 and which only donated $2,000. But I quibble.

I can’t quite tell what the total NPA spending was, because they file for the party and for candidates but the candidates give money to the party, though not everything they raise and so on. But it appears that the party raised just over $1 million, Peter got brought in $200,000 after paying his money to the party, Suzanne about $70,000 in total but she gave some to Peter’s campaign and then some to the party, etc., so I’m going to estimate the total was around $1.3 million. The list of the city’s prominent figures in the development industry is fairly complete.

Bob Rennie appears to be the biggest donor, having turned over $35,000 worth of his advertising pages (I presume in the Vancouver Sun) to the party. Developer Rob Macdonald gave at least $12,625; Imperial Parking kicked in $12,500 ($7,500 to the party; $5,000 to Peter); Concord Pacific gave around $12,000, Jimmy Pattison’s company, $10,000; Henderson Developers gave $12,500; the Keg restaurants gave $10,000. There are a couple of newcomers (to me, anyway, it seems) on the scene with big money. The owners Harbour Centre Complex, the Sears tower to oldtimers, gave $10,000. That’s odd, considering that the directors of the company, Rainer Hackert and Carl-Gustav Staelin, are from Missassagua and Germany respectively. Another newcomer donor is David Sidoo, the ex-football player, investment banker and owner of DB Bistro Moderne. Those last two also gave $10,000 apiece.

What does new NPA president Michael Davis make of all this? Well, he’s glad the party’s not in debt. They came out of the debacle with about $3,000. But he’d like to see a limit on donations from unions, developers and businesses. Gee, maybe there could be bipartisan support for this idea at last.

Now we’re waiting to see what Vision will file.

BTW, for those waiting to see what Sam Sullivan and Raymond Louie spent on their failed campaigns to run for mayor — keep waiting. Davis said the current law does not appear to require Sullivan for sure and Louie, maybe, to file. A candidate who runs for a nomination and loses has no requirement to file later, so we will never never find out who Sullivan’s great supporters were. (I should note that he gave $15,000 to the party through donations.) As for whether Louie, who ran for a mayoral nomination and lost but then ran for a council nomination, got it and then was elected, has to file his expenses for the mayoral nomination — that’s not at all clear, says Davis.

I would like to note for the record that I spent a quarter tank of gas, plus the cost of a coffee (with an NPA organizer) and a lunch (with a Vision organizer) on the day of the election.

It’s interesting that the new executive is composed almost entirely of the new and diverse group that was elected to the board back in December, like Chilwin Cheng, Manjot Hallen and Jeevan Khunkhun. They really seem to be trying to make the point that NPA candidate Michael Geller did during the campaign: “This is not your father’s NPA.”

Michael has been around the NPA a bit, as a long-term supporter of Sam Sullivan’s, back to the mid-90s when Sullivan was a rookie councillor in Vancouver. He now the senior counsel and director of operations with the PR company Reputations, which has long been affiliated with Sullivan as well, also because of president Wayne Hartrick’s association with him back to his early days.

I can testify from past experience that Michael has been great to deal with. He’s certainly way more comfortable talking to us media scum than previous NPA presidents have been. He worked briefly on Sullivan’s membership drive, which led up to his loss in the nomination fight between him and Peter Ladner. Michael says he kind of dropped out of the election scene after that, but is now back in and looking at how to broaden out the NPA.

Look for the association to go through another debate about what its role should be. The association has an 80-year tradition of maintaining that it’s not really a party. Theoretically, it elects a board whose main job is to choose good candidates from all parts of the city and political spectrum. Then it pretty much disbands.

Michael says there’s a “lot of enthusiasm on the board now to be more active.” The party hasn’t decided yet what to do about paying for some staff support for its existing elected members or doing the kind of outreach to members that helped Vision Vancouver build itself up so strongly prior to last fall’s election. That’s all in the planning. But the focus is definitely on maintaining the core base of voters, which held at a respectable 50,000 in the last election under Peter Ladner, convincing some people who sat on their hands in the election to come back out, and broadening the appeal. One area that Michael specifically mentioned was the arts and culture community.

The NPA’s new energy seems to have coincided with another burst of energy from park board commissioner Ian Robertson. Ian is the only NPA candidate who was elected to park board and he’s been kind of quiet until now. But this week, he sent out his first news release, letting people know about a decision the new Vision/COPE commissioners appear to be set to make about a private company that was supposed to get a contract to run a service in Queen Elizabeth Park.

I’m attaching Ian’s news release at the bottom of this post.

This new activity, if it continues, should help NPA supporters start to figure out where the party is going and what it stands for. Until now, there hadn’t been a lot of public activity going on, except for little reports over at Sean Bickerton’s blog, where the former NPA council candidate is keeping up an interesting stream of commentary on the city and politics. But aside from that, it’s been unclear in many people’s minds whether the new citycaucus.com blog was the voice of the NPA or what. Michael said, on that topic, “They’re not. I certainly like some of the reporting that they’re doing, though I disagree with some things.” Like other NPAers I’ve talked to, he likes the fact that citycaucus exists because it brings a different point of view to the blogosphere/media world, i.e. one that highlights NPA criticisms and issues. There seems to be a strong feeling by many people that the NPA somehow doesn’t get a fair shake in the media. (I await the comments from those saying all of the MSM does nothing but promote the NPA.)

So those of us who cover civic politics will be waiting to see how the new NPA defines itself and remakes itself for the new century. Looking forward to seeing what the evolution brings.

Here’s Ian’s news release

VISION-COPE PARK BOARD DECISION BAD FOR

SMALL BUSINESS

NPA Park Commissioner Ian Robertson says reversing previous Boards’ motion will hurt small business

Vancouver, BC –Vision Vancouver’s Park Commissioner Aaron Jasper will introduce a motion on March 2^nd that will reverse the previous Board’s approval to Vancouver-based Chapel at Stanley Park Enterprises Inc. to manage and operate the Celebration Pavilion at Queen Elizabeth Park, says Commissioner Ian Robertson.

“This is a sad day for small business operators wanting to do business with the Park Board and the City of Vancouver,” says Robertson.  “This operator spent considerable time and effort to go through an extensive proposal process. They negotiated in good faith with the Park Board. To have a new Board over-turn a decision that was good for the residents of Vancouver is very troubling”

Chapel at Stanley Park Enterprises had negotiated an agreement to manage and operate the Celebration Pavilion at Queen Elizabeth Park for a five-year term with an option to renew for up to an additional five years.  A percentage of the revenue would be paid back to the Park Board.

“I expect the Vision-COPE commissioners have reneged on this agreement so they can turn it into a union operation,” adds Commissioner Robertson.  “With four parties at the Board table we have a tremendous opportunity to create a new strategic plan for parks and recreation services for the residents of Vancouver. Instead, Vision and COPE are breaking deals and hurting small business operators.”

Thoughts all?