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Line in the sand for next election: Support new kinds of housing in single-family neighbourhoods. Or don’t.

July 10th, 2018 · No Comments

As I’ve remarked a couple of times, I’ve seen a revolution unfold in Vancouver the last couple of years — something I thought I’d never see. That revolution is powered by a new generation of people who’ve gotten interested in housing and who have made it a mission to lobby for new development as a […]

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Vancouver’s centre-right party settles on a (surprise) winner, left agrees on council-slate numbers for parties

June 5th, 2018 · No Comments

Well, it was another exciting week in Vancouver civic politics, as the Non-Partisan Association, after weeks of roller-coaster drama, chose its mayoral candidate: the soft-spoken and unassuming-seeming Ken Sim. That came as a surprise to everyone, including Sim himself, it seemed, on Sunday night. All the spin and whispers up to then had indicated that, […]

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Vancouver civic election shows that much is up for grabs in an unstable climate

May 14th, 2018 · No Comments

Catching up here after many weeks, where I’ve been slowed down by a combo of too much election news and killer colds and coughs. But here we are, in what is surely one of the stranger municipal election cycles of the last 50 years. (Counting out Nanaimo here, whose problems seem to go far beyond […]

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Vision councillor Kerry Jang makes it official: He’s not running again

January 23rd, 2018 · 4 Comments

Got this note from Councillor Kerry Jang yesterday, confirming what city-hall people have been hearing for a while, which is that he won’t be running again. Not a surprise, as he has a busy second life as a psychiatry professor at UBC. Jang has been Vision’s point man on issues like shelters, marijuana dispensaries and […]

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The archive of by-election coverage

November 8th, 2017 · 1 Comment

Catching up on posting some older stories here. First up: the stories before and after the Oct. 14 by-election, which provided a story with endless interpretation possibilities (Vision dead; no, progressive vote on the rise; no, NPA on the rise; no, people-power politics on the rise; coalitions the politics of the future; yada yada). First […]

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Campaign spending reports show Vision spent a million more than NPA in city’s most expensive election ever.

February 23rd, 2015 · 7 Comments

Gets boring to write election after election, but … most expensive election ever. Campaign finance reports are over on the Elections BC website, for those anxious to scrutinize them. I so look forward to having someone note that somebody gave some sum of money every time their business licence or development is approved. The basics: […]

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Vancouver NPA and Green Party will support transit plebiscite

January 12th, 2015 · 143 Comments

Much hay was being made a week or so ago about the fact that NDP MLA Andrew Weaver wasn’t gung-ho supporting a Yes vote in the transit plebiscite. But the local Green Party rep, Adriane Carr, said she plans to support it in a motion coming to council next week from NPA Councillor George Affleck. […]

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Vision Vancouver was facing “a shipwreck” as they went into final week of election

November 17th, 2014 · 12 Comments

When the Vision Vancouver team got into the elevator at the Wall Centre to travel down to the basement level where the victory party was going on, things looked pretty good. They were in charge of the school board, they had three people apparently in line for seats on the park board, and the councillor […]

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Vision wins council, loses school and parks as voters back them one more time, with some reservations

November 16th, 2014 · 41 Comments

Assuming everyone reading this blog has now memorized these election results, so you can cite them down to the last digit for the most obscure party in all political conversations of the next decade. I’ll have more to say in the next couple of days about what Vision and the opposition can learn from these […]

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Tags: 2014 Vancouver Civic Election

BulaBlog guide on how to figure out who matches your values, how to vote strategically

November 14th, 2014 · 32 Comments

I’m hearing from more than one person that this election is very confusing for them, especially those who are young and/or who are not regular political junkies. They aren’t sure what the parties really stand for, whether some candidates are better than others, and whether they should vote strategically — or even how to do […]

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