Tuesday May 16, 2023 | LANGFORD, BC [Updated May 17, 2023]
by Mary P Brooke | Island Social Trends
Sign-waving by BC Greens during the after-work commute in central Langford was a sign in itself. The campaign momentum for the Langford-Juan de Fuca by-election is warming up.
The weather was indeed hot yesterday … about 30°C at 5 pm as BC Green Leader Sonia Furstenau and Adam Olsen, MLA (Saanich North and the Islands) supported BC Greens candidate Camille Currie at her office opening event.
At the corner of Goldstream Avenue and Veterans Memorial Parkway both Furstenau and Currie waved signs in the company of about 30 campaign supporters at all four corners of the major traffic intersection.
The idea that when BC Greens activate voter interest in any election race is seen as a plus by party organizers. Rather than splitting the vote, they see their presence as a means to increase the voter turnout… ideally in their favour. And in a summertime election it could be said that it’s only the most motivated voters who come out to the voting stations, when people and their families are otherwise focussed on family downtime and vacations.
Official office opening:
Currie was joined by her family at the official office opening yesterday– husband Shawn and children Aidan and Mila are all helping out on her campaign.
The office is located at 734 Goldstream Avenue, on the ground level of the busy strip mall on Goldstream Avenue near the corner of Veterans Memorial Parkway.
Currie has been out canvassing and meeting people. She has been seeing a “willingness to want change” in Langford-Juan de Fuca.
“People become instantly engaged and they want to participate,” she told the gathering of supporters at her office opening. But she says people “aren’t aware that a by-election is coming” and are “not aware of what the options are”.
Other than outlining political logistics, Currie pointed out that she is about “well-being”, in the broader sense beyond just the mainstream health-care system. She is about “the well-being of this Earth, the people that inhabit this Earth, and the universal equitable access to the services that affect our well-being”. She was aiming to avoid being pigeon-holed as “just a health advocate”. She outlined her other priorities as “going green” (environmentally-friendly and ecologically responsible decisions and policies) and that the community be welcoming and encouraging to newcomers.
Though she swung back to the health and well-being, saying that without a healthy population the economy isn’t healthy…. “our advocates become frail, lives are lost”. She noted the pressures of increasing gaps in our society saying that “hate grows among us as inequalities rise”.
“I am acutely aware of the suffering that is going on in this community and I am absolutely appalled by it,” said Currie to the room of supporters and volunteers.
Generating enthusiasm:
Furstenau said that Currie is a candidate who can generate enthusiasm. She noted that by-elections have strange aspects. “It’s very hard to be tuned-in to a by-election,” said Furstenau about the involvement of voters in the community. There’s not as much press or attentionl she said. “The goal of a by-election is to get people committed to, and out to vote.”
Olsen got into some of the by-election campaign strategies. “You’ll hear that the election is going to come down to a couple of other parties” or that how Greens will be “stealing other party’s votes”. But he offered this analysis: “Where BC Greens win is where we increase the vote,” said Olsen.
“If we’re splitting the vote, we will lose, that’s for sure. If we’re increasing the vote and getting more people interested in voting than were going to vote previously, then we’re doing our job and we’re going to be successful,” Olsen told supporters in the room. It’s not about splitting the vote but about exciting the vote, he concluded.
29-day campaign:
The campaign period for the by-election will be 29 days, including Election Day.
===== RELATED:
- Strategies for Langford-Juan de Fuca by-election timing (May 16, 2023)
- Passing the BC NDP torch in Langford-Juan de Fuca (May 14, 2023)
- Three provincial electoral areas for west shore (April 18, 2023)
- BC Greens launch their Langford-Juan de Fuca candidate (April 6, 2023)
- John Horgan wraps up 18 years in BC elected politics (February 9, 2023)
- Decoupling of Langford and Sooke in proposed new BC electoral boundaries (Nov 22, 2022)
===== ABOUT ISLAND SOCIAL TRENDS:
Island Social Trends is professional regional journalism at islandsocialtrends.ca. Fully online as a daily news portal since mid-2020, Island Social Trends emerged from the path of previous print publications in the west shore: MapleLine Magazine (2008-2010), Sooke Voice News (2011-2013), and West Shore Voice News (2014-2020).
Since 2008, journalist and editor Mary P Brooke has taken a socioeconomic lens to reporting and analyzing the news of the west shore and south Vancouver Island region, including BC and national news impacts. [See Island Social Trends Politics Archive]. She has covered the details of local, provincial and federal elections since 2008. As of 2023 Mary P Brooke reports with the BC Legislative Press Gallery.
Mary P Brooke has also focused on news of School District 62 (Langford, Colwood and Sooke) at the board level since 2014 [see Island Social Trends Education archive] and has covered West Shore Parks & Recreation over the years (particularly the transitional years of 2014-2020). During 2020 and 2021 she reported daily on BC’s COVID pandemic news to build the ongoing COVID pandemic archive. Since 2021 she has been building a Food Security news archive.
Watch for the renewed print edition of Island Social Trends (formerly West Shore Voice News) in summer 2023. Advertisers welcome – inquiries. | How to be a Premium Subscriber