Getting closer to municipal election day
In just over a month, Calgarians head to the polls to vote for a new (or old) municipal goverment.
Monday is nomination day when hopefuls line up at city hall to file their papers and pay their nomination fee. This year we will see some intense battles for representation of the wards and possibly for the top spot.
Already the race has been given a jolt with veteran Alderman Barry Erskine announcing his retirement. Erskine, representing Ward 11, held a news conference today to let us know of his decision which has caught many city hall watchers off-guard. Erskine has maintained, up until now, he was running for the spot.
The odd twist is that Erskine says he isn’t going to close the door to provincial politics…which means some in Calgary may be putting an “X” by his name in the spring.
Without an incumbent running in Ward 11, we’ll have at least one new member in council…and that member may be green.
Brian Pincott of the Sierra Club of Canada has already announced he will run. Pincott is running his campaign on green power (in more ways than one). To power his campaign office, he is using 100% green, carbon-free electricity generated in Alberta.
This is not the only high profile race. Joe Ceci will (or might?) get a run for his money when the Calgary Police Association boss, Al Koenig, battles him to represent Ward 9.
Koenig’s announcement wasn’t as big a surprise as Erskine’s, with the rumour mill churning weeks before Koenig confirmed he is running.
Besides those two wards, it doesn’t seem many current aldermen are facing a high profile challenge except perhaps Druh Farrell. Merle Terlesky will be running in Ward 7. Terlesky is a leukemia survivor who grew up in B.C. and unsuccessfully ran for the Alberta Alliance Party in Lethbridge. He may be the one to stir the pot in this election.
Now to the mayor. It isn’t easy to beat an incumbent but it’s not impossible. While I only know of a handful of people running against Mayor Dave Bronconnier, the wonderful world of Wikipedia claims there are quite a few.
Alnoor Kassam was the first to throw his name into the hat. The local businessman is getting his name known through ads on the LRT with a green stop sign….that simply says “GO”.
Alexander Jenkins, a seismologist and geophysical consultant is running on a campaign of putting the downtown C-Train line underground.
Harry Heck..yes Heck…is running an ad campaign that appears as a black sign on the front of busses saying things like “What if…”. Heck is a real estate agent.
Jeremy Zhao is a 19-year-old U of C student who believes he can become mayor, despite being the youngest candidate (despite his lack of experience).
According to Wikipedia, Doug Service (who has run for municipal office previously), Oscar Fech, and Barry Eldridge are the other three candidates running for mayor.
Who knows what is going to happen in this year’s election, but we already have some political fun to look forward to…and at least one change in office.
This list of candidates isn’t set in stone though. Remember we may get some more surprise announcements considering we still have about five days until nominations close.
After all, Ralph Klein didn’t decide to run for mayor until the last minute and people were calling him “Your Worship” after the votes were cast. Wait a minute…Klein was a journalist too. King Cormac…I like the sound of that.