Next Municipal Election - Oct 27, 2014 - contenders

[1overcosc]

^ Not too sure. With Watson's victory so crushing, he may have won the rural wards, too. Last time around Watson had 49% of the vote with victories in all but the rural wards, and even in the rural wards he was not far behind. With 76% of the vote this time I feel it may have been a Watson plurality in 23/23.

[Dado]

Well to get an idea just look at the councillor races in the rural wards, one of which was an open contest.

Nowhere did the "rural anger" types do all that well. Maguire's brother failed to get much support in the open ward of Osgoode.

It would seem a bit strange for people to vote for Maguire at the mayoral level but then not vote for his ideological acolytes at the councillor level where they'd have more of a chance of making their vote count.

So really, Maguire's support must also include a fair bit of the suburbs, and for some reason I think it more likely in the older parts of Nepean and Gloucester than in the newer outer suburbs.

[JeffB]

Originally Posted by waterloowarrior

@MJMuirhead · 12m 12 minutes ago
Enjoy the victory @marianne4kanata but you will be going to court. Enjoy. #kanatanorth #kanata #ottcity

@MJMuirhead · 7m 7 minutes ago
We will also file an official complaint against @marianne4kanata for campaigning in polling station.

Sore loser? Or does he have a valid point?

He did lose by 1300 votes so it may have been moot.

[waterloowarrior]

BTW Congrats to m0nkeyman for running a solid campaign. Unfortunately in this election it was tough to win against someone endorsed by the incumbent, but I saw several articles recognizing his well thought out platform and important points raised in the debates. Would have been great to have your perspective on Council. Not going into Kitchissippi since there are a couple forum members on either side, but congrats for running good competitive campaigns.

[McC]

Originally Posted by waterloowarrior

Not going into Kitchissippi since there are a couple forum members on either side, but congrats for running good competitive campaigns.

I'll wade in!



Leiper has worked very hard for that poison chalice, and it'll be interesting to watch how he fares now that he's grasped it, I wish him the best of luck and all the success that our ward's peculiarly prickly residents and the system will allow!

Meanwhile, I really feel for Katherine Hobbs and her team. It must hurt deeply to essentially be fired by 10,000 of your neighbours after four years of working for what they thought/understood was in the best interests of those neighbours. To them I say congrats on everything you've achieved (and there were some notables on that list), and wish them all the best in their future endeavors. In that last part, I have little fear, Katherine, Geoffrey and all are smart and capable people with solid résumés, who I'm sure will land on their feet after they get over the loss.

And 3 cheers to m0nkeyman for his courage and dedication to heart of our city and local democracy!
Hip-Hip...!

[waterloowarrior]

Well said McC

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by Dado

So really, Maguire's support must also include a fair bit of the suburbs, and for some reason I think it more likely in the older parts of Nepean and Gloucester than in the newer outer suburbs.

I kind of agree actually. I have an odd feeling that Maguire's support also included some pockets of the Westboro population. I can see his opposition to Phase 2 (which the fiercest of the NIMBYs in Kitch oppose) having some resonance there.

[c_speed3108]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

I'm actually quite surprised Rebecca Pyrah is in 4th place. Zero campaign, no website, no nothing. I agree with the perception that she ran just for the hell of it.

I know some people that with a runaway, easy winner campaign like this one, will vote for certain fringe candidates with the idea to "help them get their filling fee back".

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

I kind of agree actually. I have an odd feeling that Maguire's support also included some pockets of the Westboro population. I can see his opposition to Phase 2 (which the fiercest of the NIMBYs in Kitch oppose) having some resonance there.

If that is the case, then it didn't translate to the provincial election unless they were the ONLY anti-Liberal votes.

[m0nkyman]

Thanks for the kind words folks.

[1overcosc]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

If that is the case, then it didn't translate to the provincial election unless they were the ONLY anti-Liberal votes.

You're putting way too much emphasis into the Liberal vs. Conservative dichotomy which in municipal politics does not exist. Municipal politics is independent of provincial politics, just like how federal & provincial politics are independent from each other. Municipal issues tend to blur left-right distinctions (as evidenced by the many municipal politicians who are hard to place on that spectrum).

I don't think someone in Westboro who voted Maguire because of his anti-Phase 2 sentiment would have also automatically voted against the OLP last May.

[Kitchissippi]

Watson's 76% of the vote might be impressive, but a voter turnout of 39% is pretty disappointing.

[Uhuniau]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

You're putting way too much emphasis into the Liberal vs. Conservative dichotomy which in municipal politics does not exist.

Tell that to the federal Conservatives, who use municipal elections (at least in Ontario) as farm-team-building and data-gathering exercises.

[Capital Shaun]

Originally Posted by Uhuniau

Tell that to the federal Conservatives, who use municipal elections (at least in Ontario) as farm-team-building and data-gathering exercises.

True. But that's because Conservatives erroneously think conservative minded voters only ever vote for conservative branded politicians at all levels of government. There's probably a small percentage that do (the core supporters) but most voters are probably quite volatile & flexible in their votes.

[rocketphish]

A few words to the wise, for our new councillors

Joanne Chianello
Published on: October 28, 2014, Last Updated: October 28, 2014 4:54 PM EDT

Dear councillors-elect,

Congratulations! You’ve just worked exceptionally hard to win one of the most demanding jobs in the city where, if done properly, the hourly pay is the equivalent of the price of a Starbucks grande latte — of which you’ll be needing many.

As you prepare over the next few weeks to plunge into your new public role on Dec. 1, here’s some unasked for advice.

The most important question to mull over before you’re sworn in is whether you’re prepared to let Mayor Jim Watson write the budget — and not allow any changes. Here’s how the mayor did it last time: At the second council meeting in December 2010, Watson moved a motion asking councillors to commit to a maximum tax increase of 2.5 per cent for each of the next four years. In addition, the mayor pressed his council colleagues to promise to “work within the funding envelope” for each department, and that any additions to the budget be accompanied by an “offsetting reduction.”

The motion passed unanimously. After four acrimonious years under Larry O’Brien — and tax increases as high as five per cent — the then-new set of councillors were understandably eager to show they were serious about fiscal responsibility.

This time around, Watson has promised to keep the tax increase to two per cent a year. But if he tries to get you to commit to that in a similar motion, don’t do it, councillors-elect! The last council was completely hamstrung by voting in favour of that motion, which effectively prevented councillors from making any changes to the draft budget (written by the mayor’s and the city manager’s offices).

Not only could councillors not argue to raise the tax rate above 2.5 per cent, it also became almost impossible to shift costs around. Say a councillor wanted to find more funds for transit, it was exceptionally difficult to see what other department the money might come from. And when one councillor did shift funds from one program to another within the transportation budget — which is what the motion directed councillors to do — she got in trouble.

Now, the mayor can be very persuasive. He’ll likely tell you about his huge mandate, which he won partly based on his two per cent promise. He might even show up at your new office with a welcome-to-City-Hall poinsettia like he did for your predecessors (no pressure, Mayor). And that’s OK — it’s his job to try to get you to help him keep his election promises.

But that’s not your job. You’ve been elected to represent your residents, presumably based on your own platform and ideas. This is not to say you should be advocating for massive tax increases — no one wants that. And it’s reasonable for the mayor to present a draft budget as a solid starting point. However, you do need to leave yourself the flexibility to add, subtract or shift expenditures around as you delve into the complex document. Heck, you might even decide there’s a key program you’d like to save or expand that’s worth raising the tax rate by 0.5 per cent.

The point is, your job is to set priorities for your community, to question spending decisions and to fight for what you think is right.

While you’re at it, think about whether naming members of the public to the transit commission is such a hot idea. The past few years have not clarified their value over elected officials (that’s you and your colleagues), but they certainly aren’t accountable to the public the way you are. Furthermore, two public commissioners left for political jobs — Cyrus Reporter to be federal Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau’s chief of staff, and Blair Crew to run the campaign of Coun. Diane Deans, the transit chair — which raises questions about how committed these volunteers are to these key city positions.

On a less important note, you also don’t have to support the mayor’s pledge to name a councillor as a sports commissioner because, really, is that the job you were elected to do? And, no offence, but if some big sporting event wanted to meet with a city politician, they’d want a tete-a-tete with the big guy, not with you.

Whether it’s your first or your seventh term, please remember who sent you to City Hall and to whom you are supposed to answer. And good luck.

[email protected]
Twitter.com/jchianello

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/chianello-a-few-words-to-the-wise-for-our-new-councillors

[rocketphish]

Too many bad candidates, not enough good ones

David Reevely, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: October 29, 2014, Last Updated: October 29, 2014 8:24 AM EDT

We’ve voted. Turnout was low, nine people on our new 24-member city council didn’t win majorities, and the candidates in Osgoode set a record for vote-splitting. We should change how we do this.

Cut the number of candidates

City elections don’t offer party labels as shortcuts for the voter who doesn’t have time to master the platforms and biographies of as many as two dozen candidates. Some downtown voters had that many names to contend with, when you reckon all the candidates for mayor and for open seats on city council and the public school board.

If all those people were serious candidates, that would be one thing. But most of those 24 people are not serious.

Only two of the eight candidates for mayor, Jim Watson and Mike Maguire, cracked even two per cent of the vote. In all, 53 of the 124 council candidates didn’t get five per cent.

Most of them went into a city office one day, filled out the nomination forms and then wandered off. At best, they had no idea how to run for office.

A handful were like Gloucester-Southgate candidate Meladul Haq Ahmadzai, who promised Sharia law and legalized hard drugs and invited reporters to campaign events he didn’t show up for. He got 43 votes, not enough to get on your typical high-school student council.

Force these people to find 100 voters willing to sign their names to a nomination form first and a whole lot of them wouldn’t trouble us. Sure, you could gather those signatures by approaching strangers at street corners, but even that demonstrates commitment and some basic political skill.

The easier way to do it, if you have the wherewithal, would be to organize a campaign event that people actually came to.

Competing camps could be responsible for scrutinizing each other’s lists and the city’s election office would deal with complaints about faked signatures. That’s how candidates’ finances are examined.

There’s no mechanism in the law for imposing these requirements, so the provincial government would have to change things. Among other things, candidates who haven’t filed their papers are forbidden to spend money campaigning, so there’d have to be some provision for the getting-signatures effort.

But open the field to more serious candidates

The strong correlation between campaigning hard for a long time and winning means the system favours people with flexible work schedules or the ability to afford extended leaves. A shorter campaign period would help people with regular jobs and a need to pay the bills get involved.

That would come at the cost of favouring incumbents, who start out with name recognition and familiarity with the issues, a down side worth considering. But it would make open wards easier for a range of candidates to contest.

Make money matter less

The people who have the most money to donate to campaigns and the most time to figure out whom they want to give it to are people who deal with city hall professionally. Nobody deals with councillors more than property developers and the people who work for them.

Practically nobody except them and the Ottawa Senators comes anywhere close to distributing the maximum $5,000 in donations the law allows from one donor in one campaign (money that has to be given out in chunks of no more than $750 to any single candidate).

Developers are legitimate businesspeople and they should have as much right to donate to candidates as anybody else does, but one way to limit the influence of their money is to reduce the maximum donation amount for everyone.

Make the limit $2,250, say, and a you could give to a mayoral candidate, a council candidate where you live, and a council candidate where you do most of your business. But it would reduce the number of donors who give to candidates ostensibly seeking to represent other people, or who hedge their bets by donating to multiple candidates in the same race, manoeuvres that undercut claims that the givers are just really, really civic-minded.

Again, most of these changes are outside the city’s power, so the province would have to co-operate. But as part of giving cities the authority to switch to ranked ballots in the next election in 2018 the provincial government is going to review the whole law that controls municipal elections, so there’s a golden opportunity coming.

[email protected]
twitter.com/davidreevely

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/reevely-too-many-bad-candidates-not-enough-good-ones

[JeffB]

Originally Posted by Kitchissippi

Watson's 76% of the vote might be impressive, but a voter turnout of 39% is pretty disappointing.

Does voter turnout by ward ever get published? I would imagine it might have been higher in a hotly contested ward (like Kichissippi), and lower in one where there wasn't much of a contest (like Knoxdale-Merivale, which is my ward).

[Dado]

In all honesty, we're not going to get many good candidates for mayor, especially from within city council, if there is too high a risk of losing one's position.

Look at what happened in Toronto: Doug Ford (not that he's a good candidate) had to give up his council seat (albeit to his brother) and Olivia Chow gave up her seat in Parliament. Here in Ottawa, last time around Watson gave up his Legislative Assembly seat while Doucet and Cullen both gave up their council seats (and Cullen tried to backtrack once Watson showed up). In the election before that we lost Alex Munter for the same reason.

This entire setup of having no elected office to fall back on heavily discourages what would otherwise be capable candidates from running. Why risk it? After all, a mayor is ultimately only one vote on council, which, as a councillor, one has anyway. And if they do risk it and lose, Council then loses a capable councillor, which makes it all the easier for the winning mayor to try to dictate to the rest of council.

So instead we tend to see people with no direct Council experience running (Tory, O'Brien, Maguire) against maybe one pre-eminent councillor or the incumbent mayor.

Overall this really isn't conducive to good government or competitive elections.

It would be far better to allow people to run for both mayor and a councillor position simultaneously. With a ranked ballot electoral system in place, the issue of filling the councillor position when a person wins both mayor and councillor pretty much goes away: you "replay" the election by dropping the first choice votes for that candidate and looking to the second choice votes, then it carries on as usual in a ranked ballot system.

[Capital Shaun]

Originally Posted by Dado

In all honesty, we're not going to get many good candidates for mayor, especially from within city council, if there is too high a risk of losing one's position.

Look at what happened in Toronto: Doug Ford (not that he's a good candidate) had to give up his council seat (albeit to his brother) and Olivia Chow gave up her seat in Parliament. Here in Ottawa, last time around Watson gave up his Legislative Assembly seat while Doucet and Cullen both gave up their council seats (and Cullen tried to backtrack once Watson showed up). In the election before that we lost Alex Munter for the same reason.

This entire setup of having no elected office to fall back on heavily discourages what would otherwise be capable candidates from running. Why risk it? After all, a mayor is ultimately only one vote on council, which, as a councillor, one has anyway. And if they do risk it and lose, Council then loses a capable councillor, which makes it all the easier for the winning mayor to try to dictate to the rest of council.

So instead we tend to see people with no direct Council experience running (Tory, O'Brien, Maguire) against maybe one pre-eminent councillor or the incumbent mayor.

Overall this really isn't conducive to good government or competitive elections.

It would be far better to allow people to run for both mayor and a councillor position simultaneously. With a ranked ballot electoral system in place, the issue of filling the councillor position when a person wins both mayor and councillor pretty much goes away: you "replay" the election by dropping the first choice votes for that candidate and looking to the second choice votes, then it carries on as usual in a ranked ballot system.

Your suggestion has some merit and I agree that good potential mayors refuse to run because they'd have to give up their current elected position.

[danishh]

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/ottawa-downtown-councillors-talk-of-urban-caucus-1.2816302

The councillor-elect for Somerset ward said there is strong support from other urban councillors to form a caucus to discuss issues that affect all of the inner-city wards.

Fresh off her victory Monday night, Catherine McKenney is set to take over for Diane Holmes in Somerset ward when the new council convenes.

But she's already held informal talks with winners from Kitchissippi, Rideau-Rockcliffe, Capital and Rideau-Vanier wards about creating an "urban caucus."
[...]
They would likely discuss common issues such as cut-through traffic, cycling and infill developments.

on one hand, this could be great for the future of our city, on the other, i worry it will simply become a nimby-alliance, with Councillors agreeing to protect each other from their respective community associations.