Seniors' Centre hosts big crowd for all-candidate meeting

The second of four planned all-candidates meeting saw a big crowd fill the Seniors' Centre Activity Room, on Thursday.

Eager West Van residents also filled the coffee lounge, and corridors in-between, for the mayoral discussion.

It remained standing room only by the time the council candidates got on the stage, the pressured eased a little.

With 17 candidates in the running, it was a long wait until I got the microphone. But I was able to joke about how hard it is to get attention before highlighting my extensive community work, receiving a positive response.

In concluding I shared a quote from Nelson Mandela - whose funeral I covered for BBC News - "May your choices reflect your hopes, not your fears."

I suggested that Mandela's words could help guide voting in West Van's municipal election:

Choosing hopefully means believing that we can fix problems.

Choosing hopefully means having the courage to make decisions.

Choosing hopefully means voting for someone new..

On the other hand choosing fearfully means voting for the same people, over and over again, as we do 92% of the time according to the North Shore News.

You have UP TO 6 votes for councillor - and the top 6 are elected.

You don’t have to use all 6 of your votes.

I’m hoping you choose me and Alexis Chicoine.

If you also choose an incumbent we get pushed down the list, sort of neutralising the votes for us.

If you have questions about the campaign, reach me at info@votejay.ca or through the Support page.