Photo: Sarah Chan (left) and her husband, Mayor Don Iveson (right), at Nomination Day at Edmonton City Hall.
Dedicated citizens across Alberta gathered this morning in town halls and community centres to submit their nomination forms to become official candidates in this year’s municipal elections. In Edmonton, 132 candidates and their supporters stood in a line stretching through City Hall’s grand atrium in order to file their papers and officially start their bids for election.
For Edmonton, this represents a record number of candidates running for Mayor, City Council and the city’s two school boards.
Over the past year, I have maintained a list of declared nomination candidates for Council and the Public and Catholic school boards. This list is now updated to reflect the names of the candidates approved to run in the October 16, 2017 municipal elections.
On this year’s ballots, Edmontonians will see a few familiar faces and the names of many first time candidates. Three long-time local politicians will not be on the ballot this year. Longtime councillors Bryan Anderson and Ed Gibbons, and one-term councillor Michael Oshry, have decided to not seek re-election.
I will delve deeper into the candidates and the issues facing voters in this election in the weeks ahead, but here are a few initial observations about Nomination Day:
By my count, 48 of the 132 candidates running in Edmonton’s municipal elections are women. 13 of the 20 candidates running for the Edmonton Catholic School District are women. 11 of 28 candidates running for the Edmonton Public School Board are women. 24 of 84 Mayoral and City Council candidates are women. Equal Voice has an excellent analysis of the gender balance in this election on their website, yegparity.ca.
Mayor Don Iveson is being challenged by 12 candidates. Most recognizable among the challengers is perennial candidate Don Koziak. Koziak has run in at least nine municipal and provincial elections since 1995, including the mayoral race in 2007 and briefly in 2010, and as the Wildrose Party candidate in Edmonton-Glenora in 2012 and 2015.
Edmonton Public School Trustee Michelle Draper was acclaimed in Ward B. She is the only candidate in Edmonton to be acclaimed in this election.
The most crowded City Council race is in Ward 4, where 13 candidates are running to replace retiring Councillor Ed Gibbons. The least crowded City Council race is in Ward 2, where incumbent Councillor Bev Esslinger is facing 2 challengers in her bid for re-election.
Here are a few of the photos from Nomination Day that I have posted on Flickr under Creative Commons licensing:
Aaron Paquette, candidate for Edmonton City Council in Ward 4.Bridget Stirling, candidate for Edmonton Public School Board in Ward G.Kris Andreychuk (right) and his family. Kris is running for Edmonton City Council in Ward 7.Michael Janz, candidate for Edmonton Public School Board in Ward F.Laura Thibert, candidate for the Edmonton Catholic School Board in Ward 77.Ahmed Knowmadic Ali, candidate for Edmonton Public School Board in Ward A.
Don Iveson at the launch of his campaign for Mayor in 2013.
Mayor Don Iveson and 25 other Edmontonians have officially submitted forms expressing their intent to run in Edmonton’s next municipal elections, which are scheduled to take place on Monday, October 16, 2017.
Mr. Iveson’s papers were signed on October 16, 2016 and are now filed in the Office of the City Clerk. After serving two-terms on City Council starting in 2007, Mr. Iveson was elected Mayor by an overwhelming 62 percent of voters in 2013. Along with his mayoral duties, he is currently the chair of Canada’s Big City Mayors’ Caucus, which includes the mayors of Canada’s largest cities.
Candidates do not have to declare what positions they plan to run for until the official nomination day, on Monday September 18, 2017.
Some recent additions to the list of interested candidates, who have filed their papers since my previousupdates, include:
Beatrice Ghettuba – A Chartered Professional Accountant and Board Chair of Edmonton’s Africa Centre. She ran as a federal Liberal candidate in the St. Albert-Edmonton riding in the 2015 election. In that race she finished second with 22.6 percent of the vote, ahead of incumbent Independent MP Brent Rathgeber.
With a less efficient dollar-to-vote ratio was Ms. Leibovici, who earned 41,182 votes (19% of the total vote) while outspending Mr. Iveson by more than $237,500 and declaring a steep $142,415.27 campaign deficit.
Released last week, the financial disclosures for Edmonton’s 2013 Mayoral and City Council elections detail how much each mayoral and councillor candidate raised and expensed during the campaign. Below is the breakdown for the top three mayoral candidates.
Mayoral candidates Josh Semotiuk and GordonWard self-financed their campaigns and did not declare any donations. Candidate Kristine Acielo did not file a financial disclosure.
Here are the financial breakdowns submitted from elected city council candidates competing in Edmonton’s 12 wards.
Edmonton City Council Election 2013, Financial Disclosure
Candidate
Total Revenue
Total Expenses
Surplus/(Deficit)
Andrew Knack
$43,143.06
$43,143.06
$0
Bev Esslinger
$34,044.28
$33,220.88
$823.40
Dave Loken
$97,054.50
$96,906.55
$147.95
Ed Gibbons
$93,461.44
$93,254.44
$207.00
Michael Oshry
$82,587.85
$82,929.85
$295.00
Scott McKeen
$105,862.81
$103,585.54
$2,277.27
Tony Caterina
$87,950.00
$87,603.00
$347.00
Ben Henderson
$59,335.06
$31,640.26
$27,714.80
Bryan Anderson
$68,836.47
$43,783.69
$25,052.78
Michael Walters
$107,198.85
$106,744.60
$454.25
Mike Nickel
$65,199.00
$64,793.81
$405.19
Amarjeet Sohi
$130,840.99
$85,105.30
$45,735.69
According to the Local Authorities Elections Act, donations to municipal election candidates are limited to a maximum of $5,000 for individuals, corporations and trade unions during an election year.
Dedicated citizens across Alberta will gather this morning in town halls and community centres to submit their nomination forms to become official candidates in this year’s municipal elections.
In the capital city, the excitement is taking place at Edmonton’s downtown City Hall. With three-term Mayor Stephen Mandelnot seeking re-election, three Councillors and a handful of other Edmontonians have stepped forward to fill the spot. While Don Iveson, Kerry Diotte and Karen Leibovici are the front-runners in the race, there is always the possibility of a dark-horse candidate stepping out of the shadows and jumping into the mayoral contest today.
UPDATE: The Edmonton Journal is reporting on the results of a Leger survey which shows Don Iveson with 47% of decided voters, Kerry Diotte with 28%, and Karen Leibovici with the support of 25% of decided voters. When taking undecided voters into account, the support is 20% for Councillor Iveson, 12% for Councillor Diotte, and 11% for Councillor Leibovici. While this is only one poll, and I look at all polls with skepticism, I am very surprised at how low Councillor Leibovici’s support is, considering her 20 year career as a politician in Edmonton.
There will be a few familiar faces missing from the ballot on the October 21 voting day. Six Councillors are not seeking re-election in their Wards. While this is a large turnover, it is not uncommon in recent elections. The last time Council faced such a significant turnover was in 2001, when six Councillors did not seek re-election.
Until this weekend it appeared as if Councillors Ben Henderson in Ward 8 and Amarjeet Sohiin Ward 12 would be acclaimed, but last-minute candidates have announced their intentions to challenges these incumbents. In Ward 9, Councillor Bryan Anderson remains unchallenged. If he remains unchallenged today, it will be the first time in recent memory that a City Councillor in Edmonton has been acclaimed.
#yegvote Google Hangout
Tune in to a special Nomination Day #yegvote Google Hangout tonight at 8:00 p.m. at EdmontonPolitics.com. Mack Male, Ryan Hastman and I will run down the list of candidates and give our analysis of the first official day of the election campaign.
Municipal elections in Alberta are being held on October 21, 2013.
After a week-long break from the world of political writing and social media, I was happy to return just in time for yesterday’s sixth edition of the #yegvote Google Hangout. This week, Ryan Hastman and I were joined by guest Steven Dollansky, who sat in for Mack Male, who could not make it this week.
In this week’s hangout, we focused on the three-main mayoral candidates – Kerry Diotte, Don Iveson, and Karen Leibovici – and how they are positioning themselves in the hotly contested race to replace outgoing Mayor Stephen Mandel.
With the election less than two months away, and nomination day on September 23, we are expecting the election to quickly heat up as candidates try to gain attention and differentiate themselves from the large pack of political hopefuls that are crowding this year’s municipal election ballots in Edmonton.
With much attention focused last week on Edmonton Mayor Stephen Mandel‘s harsh criticisms of the recent provincial budget, it may have been easy to miss news that candidates planning to seek election in this October’s municipal election are beginning to creep out of the woodwork.
Michael Walters
Community organizer Michael Walters launched his campaign this weekend in Edmonton City Council’s Ward 10. The Ward is being vacated by two-term Councillor Don Iveson, who announced last year that he would not seek re-election in Ward 10. Mr. Walters was the Alberta Party candidate in Edmonton-Rutherford in the 2012 provincial election and has recently been involved in local initiatives to redevelop the near-abandoned Petrolia Mall in the Greenfield neighbourhood.
More than 200 people attended Mr. Walters’ campaign launch, including Ward 9 Councillor Bryan Anderson (who also recently announced his intentions to seek re-election), former Councillor Michael Phair, Edmonton-Riverview PC MLA Steven Young, former School Board Trustee Sue Huff, and past Liberal candidate Arif Khan.
Ray Martin
Speaking to a crowd of New Democrats gathered to celebrate his more than 30-year career in politics, former MLA Ray Martin announced his intention to seek election in Edmonton Public School Board’s Ward D in this October’s municipal elections. Ward D’s current Trustee, Dave Colburn, announced he will not seek re-election.
“Once again, Edmonton’s schools in the urban core are in the crosshairs of PC budget cuts.” said Mr. Martin said in a press release this morning. “It’s time for Edmontonians to stand up for these schools and neighbourhoods and I’ll be happy to take that fight to the board and to the PC government.”
If political candidates earned Air Miles for each time they ran in an election, Mr. Martin would be the New Democratic Party’s resident globetrotter. Having served as his party’s provincial leader and leader of the Official Opposition from 1984 to 1993, Mr. Martin has become his party’s most well-known standard bearer over the past thirty-years (at least).
First elected as MLA for Edmonton-Norwood from 1982 to 1993, Mr. Martin returned to provincial politics in 2004, serving as Edmonton-Beverly-Clareview‘s MLA until 2008. Between his times in provincial politics, Mr. Martin was an elected trustee representing Ward D and was a perennial federal NDP candidate in Edmonton. Most recently, Mr. Martin ran as the NDP candidate in Edmonton-East in the 2008 and 2011 federal elections and in Edmonton-Glenora in the 2012 provincial election.
Mimi Williams
Writer and local activist Mimi Williams has announced her plans to challenge Councillor Tony Caterina in Ward 7 (Councillor Caterina is expected to seek re-election). A long-time NDP activist, Ms. Williams made her announcement at the NDP provincial council held last weekend in Edmonton. Her previous electoral experience includes runs for Edmonton Public School Board in 1995 and City Council in 1998, 2001, and 2004. Ms. Williams is expected to officially launch her campaign later this year.
Pity the Billionaire. Oilers owner Daryl Katz asks Edmonton City Council to make more financial concessions in his sweat-heart deal to build a new downtown arena.
One week after Edmonton’s Chamber of Commerce warned of dramatic consequences if construction of the new downtown arena did not begin soon, the Katz Group, owned by billionaire Daryl Katz, has demanded further financial concessions to the already rich deal that City Councillors agreed to last year. Despite weak-kneed support by most Councillors who voted to build a downtown arena for the Katz Group-owned Edmonton Oilers last year, a pre-election year backbone appeared in Council Chambers today.
In a last-minute addition to the agenda, councillors were given a top-secret briefing by city administration on negotiations with the Katz Group over a new downtown arena.
When councillors finally emerged from their closed-door meeting, they were grim. Without revealing any details of their private discussions, Bryan Anderson and Kim Krushell, two of the most passionate supporters of the arena project, moved and seconded a motion, written in the sort of code that could only be deciphered by longtime arenaologists.
Here’s the exact wording: “That in response to the Katz Group’s recent request for additional public funding, administration is directed to respond to the Katz Group that City Council remains committed to the negotiated framework approved by City Council on October 26, 2011.”
Simple translation?
No.
No more concessions for Daryl Katz and the Oilers. Councillors were united in their new-found resolve. Only Kerry Diotte and Linda Sloan voted against the motion — and that’s only because they thought last October’s deal was too rich. Read more…
Meanwhile, Mr. Katz’s employees, Taylor Hall and Jordan Eberle, are signed up to earn $42-million and $36-million over the next seven and six years playing for the last-place Edmonton Oilers. Mr. Katz’s hockey company may operate in an alternate bizarro universe when signing paycheques, but these types of sky-high salaries make it difficult to feel sympathetic to his company’s plea for more financial concessions by Edmontonians.
If you read one article today, please read Paula Simons well written column on how billionaire Daryl Katz and the Katz Group were able to score major concessions from the City of Edmonton during their campaign to secure public funds to build their new downtown arena.
Simons: Katz Group power play scores major concessions from city
Call it the art of the deal — raised to the level, not of a Donald Trump, but of a Leonardo da Vinci.
Back in April, Edmonton city council agreed that it would only support Daryl Katz’s proposal for a new downtown arena under a long list of very strict circumstances. Among them? The motion required the Katz Group to put up at least $100 million toward the capital cost of the arena. It put a strict $125-million ceiling on the city’s direct cost for building the facility. And it specified that no deal would go ahead until another level or levels of government had somehow made up the remaining $100 million funding shortfall.
There is still no public hint of that magical $100 million, from either the Alison Redford Tories or the Stephen Harper Conservatives.
Yet at a hastily called meeting this past Friday, with three councillors out of town and one on a medical leave, city council voted to buy the land that Katz has optioned for a new arena. (Bryan Anderson, who’s recovering from surgery, missed the vote. So did Ben Henderson, who was stuck on a plane. Karen Leibovici and Linda Sloan were out of the country on holiday, but voted over the phone.) Of those councillors who did vote, only Sloan, Tony Caterina, and Kerry Diotte opposed the purchase.
Read the rest and if your stomach is feeling queasy when you reach the end of the column, phone or email the Mayorand your City Councillor, and tell them how you feel about the decisions they are making by rushing the decision to provide public funds to pay for a downtown arena for Mr. Katz and his company.
Depending on what part of Edmonton you live in, you have probably noticed the lawn signs beginning to line up on private front lawns and sprawled across City-owned boulevards. While I hear that the sign war is red hot in the closely contested Wards 3, 7, and 11, in my downtown Ward 6 I have only noticed signs from a handful of candidates (Michael Janz, Bev Sawyer, Brian Kaptiza, and Rudy Arcilla).
Thus far there is virtually no signage belonging to incumbent Councillor Jane Batty in my neighborhood. This is a stark contrast from the last time I lived in this neighborhood during a municipal election. Back in 2004, I remember the area being covered with signs belonging to Councillors Michael Phair, Mrs. Batty, and then-challenger Ben Henderson (who is now standing for election in the new Ward 8 on the south side of the North Saskatchewan River).
There have been three City of Edmonton sponsored all-candidates forums held since Nomination Day in Wards 3, 7, and 11. They were all live-streamed online and should be posted shortly afterwards on the City of Edmonton election website.
Jeff Samsonow wrote a thought-provoking article yesterday that raised some serious questions about how the media cover their colleagues who are jumping into politics. More specifically, Mr. Samsanow is referring to on-leave Edmonton Journal columnist Scott McKeen, who is standing for election in Ward 7. Journal columnist Todd Babiak shared some of his thoughts on the Edmonton Commons blog, but did not really address the issue that Mr. Samsonow was getting at.
Scanning some of the candidates websites over the past few days has revealed some interested gems. Who would have thought that the people in your neighbourhood were such a colourful bunch? For example, did you know that the guy living down the street believes that the relationship between North Edmonton and South Edmonton is similar to North Korea and South Korea? Ward 3 candidate John Oplanich says so on his website.
The Northside has been ignored for far too long at the expense of the Southside/Westend/Millwoods and City Council (Ron Hayter, Kim Krushell, Ed Gibbons, Tony Caterina) has allowed this to happen. The southside/westend /Millwoods continues to flourish, prosper and live in luxury as the northside is drowning in controversy – City Center Airport/CN Railway in Calder. For 80 years we have called this corridor a Wasteland-Dead Zone. Can we afford to wait another 40 years? We need a strong and clear voice on City Council. VOTE for CHANGE. I‘m starting to feel like I live in North Korea and on the opposite side of the river is beautiful South Korea.
Ward 4 candidate Scott Robb is the first open Satanist to stand for election in Edmonton. I do not wade into the topic of organized religion very often on this blog (for good reason) and I am not going to start now, so you can make your own judgments. Whether you agree with Mr. Robb’s religious beliefs or not, he deserves some credit for being so open with it (at least he’s not running for the Catholic School District). I asked Mr. Robb about an online campaign that has emerged against him:
“All I have to say about it is it is one man’s narrow-minded ignorant opinion of me in which he fabricated stories, took posts of mine out of context (and some were photoshopped, although he publicly denies it)…
I’m curious, is that where everyone is finding out my religious beliefs? Because Satanism is not a cult, it’s been recognized as a legit religion since the british repealed their witchcraft laws in 1951! Cults brainwash people and don’t let members leave, we urge people to learn on their own and allow them to leave our church simply with a notification that they wish to…”
Meanwhile, retiring Trustee Gerry Gibeault is sharing some advice from his fifteen years on the Edmonton Public School Board: School Board Secrets. One political watcher close to the public school board has told to me that the online presence of this normally low-profile Trustee in this campaign could signal Mr. Gibeault’s desire for more than just a quiet retirement. The source suggested that Mr. Gibeault could be interested in a return to provincial politics in the near future. He was the NDP MLA for Edmonton-Mill Woods from 1986 to 1993.
Mayoral candidates targeted the vote rich communities of Senior citizens in the City today. Mayor Stephen Mandel announced plans today about Seniors Housing and Recreation. The Seniors Housing plan proposes more cooperation between the City, the Province, Builders, and Seniors Groups to expand the number of seniors housing units available in Edmonton.
Mayoral candidate David Dorward made his first non-City Centre Airport related policy announcement today focusing on seniors and taxes. It has not yet been posted online or emailed out to their media list, so I do not have link to refer to. Thanks to @OrganizerMike for providing a less than 140 character summary of Mr. Dorward’s announcement:
@davecournoyer i stopped by his Presser- tax caps, tax rebates to seniors, review LRT spending -basically #yegvote
The first Mayoral all-candidates forum will be held tonight at Harry Ainley School from 7:00pm to 9:00pm. I will be there live-tweeting (follow @davecournoyer and #yegvote) and will provide some reflections on the debate later tonight.
