2014 Winnipeg municipal elections

Winnipeg CTV has coverage of Bowman's victory speech:

http://winnipeg.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=474676&binId=1.1164782&playlistP...

Cute guy, btw.

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In a way, these results are a repudiation of the Katz years. Katz' 2 council allies, Havixbeck and Steeves, did very poorly and lost ground from where they had been in the campaign. Katz council allies Swandel, Nordman, and Steen are gone, the latter 2 were defeated.

From a gender perspective, Gillroy and Lukes will join council with Havixbeck leaving, which slightly increases the representation of women councillors.

.icult than it already will be for Bowman to implement his plans.

I think the only good thing about the mayoral results was that Judy was creamed badly enough that it should provoke some serious soul-searching. Had it been close, then those backing Judy would have found something to blame -- RFO for stealing votes that Judy was somehow rightfully entitled to, people not inspired enough by her thoroughly uninspiring campaign to vote and volunteer for her, etc. With barely a quarter of the vote, and no way to blame it on vote-splitting, the NDP/labour machine has no one to blame but themselves for this one. Maybe it will provoke some soul searching and analysis as to why they lost. That may be a long shot though; I don't think the labour/NDP machine in Manitoba has the answers or even the willingness to ask the questions.

On the other hand, the provincial PCs no doubt took note of Bowman's performance and may decide not to run a Steeves-esque campaign next election. I doubt that as well though; I'm not sure they have the brains or talent to do anything but run another dolt and hope that fifth time is the charm.

PrairieDemocrat15 wrote:

Finally, A24, what's your take on how the new council will operate? Will the right maintain the control its had over city politics since at least 2006?

In the absence of a polarizing figure like Sam Katz or Gord Steeves, I honestly think many (if not most) votes and issues won't break down on clear left-right lines, and we may have some pleasant surprises. I already stated that Lukes will be an ally on issues of active transportation, and it was her activity on that file which helped her win. I also wouldn't classify Sharma as a hard-right councillor either, I generally have the sense that she's one who will go where the wind blows. This is also a long-shot, but ghoris mentioned that Browaty will probably take over for Bonnie Mitchellson, so a jump there would open up a by-election opportunity.

I heard Gerbasi's comments on the mayoral race, and while she was clearly disappointed that Judy didn't win, she also expressed a willingness to see how things went. I think if Bowman were to make use of her talent on EPC that would show a tremendous amount of goodwill. She would certainly be his strongest ally on the rapid transit file.

I'm also curious as to why you placed Dobson on the right end of the spectrum, given that he's run against Nordman several times before.

terrytowel wrote:

And with the large Aboriginal population, that community came out for Bowman. To have a chance to put an Aboriginal in the top job.

(citation needed)

terrytowel wrote:

Just speculating.

But Judy's biggest mistake was not saying in the final days

"You can vote to stop Brian Bowman. But you can't vote Robert-Falcon Ouellette to stop him. That actually won't work"

or

"If you want to stop Brian Bowman, you cannot vote for Robert-Falcon Ouellette"

As Bowman is a CONSERVATIVE!

If she said that she would have won.

First off, I don't know how you've come to the conclusion that Winnipeg's aboriginal population came out for Bowman, especially when Robert Falcon Ouellette really connected with a lot of aboriginal people in Winnipeg.

Second, even if you make the generous and unrealistic assumptions that all RFO voters (and, why not, let's throw in Sanders voters as well) had Judy as a second choice, and would have voted for another candidate, And that somehow Judy is entitled to every vote that RFO earned, even if every RFO voter changed their vote to Judy, she still would have lost by a wide margin.

Third, in the final days of the campaign when it became war that Judy didn't have it in the bag, a lot of her supporters did precisely that. Obviously they failed, because "I'm not Bowman" isn't exactly an inspiring selling point. I think some prominent New Democrat once said something about hope being better than fear?

terrytowel wrote:

If Judy advocated strategic voting against a Conservative who would gut city services, she would have won.

It worked with Kathleen Wynne.

No, she wouldn't have. The Ontario election is not the Winnipeg election. Even if you add the votes of everyone but Steeves and Bowman together and put them in Judy's column (which is, of course, extremely optimistic to say the least) that's still over 10,000 votes short of Bowman's total. The idea that she could have somehow peeled away more RFO voters from RFO than the number of people who actually voted for RFO is just plain wrong.

Not to mention that her suppprters actually did what you are suggesting. In the days leading up to the election, I saw a lot of Judy supporters trying desperately to convince RFO voters to vote strategically for Judy. It didn't work because RFO ran a much more inspiring (if sometimes naive) campaign than Judy, and "vote for me because I'm not Bowman" is literally the least inspiring campaign strategy possible.

Finally, a negative campaign could have easily backfired given Bowman's nice guy outsider image and the perception of Judy as a career politician.

terrytowel wrote:

btw Judy says she is finished with politics. She plans to retire from elected office and do volunteer and community work.

So Judy has already announced that she is leaving politics for good?

It's possible that she wouldn't even necessarily win back Winnipeg North if she were to run against Kevin Lamoureux.  It would be a close contest, but there would be no guarantees.  Things have changed in the nearly 5 years that have passed since she held the riding.

It probably did. Winnipeg voters have historically had no hesitation in voting for relative political neophytes for Mayor. Of the seven Mayors elected since Unicity, only two were sitting Councillors (Robert Steen and Glen Murray)' and three had never previously held elected office prior to being elected Mayor (Susan Thompson, Sam Katz and Brian Bowman).

Debater wrote:

terrytowel wrote:

btw Judy says she is finished with politics. She plans to retire from elected office and do volunteer and community work.

So Judy has already announced that she is leaving politics for good?

It's possible that she wouldn't even necessarily win back Winnipeg North if she were to run against Kevin Lamoureux.  It would be a close contest, but there would be no guarantees.  Things have changed in the nearly 5 years that have passed since she held the riding.

Judy has no interest in being an MP, it is a been there done that.

I suppose we can speculate that if Steeves (who i regard as kind of the Winnipeg equivalent of the Fords) had held on to second place in the last polls the election would have polarized into a Judy vs. Steeves contest and i suspect that Steeves "vote universe" was much smaller than Bowman's. Judy could have won against someone polarizing and hard-right like Steeves...but it was harder against a new face who had no record and who was harder to depict as a dangerous rightwing...in any case since Winnipeg has had a rightwing mayor for virtually its entire history - people don't know things can ever be better!

[url=http://enmasse.ca/?p=169]This is what happened in Manitoba's 2 big cities on the 22nd[/url]

Apparently the new EPC members will be unveiled by Mayor Bowman at tomorrow's swearing-in ceremony. Which I guess means the councillors have already decided amongst themselves who should be appointed. I presumed that would happen at the organizational meeting of council on November 12. I wonder if they had some sort of formal secret ballot or if Bowman informally polled each councillor one-on-one?

From what I gather, most people are betting on Jeff Browaty, Jenny Gerbasi and Brian Mayes to make the cut. Of the rookies, Janice Lukes and Cindy Gilroy seem to be the most likely candidates. Then there's the wild cards like Matt Allard, Mike Pagtakhan, John Orlikow and Russ "Wild Card" Wyatt.

PrairieDemocrat15 wrote:

ghoris wrote:

Apparently the new EPC members will be unveiled by Mayor Bowman at tomorrow's swearing-in ceremony. Which I guess means the councillors have already decided amongst themselves who should be appointed. I presumed that would happen at the organizational meeting of council on November 12. I wonder if they had some sort of formal secret ballot or if Bowman informally polled each councillor one-on-one?

Sounds like backroom "old-school politics" to me. It seems Bowman is just having private conversations with councillors before he selects "his" EPC. If that's the case, its a far cry from his election pledge of having council elect the EPC.

It was the Filmon government that gave discretion for the mayor to appoint his or her EPC, so even if Bowman follows through on his promise, the only way to stop the next mayor from stacking the EPC with loyal followers is a change in legislation. That model that Filmon introduced has to go. It was this system that produced 2 of the worst mayors the City ever elected (Thompson and Katz). What's also striking is that of the 3 mayors who were elected under this system (Thompson, Murray, Katz) when each mayor left, the voters gave a strong reputiation of the outgoing mayor's administrations the next chance they had in the general election. I think the structure giving the mayor near dictatorial powers made voters hungry for a change.

[url=http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/from-the-cbc-archives-greg-seling... trip down memory lane[/url]

*Sigh,* if only our progressive politicians today could be as open and forthright and honest as the WIN group was portrayed in that clip.

[url=http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/opinion/columnists/mr-happys-smile-turn... Bowman's honeymoon over?[/url]

Quote:

Sanders made a crack about the delegation of too much authority to the public service, evoking the old adage of absolute power corrupting absolutely. That's when the happy-go-lucky Bowman stopped smiling.

"I trust that you are not implying or in any way shape or form inferring that any individual is 'corrupt,' " Bowman told Sanders. "I am sure you are well aware of the laws of defamation and would not be opening yourself up to that sort of legal action."

With all due respect to Winnipeg's privacy lawyer of a mayor, it's impossible to defame "the administration" or any other group of people in Canada. Sanders, another lawyer, came nowhere near the defamation bar.

Far more significantly, Winnipeg's newly elected mayor wasted only weeks before he resorted to something Katz never did -- using libel chill to try to silence a committee delegate.

Sure, Sanders can be annoying. But so could the late Nick Ternette, another activist who displayed a passionate commitment to his city. Bowman must develop a thick enough skin to tolerate well-intentioned criticism, even when it's harsh.

I know it's early days, but is it possible that Bowman's coalition is starting to show cracks? Consider his [url=http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/chipman-fires-shot-at-mayor-29088... with Mark Chipman,[/url] and now the proposed budget apparently [url=http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/poor-to-bear-brunt-of-city-cuts-2... recreational facilities in lower income areas.[/url] Not to mention that he is going full speed ahead on the rapid transit detour (without even figuring out how he was going to pay for it) even though it's apparently going to cost more to go down the hydro corridor than previously estimated (ironic, since we were told as a City that the detour would be less costly than running the corridor where the actual transit traffic is). Plus, after Morantz rightly asked police officials tough questions about their budget, Bowman held a press conference with Chief Clunis to say that relations between the city and police were all fine and dandy.

I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt when he was elected even though I didn't vote for him, but now? He seems to be more about projecting a happy image of everything, rather than making tough choices as Mayor (unless those choices are tough on people without much money, which seems to be SOP with politicians across the spectrum these days). Plus, he (along with Falcon-Ouelette, for that matter) seem to have made it through the campaign without much scrutiny. Maybe I'll vote for someone different in 2018.

Any other thoughts from our Winnipeg contingent?

[url=http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/minor-increase-to-business-tax-wi... Ross Eadie and Jason Schreyer call on city to increase business taxes:[/url]

Quote:

Coun. Ross Eadie said Wednesday he would like to lessen the property tax burden shouldered by Winnipeg homeowners by raising the business tax by about 0.1 per cent.

Eadie said the business property values are dropping while home values are shooting up, and by raising the business tax the city could generate approximately $1.4 million.

“Business is not hurting in terms of taxation,” said Eadie.

With the PCs headed for election tomorrow, is there any chance that Pallister's hard-right government cracks Bowman's coalition, and could this pave the way for a challenger to a mayor who has, thus far, avoided any major public gaffes?