Edmonton Election 2013: Update #1

The format seems to work well for my weekly Edmonton and Media notes, so I’m starting a weekly series for the election. Thursday evenings will be the day, mainly because that’s when you can expect to have a #yegvote Hangout at EdmontonPolitics.com.

Tonight was our third Hangout and our first with a special guest! We spent some time talking with Aliza Dadani, founder of ActivatED, a self-described group of “concerned, young forward-thinking Edmontonians.” Here’s some coverage they got recently from Metro. You can watch the video at YouTube:

Here are this week’s notes:

• Here is the list of declared candidates as captured by Dave as of today. Notably there are two new candidates for mayor: Fang Hu and Kristine Acielo.
• The City of Edmonton held an information session for all candidates on Wednesday. According to the Journal, about 70 people attended. Here is Global’s coverage. Here’s the Running for Office information site. You can keep up with Edmonton Elections on Twitter. Oh and remember to keep signs off public property!
• ActivatED has made a series of endorsements over the last week. They have endorsed Dave Colburn in Ward 7, Ben Henderson in Ward 8, Amarjeet Sohi in Ward 12, David Dodge in Ward 3, and Linda Sloan in Ward 1. Further endorsements will be posted over the next two weeks.
• In case you missed it, The Local Good has added an Election 2013 section to their website. They have been posting responses to a questionnaire they sent to candidates. Here are the responses they have posted thus far: Kyle Brown in Ward 6, Scott McKeen in Ward 6, Nita Jalkanen in Ward 2, Bryan Kapitza in Ward 6, Mujahid Chak in Ward 11, Heather MacKenzie in Ward 6, Melinda Hollis in Ward 6, and Mimi Williams in Ward 7.
• The Professional Arts Coalition of Edmonton has also been posting survey responses to their Facebook group.
• Here are some questions for candidates from Action to End Poverty in Alberta.
• And yet more questions! Zombie Wall Edmonton has five for candidates.
• Ryan Hastman has posted a series of candidate profiles to his blog with many more on the way. Here’s the first batch: Jim Gibbon in Ward 5, Max Merrett in Ward 11, Harvey Panesar in Ward 11, and Dexx Williams in Ward 6. He has also been blogging about St. Albert races!
• From David Staples: You don’t have to live in a ward to represent city well and Mayoral candidates want regional cooperation, not warfare.
• File this one under stating the obvious: U of A political scientist Jim Lightbody says “there’s no clear frontrunner yet” in the mayoral race.
• Also in the Journal: “Non-partisan municipal elections in Canada are seemingly dictated by an incumbent-take-all rule, with research showing these councillors win 86 per cent of races in major cities.”
• Good question from Terence Harding: When your candidate comes to the door, what will you say?
• Todd, or @merlin67 on Twitter, has created a Twitter list of candidates. He’s currently got 59 people on it.
• How’s this for a strange series of tweets?

THIS I find strange. #yegvote #yegcc pic.twitter.com/89dok1rNNU

— Chris LaBossiere (@ChrisLaBossiere) August 15, 2013

• Karen Leibovici today posted a new video introducing herself to voters.
• Slowly but surely, platform pieces are starting to emerge! Don Iveson posted a thoughtful entry on Street-Oriented Brownstones. That followed his post last week on Edmonton’s Vibrant Arts Landscape. And just tonight, he announced he has been asked by the World Economic Forum to represent Edmonton in a program called Global Shapers.
• From Ward 10 candidate Michael Walters: A commitment to well managed and modern transportation. He also blogged about mature neighbourhoods.
• Ward 6 candidate Scott McKeen blogged about Police Training on Mental Health Issues and also Urban Sprawl.

I decided to put Dave’s declared candidate data into a spreadsheet. There are currently 6 mayoral candidates, 47 ward candidates, 16 public school board candidates, and 11 Catholic school board candidates. That compares to 7, 62, 24, and 20 on nomination day in 2010. Here’s the mayoral and ward races broken down by gender:

Some forum and other event dates to note:

• September 27: Capital Club Mayoral Candidates Forum for the LGBTQ Community
• September 30 – October 9: Candidate Forums for all Wards
• October 1: First Mayoral Candidate Forum
• October 6: Politweetup
• October 7: Second Mayoral Candidate Forum
• October 10: Third Mayoral Candidate Forum

You can follow Edmonton Election news on Twitter using the hashtag #yegvote and you can see my coverage here.

What have I missed? Let me know!

Disclosure: I’m actively volunteering for Don Iveson’s mayoral campaign.