New Kamloops city councillors eager to learn from incumbents

Oct 22, 2018 | 4:18 PM

KAMLOOPS — After a busy election campaign and a nerve-racking Saturday evening, Kamloops’ four new city councillors have had some time to let the election results sink in. 

The four newcomers will hit the ground running on Nov. 5, when they are sworn in at the inaugural council meeting. 

“They need to understand the difference between running for office and being in office,” said Ken Christian, who was re-elected as mayor Saturday. “That can be a challenge at times. Certainly when you’re outside of the horseshoe things look like they’re going to be much easier than they actually are. These are people that I think are really students of civic government and I think they will be quite quickly up to speed.”

Dale Bass, Sadie Hunter, Mike O’Reilly and Bill Sarai were elected to city council Saturday evening, joining four incumbents. 

“I think it’s a really good thing,” Sarai said when asked about the make-up of council. “That’s what the whole plan and the whole platform was, to get some new voices, some fresh faces, some new visions. It’s really nice too, all 21 candidates that ran in this campaign, all of them could have a seat at this table.” 

The new colleagues are well-versed in the platforms of their former opponents and have noted some similarities with their visions. 

“I campaigned, and I think most of the councillors did, on keeping Kamloops affordable, and affordability,” O’Reilly said. “There’s a direct link between having strong, good paying jobs and affordability and I think everybody elected, not just the new people, all nine of us had a very similar message on that, so I look forward to coming up with solutions.”

The new council will also address such issues as infrastructure management and snow clearing. 

One of the biggest tasks facing council in the near future is the passing of the provisional budget. 

“From my background as a scientist I’ll be trying to take in as much information (as possible) and be a sponge for the next few weeks on the process,” Hunter said, “but also policy and bylaws and try to get as much as I can so I can make informed decisions and informed commentary.”

Each of the new councillors admits they have plenty to learn about the job, but each believes they are up for the challenge. 

“I have a pretty good feel for how it all works anyhow, because I’ve been watching it online for a long time,” Bass said. “I know the incumbents, I’m close to a lot of the incumbents, I consider them good friends. But, the reality is they know what’s going on, they know the insides and outs better than I do and I’m going to expect them to be assisting and answering the probably 10,000 questions I’ll have.”

The first regular meeting of the new council is Nov. 6.