Municipality elections are set to take place across B.C. on November 15, however Sun Peaks residents won’t be turning out to the polls, due to a lack of nominees for the open positions.
Sun Peaks mayor, Al Raine, and councillors Mike Forster, Ines Popig and Mario Pozza were officially re-elected by acclamation on October 20. They will be sworn in for their four-year terms at the municipality meeting on December 1.
No other candidates were declared following the close of the nomination period on October 10.
Mayor Raine said he would have liked to have seen the election run its course.
“The perfect world would be a rotation of at least one position each time so that you could get some new people involved,” Raine said. “You could say the democratic process is best served when there are more people running, but if people are satisfied, then that’s fine too.
“Obviously the community has some confidence in the present council, and that was one of the motivations for others not to run at this time.”
Raine said there was still plenty of work to be done by the current council, and he looked forward to continuing on with them for the next four years.
“I’ve talked to all the councillors and everybody is excited about the next four years and the things we can accomplish.”
The new, four-year-terms, may have been a factor in discouraging nominations, based on feedback Raine received.
“I do believe the four years terms were a factor, and I’ve spoken to a number of councillors in other jurisdictions, and people were concerned about the four years. There are people who aren’t running again (elsewhere) because the four years was seen as too much for them.
“The big push for four-year-terms was from urban areas, where the cost of elections can run into the millions of dollars.”
Raine also reiterated that he intends to step down from the role of mayor in the future.
“At this point, my intention is that this will be the last term for me,” he said.
The next four years will give the council the opportunity to implement some succession planning, with Raine saying the next mayor didn’t necessarily need to come from within the current council.
“There are a lot of people who could attend council meetings and get a pretty good feel for what’s going on in the municipality and make for a very good councillor or even mayor in the future.”
Raine said he expected the next election would see some changeover.
“Right now, for everybody on council, they will have given eight years to the community.
“Hopefully a few councillors will stay on, so there’s some continuity in the next round, but I’m sure there will be some changes in the next election.”
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