Recent Posts
Connect with:
Thursday / April 3.
  • No products in the cart.
HomeStandard Blog Whole Post (Page 197)

Bob Mackin

If he is elected Mayor of Vancouver on Oct. 20, the target of an anonymous Facebook smear campaign says that he would strike a privacy task force to protect personal information and try to end anonymous campaigning.

NPA leader Ken Sim made the announcement Sept. 25 when he unveiled the party’s transparency and accountability platform.

“I’m extremely concerned, as I know you are, about the influence of anonymous advertising and secret money on our political process,” Sim said. “That’s why I will commission an independent, third party review of the current election financing and advertising rules, including the role of anonymous groups, with the goal of taking anonymous advertising out of Vancouver politics.”

NPA mayoral candidate Ken Sim

A Facebook page called “Vancouver Deserves Better than Ken Sim” appeared Sept. 14 and made allegations against Sim, without providing any proof. The anonymous operator of the page did not respond to theBreaker. Facebook removed the page within two days, citing a breach of its spam policy. While the page was up, a former NPA board member suggested Yes Vancouver mayoral candidate Hector Bremner was responsible. Bremner, a city councillor whose NPA bid for the party’s mayoral nomination was rejected, did not respond to theBreaker. Among the questions for Bremner was whether he would condemn the approach taken by that particular Facebook page.

“I was warned about this before I decided to run for office,” Sim said. “I have a clean record and I’m not ashamed of anything I’ve done. There’s probably going to be more mudslinging but it’s not going to be coming from us. We’re going to run our campaign based on facts, if people sling mud and they make stuff up, we can’t stop them. Were going to focus on winning a campaign.”

The Globe and Mail reported that developer Peter Wall, who has previously backed  the BC Liberals and Vision Vancouver with big donations, spent $85,000 through the Bennett Jones law firm on a secret billboard campaign promoting Bremner and his Yes Vancouver party. StarMetro reported that MNH Strategies was contracted to execute the campaign. The company’s principal is Micah Haince, who worked in the BC Liberal government caucus office under Bremner supporter Lorne Mayencourt. The B.C. phone number on the MNH website was no longer in service and a call to the Ottawa number and an email to the company was not returned. theBreaker wanted to know whether MNH was also involved in the anti-Sim Facebook page.

The controversy prompted rival Coalition Vancouver mayoral candidate Wai Young to call for a police investigation. Elections BC regulates paid advertising during the Sept. 22-Oct. 20 election period, and the Wall-funded campaign was gone before the official campaign period.

Sim said he is also concerned about complaints by NPA members who have received fundraising email from Bremner’s Yes Vancouver party without their consent. Several members have contacted theBreaker, believing there may be a breach of the B.C. Personal Information Privacy Act.

NPA campaign manager Wendy Hartley had previously told theBreaker that the party believes the only list Bremner may have accessed was the one for the 2017 by-election campaign. She said the party asked Bremner’s campaign manager in late May to cease and desist from using any NPA membership list information. Hartley said anyone who has concerns has been encouraged to complain to anti-spam authorities, such as the CRTC.

“They are not authorized to use any of this personal information,” Hartley said. “They advised us that they were only contacting people with whom they had a prior existing relationship.”

Nobody from Yes Vancouver has responded for comment.

Bremner at the Sept. 17 BIV/Courier debate.

“It’s very clear that there are other organizations breaching a bunch of rules and I don’t think that’s right,” Sim said. “People have a right to have their privacy protected. We can only carry ourselves accordingly, we can’t stop people from behaving badly. But we can point it out.”

Sim also said a majority NPA city council would establish a civic lobbyist registry and whistleblower protection, though details were not released. The announcement was timed for Right to Know Week. Sim said the NPA would also “end the process of an overly secretive city hall where reporters are unwelcome… by making transparency and disclosure the default response to all inquiries; exceptions will be made only when necessary, rather than at every possible turn.”

The NDP government has not enacted the promised Duty to Document law, which would ban the unauthorized deletion or destruction of government records. That means city hall records created under the outgoing Vision Vancouver regime since 2008 are in jeopardy of disappearing before a new mayor and council are elected. 

“They have a duty to all Vancouverites not to do that, so stop destroying stuff if you are and follow the law,” said Sim, who has promised a full audit of city hall finances.

In a 2016 compliance audit, Information and Privacy Commissioner Elizabeth Denham found Vancouver city hall, under Vision Vancouver’s watch, routinely violated basic duties of the province’s freedom of information law and tended to discriminate against media requesters.

Mayor Gregor Robertson’s former chief of staff, Mike Magee, mass-deleted his email and used his consulting company’s email account to conduct civic business. Robertson was recently found by theBreaker to be using a Gmail account to conduct civic business, despite Denham’s warning to stop using private email accounts for public business.

When Robertson led Vision Vancouver to its first victory in 2008, he promised to restore transparency and accountability to city hall. “I will not let you down,” he said, in his first swearing-in speech. 

Support theBreaker.news for as low as $2 a month on Patreon. Find out how. Click here.

Bob Mackin If he is elected Mayor of

The political battleground that Facebook has become is harmful to democracy.

That is according to the Victoria, B.C. whistleblower whose revelations of widespread data misuse shook the social media giant earlier this year.

Christopher Wylie told Extraordinary Future 2018 investment conference in Vancouver on Sept. 19 that Facebook’s claim to be a community is an illusion.  

Wylie, the former research director for military contractor SCL Group, talked about how the company morphed into an election campaign business and how social media has been weaponized against voters.

He sat down with Blake Corbet, the managing director of PI Financial Corp., at the Vancouver Convention Centre. Listen to part of their candid conversation on this edition of theBreaker.news Podcast. 

Also: commentaries and headlines from around the Pacific Rim and Pacific Northwest.

Click below or go to iTunes and subscribe.

Have you missed an edition of theBreaker.news Podcast? Go to the archive.

Support theBreaker.news for as low as $2 a month on Patreon. Find out how. Click here.

theBreaker.news Podcast
theBreaker.news Podcast
theBreaker.news Podcast: Facebook whistleblower comes home to B.C.
Loading
/

The political battleground that Facebook has become

Bob Mackin

If Peter Fassbender gets his old job back, he said he won’t quit his new job.

Fassbender is running in the Oct. 20 election to be mayor of Langley City. That is the position he held from 2005 until 2013, when he was elected the BC Liberal MLA for Surrey-Fleetwood.

Peter Fassbender in the mayor’s office, in 2011 (Facebook)

He was education minister and municipal affairs minister (with responsibility for TransLink) in the Christy Clark government until losing the seat in the 2017 provincial election to the NDP’s Jagrup Brar. In a post-election party meeting, Fassbender emphatically blamed Clark for the defeat.

Since then, he became a managing director of a company called Modusteel, which markets modular structural steel for houses, towers, warehouses, hotels, airports, stadiums and bridges. His Modusteel partners include Surrey developer Robert Dominick, lawyer David Siebenga and Stantec architect Jiang Zhu.

“It’s an organization that is looking at building more affordable housing and so it will be dealing with the private sector and social housing,” Fassbender said in an interview. “I don’t see any need for me to step away at all.”

Fassbender said, as mayor, he would recuse himself if a matter came to council that involved Modusteel, “but I think that’s way down the road.”

A brochure on Modusteel’s website lists a Surrey address, but the website includes a Richmond address. A source told theBreaker that Fassbender visited the office of Hong Guo, the immigration and real estate lawyer and Richmond mayoral candidate, on Sept. 19.

“I know Hong, but I’m not getting involved in it. I’ve got my own campaign to run,” Fassbender said.

Will Hong Guo remain in the race?

The NDP cancelled the BC Liberals’ plan to build a bridge to replace the Massey Tunnel last year. Guo is a proponent of the bridge, hence her campaign logo and change-themed campaign. Incumbent Richmond Mayor Malcolm Brodie is a BC Liberal who prefers a new tunnel rather than the 10-lane bridge concept.

“I’ve encouraged her,” Fassbender said. “I’ve talked to [Delta council candidate and outgoing mayor] Lois Jackson, I’ve talked to a lot of people for a long time that that should be one of the priorities, it’s one of the most-congested corridors in the Lower Mainland and we need to find a solution to that. Of course, I supported the bridge when I was in government and I still do.”

Guo, however, faces major obstacles to her election bid in the form of a professional misconduct citation by the Law Society of B.C. and a $13 million lawsuit, first reported by the Richmond News, from Chinese investors involved in a collapsed real estate deal. None of the allegations has been proven in court.

“I’m not going to comment on Hong’s situation with the Law Society, that’s for her to answer,” he said. “I’m going to leave that to her. I think that’s inappropriate for me because I don’t know any of the details whatsoever, I’m not going to comment at all.”

Earlier this year, Fassbender was co-chair of ex-Transportation Minister Todd Stone’s unsuccessful bid for the BC Liberal leadership. 

Fassbender’s opponents in Langley City are Coun. Val van den Broek, who is endorsed by outgoing mayor Ted Schaffer, and Serena Oh. Oh is a perennial candidate whose allegations of ballot improprieties in the 2016 by-election were rejected by B.C. Supreme Court and Court of Appeal judges. The mayor of Langley City will be paid $99,533 next year, plus meeting fees for Metro Vancouver and the TransLink Mayors’ Council.

Support theBreaker.news for as low as $2 a month on Patreon. Find out how. Click here.

Bob Mackin If Peter Fassbender gets his old

Bob Mackin

A pair of Coalition Vancouver school board candidates is taking issue with a OneCity city council candidate listing his name in Chinese characters on the Oct. 20 ballot.

Ken Denike and Sophia Woo filed a challenge of Brandon Oliver Yan’s registration in B.C. Supreme Court before the Sept. 18 deadline.

OneCity’s Brandon Yan and his grandparents (Twitter)

“There are 158 candidates [for mayor, city council, park board and school board], his is [the] only ballot accepted by B.C. Elections (Vancouver city office). No other candidate allowed same privilege,” said the statement of claim. “We hereby request either his Chinese characters be removed or all eligible candidates be given same opportunity/privilege.”

On Yan’s registration, he identified himself as “Yan, Brandon Oliver.” His preferred name for the ballot is “Yan, Brandon 甄念本.”

City hall spokeswoman Ellie Lambert said it is too late to change nomination documents. Yan, she said, was asked by the city’s chief election officer, Rosemary Hagiwara, to confirm that the Chinese characters, 甄念本, are his usual name.

Mr. Yan provided written confirmation that the Chinese characters are his usual name given to him at birth by his parents,” Lambert said. “Section 44(1)(b) of the Vancouver Charter allows candidates to be listed with any name they are commonly known as (usual name) to ensure they are identifiable on the ballot. In this case Brandon Yan confirmed to Election officials that he is known to some people by his Chinese name.”

In the 2014 election, COPE candidate Audrey Siegl was listed on the ballot beside her Musqueam name, sχɬemtəna:t. 

OneCity campaign manager Deanna Ogle refused to let theBreaker speak to Yan.

“They filed at the exact same spot with the exact same rules as Brandon did,” Ogle said. “It is their responsibility as candidates to understand the rules and make requests. The school board list has Mrs. Doubtfire on it and we’re focusing on this?”

Denike and Woo are trying to make a comeback after 2014 when they were ejected from the NPA for opposing changes to the school board’s policy on transgendered students. They unsuccessfully ran for Vancouver 1st. 

Support theBreaker.news for as low as $2 a month on Patreon. Find out how. Click here.

Bob Mackin A pair of Coalition Vancouver school

Bob Mackin

The political battleground that Facebook has become is harmful to democracy, says the Victoria whistleblower whose revelations of widespread data misuse shook the social media giant earlier this year.

Christopher Wylie told a tech investment conference on Sept. 19 in Vancouver that Facebook’s claim to be a community is an illusion.  

He pointed to the stage he was on at the Vancouver Convention Centre and the audience at the Cambridge House International Extraordinary Future conference. 

Christopher Wylie at the Extraordinary Future conference in Vancouver on Sept. 19 (Mackin)

“Everybody understands and hears what that person is saying, if that’s bullshit, someone can call me out,” Wylie said. “If I’m a candidate and I say something and I lie — news shock, lying happens all the time in politics! — but the difference is that the media can call me out, or an opposition candidate can call me out or civil society or members of the public can call me out.”

But, on Facebook’s version of a public forum, content can be surreptitiously tailored for and delivered to individual users.

Or, as Wylie put it: “I can whisper in your ear something with the benefit of having followed you around for months on end, read your conversations, listened in to what you say, what you’re interested in, what you watch, what you listen to and know exactly the types of things that you connect with and you don’t connect with.”

Facebook, he said, “has created the degradation of our public forum, because you can’t actually see what happens.”

Wylie said that is what made it a successful medium for disinformation, which is like magic. “What makes it so dangerous is that people enjoy receiving it. It’s not like you’re receiving something you don’t like, it wouldn’t work that way.”

Techniques used in political campaigns, from the Brexit referendum in 2015 to the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign, were honed with military precision by SCL Group, the military contractor where Wylie worked as research director. SCL begat its American division, Cambridge Analytica, and what Wylie called its subsidiary in Victoria, AggregateIQ.

Authorities on both sides of the Atlantic are investigating the companies that Wylie exposed. British Columbia’s Information and Privacy Commissioner Michael McEvoy has collaborated with former B.C. information watchdog Elizabeth Denham, who now is now the United Kingdom information commissioner. 

Wylie said that psychological operations employed to deceive and confuse terrorist recruits or enemy combatants have been adapted for the digital world. 

“If you’re a voter and you get led down the garden path, you are targeted in the same way,” he said. “We find you and we identify dispositional attributes in you that make you more inclined to engage with paranoid thinking, for example, or conspiratorial thinking or racial biases, and we start to compact that in you by disseminating information to you which is not necessarily true, but is conducive to amplifying your dispositional starting point.”

Wylie’s appearance coincided with the Vancouver civic election campaign that has been marked by anonymous Facebook pages promoting mayoral candidate Hector Bremner and attacking NPA rival Ken Sim. Both were removed from the platform last weekend for violating Facebook policy. Bremner denied responsibility at a Sept. 17 debate, but did not answer whether he wants to learn who was responsible. 

In May, Facebook announced a new policy requiring election and issue-related ads in the United States to be clearly marked with a “paid for by” disclosure, and that advertisers must verify their identity and location.

“We believe that increased transparency will lead to increased accountability and responsibility over time – not just for Facebook but advertisers as well,” said Facebook’s director of product management, Rob Leathern, in a May 24 news release. “These changes will not prevent abuse entirely. We’re up against smart, creative and well-funded adversaries who change their tactics as we spot abuse. But we believe that they will help prevent future interference in elections on Facebook. And it is why they are so important.”

However, the policy has not been rolled-out in Canada, despite municipal elections in B.C. and Ontario and provincial elections in Quebec and New Brunswick this fall. 

Listen to an excerpt from Christopher Wylie’s Sept. 19 appearance in Vancouver. Click below. 

Support theBreaker.news for as low as $2 a month on Patreon. Find out how. Click here.

Bob Mackin The political battleground that Facebook has

Bob Mackin

The mystery remains about who was behind a Facebook page that promoted mayoral candidate Hector Bremner and another that attacked a rival from the party that Bremner originally wanted to lead.

But the social network giant has revealed the reasons why those pages are no more.

The Vancouverites for Affordable Housing page appeared in late August and preceded a pro-Bremner billboard and transit poster campaign that took advantage of a loophole in new campaign finance laws. Vancouverites for Affordable Housing is also the name of a Facebook page that was active in 2015 and 2016 and spawned the Housing Action for Local Taxpayers group.

Logo for anonymous Vancouver election-related Facebook page

The anonymous pro-Bremner page disappeared Sept. 14, the same day that an anonymous attack page called Vancouver Deserves Better Than Ken Sim appeared. The anti-Sim page featured graphics and text that made baseless allegations against Sim. theBreaker has chosen not to repeat the allegations.

Bremner did not respond for comment and a message to the operator of the page was ignored.

Citing company policy, Facebook refused to divulge the names of the users behind the two pages. Its media relations department confirmed to theBreaker the reasons why the pages disappeared.

The admin account for the pro-Bremner Vancouverites for Affordable Housing was disabled for violating Facebook’s authenticity policy, “which resulted in the page being unpublished,” according to a Facebook staffer who refused to be identified in print.

The policy rationale under what Facebook formally calls Misrepresentation states: “Authenticity is the cornerstone of our community. We believe that people are more accountable for their statements and actions when they use their authentic identities. That’s why we require people to connect on Facebook using the name they go by in everyday life. Our authenticity policies are intended to create a safe environment where people can trust and hold one another accountable.”

The Vancouver Deserves Better Than Ken Sim page was “unpublished” for violating the Facebook spam policy.

We work hard to limit the spread of commercial spam to prevent false advertising, fraud, and security breaches, all of which detract from people’s ability to share and connect,” said the anti-spam policy rationale. “We do not allow people to use misleading or inaccurate information to collect likes, followers, or shares.”

“I’m glad to see that they are taking action,” said Justin Fung of HALT, who complained to Facebook about the pages. “I think there is still a long way to go in terms of full disclosure on the source of funds is. A lot of damage has already been done inn terms of people’s faith in politics, and people’s faith in that platform.”

Fung has launched a GoFundMe crowdfunding campaign that offers to pay for information leading to the identification of those responsible for the Facebook and out-of-home ads that feature high-resolution photos of Bremner. 

Elections BC does not regulate free content on social media, but any paid campaign messages by candidates, elector organizations or third-party sponsors must identify the advertiser from Sept. 22 to Oct. 20.

theBreaker asked the office of Municipal Affairs Minister Selina Robinson about the pro-Bremner campaign.

The advertising in this case appears to be an attempt to spend as much money as possible on advertising a mere two weeks before the campaign period begins,” said the prepared statement sent on Robinson’s behalf. “Clearly this suggests that the third party limits set by the old government, which only cover the campaign period, don’t do enough to take big money out of politics. We will be reviewing all of the new amendments to the Local Elections Campaign Financing Act based on the experience in these elections. We will make improvements where they are needed.

Bremner at the Sept. 17 BIV/Courier debate.

In May, Facebook moved to make all election-related ads on Facebook and Instagram in the U.S. clearly labelled with a “paid for by” disclosure from the advertiser at the top of the ad. The company also requires political advertisers to provide government-issued photo identification and verify where they live in the U.S. The social network has not yet applied the same checks and balances in Canada.

At the Sept. 17 mayoral debate moderated by Kirk LaPointe, the 2014 NPA mayoral runner-up and Glacier Media vice-president, Bremner was asked whether he or his party would “encourage the mystery people behind the ads to come forward and show the receipts or would you rather they remain shrouded?”

Bremner, who is running a campaign that pledges to “stop playing politics,” did not directly answer the question. Instead, he tried to shift the spotlight onto left-of-centre parties and well-known environmental and labour donors.

“So… the campaign finance laws written by the NDP, supported by Vision, supported by Green, put in place, and you know if someone wants to come out and say it was them, I’d love to know about it as well. The reality is they created this [political action committee] system, our campaign did not ask for, did not collaborate with, and did not have any knowledge of this campaign,” Bremner said.

“When this showed up it was there….(audience laughter)… Listen, where were you, when Tides Canada was pouring tons of money in here just a few years ago? You didn’t say anything, you said nothing, where is all the [Vancouver and District Labour Council] money going? There has been astroturf campaign after astroturf campaign in supporting a new party, a new campaign and it says I’m best for mayor. I was honoured to have their support. If they want to come out and do it, then. I have not engaged with them, they are free to come and tell ya.”

Bremner’s bid to become the NPA mayoral candidate was thwarted by the party’s board amid conflict of interest accusations inside and outside the party. He was elected to city council in last October’s by-election, but remained as vice-president of the Pace Group lobbying and public relations company. 

 Support theBreaker.news for as low as $2 a month on Patreon. Find out how. Click here.

Bob Mackin The mystery remains about who was

Bob Mackin

In 2014, Mayor Gregor Robertson’s original chief of staff Mike Magee was found to have used his private email account to negotiate the lease of a city building to Vision Vancouver campaign supplier Hootsuite.

In 2016, Magee was caught mass-deleting his city hall email.

Now, as his mayoralty is finally ending, theBreaker can exclusively reveal that Robertson used a Gmail account to hide messages over a four-year span from freedom of information requesters.

Last fall, theBreaker found evidence that Robertson had been communicating with chief of staff Kevin Quinlan via Gmail. In January, city hall unsuccessfully asked the Office of the Information and Privacy Commissioner to delay release of Robertson’s email beyond the 2018 election because it had to search more than 5,000 pages from Robertson’s account. Robertson opted to retire, instead of seek a fourth term.

More than 300 pages were finally released to theBreaker this summer, showing the earliest message from May 2014, six months before Robertson was re-elected to a third term and more than a year after B.C.’s information watchdog issued a stern warning for  politicians and bureaucrats to stop using private email services.

In the wake of a BC Liberal government email scandal, Elizabeth Denham told provincial and municipal officials that private email is not private when used to discuss public business. She also suggested public bodies prohibit elected and appointed officials from using private email, because the accounts are web-based and reside on servers in foreign countries.

“The use of personal email accounts does not relieve public bodies of their duty to comprehensively search for requested records and to produce them,” Denham wrote. “The use of personal email accounts for work purposes can give the perception that public body employees are seeking to evade the freedom of information process.”

The email obtained by theBreaker showed, among other things, that Robertson’s Tweets are ghostwritten.

Some examples, within the trove of “Gregor Mail.”

“Getting these out soon will help frame media. All these should be ready to go, no edits needed to fit,” Quinlan wrote March 18, 2016.

July 11, 2014: “Vancouver! It’s weekends like this that we changed patio hours to stay open later. Get out there and support our local biz! #patiolanterns” 

“Time to vote #yesfortransit. take your ballot…  Remind friends + family to vote #yesfortransit” Quinlan wrote on May 27, 2015, in the dying days of the failed plebiscite for TransLink expansion funding.

On Oct. 6, 2015: “I had doubts about #viaducts removal 4 years ago but city staff studied extensively. Connecting Georgia with Pacific=car access maintained.”

Neither Robertson nor Quinlan responded to interview requests.

Other highlights:

  • Various email about media coverage after the September 2015 firing of city manager Penny Ballem and the reaction of retired bureaucrats, like former chief engineer Peter Judd, who said Vision was pushing its agenda too hard;
  • December 2014 exchanges with perennial Robertson speechwriter Rob Cottingham, about edits to Robertson’s swearing-in speech;
  • March 2018 email about scheduling a meeting with Don Millar, the veteran campaign strategist that Robertson shared with Christy Clark;
  • Email from March 2016 from the owner of Tractor Foods, recounting his conversation with Robertson, who said he would “make some calls to push [a building permit] ahead”;
  • A March 2018 email in which Robertson expressed confusion to his aide, Shea O’Neil, about travel arrangements. “Is this doable? The cal says G travel but I’m forgetting what that is…”
  • Censored August 2017 email with ex-Vision city councillor Geoff Meggs, now Premier John Horgan’s chief of staff, and TransLink Mayors’ Council executive director Mike Buda;
  • A mysterious February 2016 email from Magee to Robertson, Quinlan at his private email address and aide Braeden Caley about Chip Wilson, the Lululemon founder and Vision donor who invited Robertson to a private Red Hot Chili Peppers concert at his Point Grey Road mansion in 2013. But the contents were censored for fear of revealing alleged advice and recommendations.
  • And a March 1 email to proclaim Jean Scott Magee Day in Vancouver, in honour of the 90th birthday the mother of ex-chief of staff Magee.

When Robertson was sworn-in for the first time in December 2008, he stated “I will not let you down on making city hall more open and accountable.”

A 2016 audit and compliance investigation by Denham found city hall routinely ignored FOI deadlines, deliberately deleted or hid records, went overboard with censorship, issued deceptive invoices, and showed ill-will toward reporters who filed FOI requests.

Support theBreaker.news for as low as $2 a month on Patreon. Find out how. Click here.

Bob Mackin In 2014, Mayor Gregor Robertson’s original

Bob Mackin

A veteran lobbyist and federal Liberal strategist volunteering on Hector Bremner’s campaign said the Yes Vancouver party’s candidate for mayor is charismatic, thoughtful and “the only person ready” for the job.

“As a politician he’s a natural, you can’t make change in politics unless you’ve got the instincts. He’s got it,” Charles Kelly said in an interview about the candidate behind the Let’s Fix Housing slogan.

Kelly’s name and signature are on the list of Bremner’s nominators obtained from the City of Vancouver elections office by theBreaker. Kelly said he retired earlier this year as the president of the B.C. Ready-Mixed Concrete Association and is consulting for the B.C. Construction Safety Alliance, but shares Bremner’s desire to increase housing supply. Kelly said he is acutely aware of the high demand for housing because he owns several condos for investment purposes in Vancouver and Kelowna.  

Charles Kelly (UN)

The former federally registered lobbyist, ex-Blarney stone owner and New Pacific magazine publisher was commissioner general of the 2006 United Nations World Urban Forum in Vancouver. That event marked the 30th anniversary of Habitat ’76 where Kelly was an aide to federal urban affairs minister Barney Danson.

Bremner is a marketing consultant and unsuccessful 2013 BC Liberal candidate in New Westminster who was ex-Deputy Premier Rich Coleman’s aide until he join the Pace Group lobbying and public relations company in early 2015.

Bremner continued as a full-time vice-president at Pace after he was elected to city council last fall with the NPA. That sparked conflict of interest complaints to city hall, which led to Mayor Gregor Robertson’s appointment of Beach Avenue Barristers lawyer Henry Wood to investigate. Wood, who lectures on professional ethics at the University of B.C., is expected to submit his report this month. Bremner is represented by Farris lawyer James Hatton, the longtime federal and BC Liberal insider who Christy Clark named to BC Hydro’s board of directors in 2013.  

“I think people are reaching at straws and trying to create a bogeyman that doesn’t exist,” Kelly said. “He certainly didn’t do anything untoward.”

Besides Kelly, Bremner endorsers who signed his registration papers include the Yes party’s campaign svengali and Clark’s ex-husband Mark Marissen, lobbyist Cynthia Shore of Patrick Kinsella’s Progressive Group, independent city council candidate Adrian Crook and former B.C. Young Liberals president Sebastian Zein.

Crook is the Abundant Housing Vancouver activist and video game and app designer who supported Vision Vancouver in 2014 and had sought an NPA nomination for city council before Bremner split from the party. Crook’s campaign advisor is ex-Bremner campaign manager Mike Wilson, husband of Yes party co-founder Jocelyn Wong-Wilson. Zein’s background includes work with Proximis, the digital ad agency that worked for the BC Liberals and Vision Vancouver.

Crook (far right), Zein (third from right, beside Bremner) during an April NPA campaign fundraiser. (Facebook)

The registration for the Yes Vancouver website contains an email address at Kimbo Design, a company that had Facebook ad contracts with the BC Liberal government and created logos for BC Liberal and Vision Vancouver campaigns.

Bremner’s statutory disclosure form says he lives in an apartment building north of Wall Centre on Burrard and that he reports having no assets. Property records show he rents from a West Vancouver owner. One of his neighbours, on a lower floor, is Vision Vancouver city council candidate Tanya Paz.

The Pace Group is not listed under Bremner’s sources of income, as it was in his January filing. His LinkedIn profile says his employment there ended in July. 

Crook’s filings indicate he is a resident of a condominium near B.C. Place Stadium, part-owner of Adrian Crook and Associates and has shares in Loud Crow Interactive Inc.

His nominators are an eclectic bunch: BC Liberal MLA Sam Sullivan, independent council candidate Sarah Blyth, OneCity council candidate Brandon Yan, Green council candidate Pete Fry and Pro Vancouver ccouncil candidate Raza Mirza.

Since we are not running for majority on any office, as Greens we have to ‘walk the talk’ when we talk about a willingness and ability to work with other parties toward consensus, and wanting to do things differently from the toxic partisanship that has been ingrained at 12th and Cambie,” Fry said.

Said Mirza: “[Crook] asked me politely and I said OK, I’ll do it. I do not think it was a big deal. I’ve done it for other candidates as well.”

But, the heart of Crook’s nominators are from the Yes Vancouver sphere (Leo Heba, Stephanie Ostler, Tim Crowhurst, Scott de Lange Boom, Sebastian Zein and Jocelyn Wilson), fellow Bremner-allied candidate Wade Grant and their advisor Mike Wilson, Abundant Housing Vancouver (Jennifer Maiko Bradshaw, Graham Cook and Daniel Oleksiuk), and Cambie Report podcaster Ian Bushfield.

NPA mayoral candidate Ken Sim’s disclosure form lists a $3.67 million house in Arbutus Ridge, which assessment records show is in the name of his wife, Teena Gupta. Sim also has a $288,000 Whistler suite through his company, Chindian Holdings. His assets include Nurse Next Door Professional Homecare Services Inc., Rosemary Rocksalt Ltd. and Sim (2016) Family Trust.

Chindian holds an undisclosed number of shares in rideshare company Lyft, which could fall under partial civic regulation when the NDP government finally legalizes the industry in B.C. in 2019 or 2020. NPA spokeswoman Wendy Hartley said Sim would place Lyft and other shares in a blind trust or sell them, should he become mayor. He also favours implementing a conflict of interest commissioner or ombudsperson at city hall.

Sim’s endorsers include Teck Resources director Tracey McVicar, West Coast Liquor director Roger Gibson, Lululemon founder Chip Wilson, and motorcoach fleet owners Robert and Joanne McMynn.

Sylvester between her ally Gregor Robertson and the Mayor of Rio de Janeiro.

Former Conservative MP Wai Young, the Coalition Vancouver mayoral candidate, reported a $1.01 million apartment near the Fraser River and $2.4 million house near Kensington Park. Vancouver 1st mayoral candidate Fred Harding, whose given names are Harold Christopher, lives with his Chinese singer/model wife Zhang Mi in a house worth nearly $3.1 million in Marpole. The property is registered to Yue Sui Zhou and Hideharu Hirose.

Ex-Burnaby South NDP MP Kennedy Stewart, whose full name is Edward Charles Kennedy Stewart, listed his residence in the 30th floor of a Concord Pacific-developed tower near David Lam Park. The suite, registered to Stewart’s landlord Shahab Moradi, was assessed at $1.83 million last year.

The other left-wing independent is Simon Fraser University professor Shauna Sylvester, the Queen of Co-ops. Her disclosure lists the following as assets: member shares in Belmanor Housing Co-Op, Vancity, MEC, Barnet Sailing Co-op, East End Food Co-op and CCEC Credit Union. She also has an undisclosed number of shares in Pique Venture Investment.

She lives in an apartment building near Rosemary Brown Lane, named for the late SFU women’s studies professor who was Canada’s first black woman elected to a provincial legislature.

Sylvester also reported interest in a cabin near South Beach in Point Roberts, Wash.

Her nominators include Vision stalwarts Denise Taschereau and Paul LeBlanc, Mark Busse, NDP Health Minister Adrian Dix’s wife Renee Saklikar, former Ipsos Reid pollster Daniel Savas, mining magnate Ross Beaty, and Sylvester’s husband, ex-CCEC Credit Union CEO Ross Gentleman.

Nominations closed at 4 p.m. Sept. 14. There were 21 people registered to run for mayor and 71 for city council.

The period to challenge a candidate’s nomination and endorsements runs through Sept. 18 at 4 p.m. The deadline for a decision on a challenge to a candidate’s nomination, and for a candidate to withdraw from the ballot, is 4 p.m. Sept. 21. The campaign period officially runs Sept. 22 to Oct. 20.

More to come…

Support theBreaker.news for as low as $2 a month on Patreon. Find out how. Click here.

Bob Mackin A veteran lobbyist and federal Liberal

On this week’s edition of theBreaker.news Podcast, host Bob Mackin checks-in with Research Co pollster Mario Canseco. 

His latest poll shows 46% of respondents say they would definitely or probably consider voting for a Green Party candidate for Vancouver city council on Oct. 20 and 38% would consider an independent candidate. 

Meanwhile, in the race to succeed Mayor Gregor Robertson, ex-Burnaby NDP MP Kennedy Stewart has confidence of 33% of respondents, followed by Shauna Sylvester and Coun. Hector Bremner at 26% each, and the NPA’s Ken Sim at 24%. 

Canseco sat down at Mahony and Sons in False Creek after the registration deadline passed on Sept. 14 to talk about his findings and observations. The official campaign period is set to begin Sept. 22. The conversation covered the bombshell withdrawal of Vision Vancouver mayoral candidate Ian Campbell to vote-splitting among right-of-centre parties. 

“To go from forming the government and having a majority in council to not running anybody [for mayor] and being in great danger of not having anyone elected,” Canseco said of Campbell’s mysterious Sept. 10 departure. “It’s one of the most-astonishing collapses that we have seen.” 

Also: commentaries and headlines from around the Pacific Rim and Pacific Northwest.

Click below or go to iTunes and subscribe.

Have you missed an edition of theBreaker.news Podcast? Go to the archive.

Support theBreaker.news for as low as $2 a month on Patreon. Find out how. Click here.

theBreaker.news Podcast
theBreaker.news Podcast
theBreaker.news Podcast: Less than five weeks until Vancouver votes
Loading
/

On this week's edition of theBreaker.news Podcast,

The filing window for candidates in the 2018 British Columbia municipal elections is closed.

The door of the Vancouver civic election office closed to registrants at 4 p.m. on Sept. 14, but it took almost nine more hours for the official list to be made public. theBreaker, which was there at 4 p.m., had been updating the list as it progressed since the Sept. 4 opening of the filing period. 

There are 21 candidates for mayor, 71 candidates for the 10 council seats, 33 for seven seats on park board and 33 for nine seats on school board. That is 158 contestants vying for 27 jobs. (Kelly Alm and Gordon T. Kennedy are running for both city council and school board.) Names will appear on the ballot in random order, after a draw for positions on Sept. 21 at 5 p.m. in the city council chamber. 

The list is subject to change. Candidate nominations can be challenged until 4 p.m. Sept. 18. Names can be withdrawn until Sept. 21.

As always, theBreaker welcomes confidential tips about what’s going on inside campaigns. Click here. 

Office First Name Middle Name Last Name Party (independent if blank)
Mayor Wai Yee YOUNG Coalition Vancouver
Mayor Katherine Susan LE ROUGETEL
Mayor Gölök BUDAY
Mayor Angela May (Rollergirl) DAWSON
Mayor Hector Dennis BREMNER Yes
Mayor Ken SIM NPA
Mayor Timothy Ping Kwan CHAN
Mayor Jason LAMARCHE
Mayor David Kuan-Yu CHEN Pro Vancouver
Mayor Michael Christian HANSEN
Mayor Constance Clara FOGAL IDEA Vancouver
Mayor Christopher Harold HARDING Vancouver 1st
Mayor Maynard AUBICHON
Mayor Sophia Cherryes Kaur KAISER
Mayor Tim LY
Mayor Lawrence MASSEY
Mayor Kennedy STEWART
Mayor Shauna SYLVESTER
Mayor John YANO
Mayor Satie SHOTTHA
Mayor Sean CASSIDY
Councillor Lisa Gwen KRISTIANSEN Pro Vancouver
Councillor Hsin-Chen FU
Councillor Harry Herschel MIEDZYGORSKI
Councillor Abubakar Amanat KHAN
Councillor Ken D CHARKO Coalition Vancouver
Councillor Glen Norman CHERNEN Coalition Vancouver
Councillor Sheng-Yang James LIN Coalition Vancouver
Councillor Franco PETA Coalition Vancouver
Councillor Penelope STAINTON-MUSSIO
Councillor Sheng XIE Coalition Vancouver
Councillor Hamdy EL-RAYES
Councillor Brinderjit Kaur BAINS Yes
Councillor Phyllis Ming-Hui TANG Yes
Councillor Jaspreet Singh VIRDI Yes
Councillor Stephanie Kelly Anne OSTLER Yes
Councillor Glynnis Choi Tei CHAN Yes
Councillor Larry James FALLS
Councillor William John SPARK
Councillor Elke PORTER
Councillor Kenneth Graham COOK
Councillor Christine BOYLE OneCity
Councillor Colleen HARDWICK NPA
Councillor Justin GOODRICH NPA
Councillor David GREWAL NPA
Councillor Rebecca BLIGH NPA
Councillor Francoise RAUNET
Councillor Morning LI Coalition Vancouver
Councillor Sarah KIRBY-YUNG NPA
Councillor Jojo QUIMPO NPA
Councillor Erin SHUM
Councillor Taqdir Kaur BHANDAL
Councillor Brandon Oliver YAN OneCity
Councillor Adriane Janice CARR Green
Councillor Peter M. FRY Green
Councillor David Hoytin WONG Green
Councillor Raza Muhammad MIRZA Pro Vancouver
Councillor Rohana Deshapriya REZEL Pro Vancouver
Councillor Lisa Marie DOMINATO NPA
Councillor Marlo Jason FRANSON
Councillor Edward Charles Cord “Ted” COPELAND
Councillor Michael John WIEBE Green
Councillor Kenneth King Chan LOW Vancouver 1st
Councillor Elizabeth TAYLOR Vancouver 1st
Councillor Elishia Amanat SAHOTA Vancouver 1st
Councillor Michelle Camille MOLLINEAUX Vancouver 1st
Councillor John MALUSA Vancouver 1st
Councillor Nycki Kaur BASRA Vancouver 1st
Councillor Jesse JOHL Vancouver 1st
Councillor Kelly ALM
Councillor Barbara BUCHANAN
Councillor Diego CARDONA Vision Vancouver
Councillor Justin CAUDWELL
Councillor Breton CRELLIN Pro Vancouver
Councillor Adrian CROOK
Councillor Melissa DE GENOVA NPA
Councillor Heather DEAL Vision Vancouver
Councillor Catherine EVANS Vision Vancouver
Councillor Wade GRANT
Councillor Gordon T. KENNEDY
Councillor Ashley HUGHES
Councillor Anastasia KOUTALIANOS
Councillor Rob McDOWELL
Councillor Penny NOBLE
Councillor Derrick O’KEEFE
Councillor Tanya PAZ Vision Vancouver
Councillor Katherine RAMDEEN
Councillor Anne ROBERTS COPE
Councillor SPIKE
Councillor Jean SWANSON COPE
Councillor Wei Qiao ZHANG Vision Vancouver
Councillor Sarah BLYTH
Park Commissioner Ray En-Jui CHANG Coalition Vancouver
Park Commissioner Jason Robert GALLOWAY Coalition Vancouver
Park Commissioner Juan Carlos MALDONADO Coalition Vancouver
Park Commissioner Taran SANGHA Coalition Vancouver
Park Commissioner Winnie Wing Leung SIU Coalition Vancouver
Park Commissioner Olga ZARUDINA Coalition Vancouver
Park Commissioner Leonidha HEBA Yes
Park Commissioner Casey CRAWFORD NPA
Park Commissioner Anne-Marie COPPING NPA
Park Commissioner Pall BEESLA NPA
Park Commissioner Tricia BARKER NPA
Park Commissioner John COUPAR NPA
Park Commissioner Camil I.S. DUMONT GREEN
Park Commissioner John Fraser Stuart MACKINNON Green
Park Commissioner Dave Andre DEMERS Green
Park Commissioner Richard (Rick) Gray HURLBUT Pro Vancouver
Park Commissioner Kathleen Anne MCGARRIGLE NPA
Park Commissioner Clifford Evan RELPH
Park Commissioner Margaret Elizabeth HAUGEN IDEA Vancouver
Park Commissioner Jamie Lee HAMILTON IDEA Vancouver
Park Commissioner Ray GOLDENCHILD Vancouver 1st
Park Commissioner Herbinder JOHL Vancouver 1st
Park Commissioner Jennifer Chang Yu YEUNG Vancouver 1st
Park Commissioner Christopher Vincent FUOCO Vancouver 1st
Park Commissioner Massimo ROSSETTI Vancouver 1st
Park Commissioner Victor CUEVAS
Park Commissioner Greg EDGELOW Pro Vancouver
Park Commissioner Gwen GIESBRECHT COPE
Park Commissioner John IRWIN COPE
Park Commissioner Mathew KAGIS Work Less Party
Park Commissioner Steven L. NEMETZ
Park Commissioner Shamim SHIVJI Vision Vancouver
Park Commissioner Cameron ZUBKO Vision Vancouver
School Trustee Kenneth Gwen DENIKE Coalition Vancouver
School Trustee Nadine Claire GOODINE Coalition Vancouver
School Trustee Sophia Wai WOO Coalition Vancouver
School Trustee Ying ZHOU Coalition Vancouver
School Trustee Jorge Julian PRIETO Yes
School Trustee Fraser BALLANTYNE NPA
School Trustee Christopher RICHARDSON NPA
School Trustee Carmen CHO NPA
School Trustee Oliver HANSON NPA
School Trustee Estrellita GONZALEZ Green
School Trustee Janet Rhoda FRASER Green
School Trustee Sheung Man Lois PEDLEY Green
School Trustee Carrie Anne BERCIC OneCity
School Trustee Erica Jane JAAF OneCity
School Trustee Jennifer REDDY OneCity
School Trustee Barbara Kathleen ANDERSON IDEA Vancouver
School Trustee Pratpal Kaur GILL Vancouver 1st
School Trustee Tony ZL DONG Vancouver 1st
School Trustee Bruno BARONET Vancouver 1st
School Trustee Marco He Pui LEE Vancouver 1st
School Trustee Kelly ALM
School Trustee Diana DAY COPE
School Trustee Stephanie DESCOTEAUX Vancouver 1st
School Trustee Fairnia FARROKHI
School Trustee Gordon T. KENNEDY
School Trustee Tiffiny KINDRID Pro Vancouver
School Trustee Aaron LEUNG Vision Vancouver
School Trustee Mrs. DOUBTFIRE
School Trustee Morgane OGER
School Trustee Barbara PARROT COPE
School Trustee Chris QIU NPA
School Trustee Allan WONG Vision Vancouver

Support theBreaker.news for as low as $2 a month on Patreon. Find out how. Click here.

The filing window for candidates in the