OPINION

It’s time for Mayor Basran to go.

Elections of all types generally have low turnouts, this is even more so the case when it comes to municipal elections. Yet, arguably no vote counts as much as one you cast for a council member and Mayor. And in the case of Kelowna being such a dynamic and fast growing city these votes are especially critical.

Kelowna IS a dynamic city make no mistake about it. It seems like our current Mayor however thinks that Kelowna being “dynamic” is his doing. Follow Mayor Basran’s social media and professionally produced videos that promote the brand of Colin Basran and you see this. Full credit to whoever is doing some of these videos. They are really good if the goal is to promote a product or help someone become a social media influencer.

I appreciate marketing and social media influencers as much or more than anyone. I just don’t need it or appreciate it when it’s coming from our Mayor.

Mayor Basran’s strategically planned re-election announcement was titled “Kelowna’s Future, my Future.”

As voters we should only care about the first part of that sexy title.

I like Colin Basran. I have voted for Colin Basran in the past but I think he has lost sight of what is important to our city and what’s important when it comes to serving the citizens who vote for civil servants.

Mayor Basran is not getting my vote for the 5 reasons below:

1.TIMING OF HIS RE-ELECTION ANNOUNCEMENT

The Mayor has stated that he waited until the final day to announce because he didn’t want to campaign this summer, preferring  to spend time with his children. I can salute spending time with his children and putting campaigning on the back burner.

We all get 100% family time vs summer campaigning…but the claim that this is why no earlier announcement is questionable. He could have easily declared and said he would start his campaign after the summer. This is politicking, period…especially when it conveniently allowed ads featuring Mayor Basran to be posted on the city website because he had not declared his candidacy yet.

Everybody knew for months that Mayor Basran was running. The timing was strategic and it used the citizens website for his political gain.

2. AFFORDABLE (FAMILY) HOUSING

I am a Realtor in Kelowna and part of a focus group of Realtors concerned about housing affordability and how it may be affected by real estate speculation in our city and throughout the Central Okanagan. We are people “on the ground” as they say. We are Realtors who are genuinely concerned about families and young people being able to afford homes that accommodate a “family” that can’t fit in tiny condos.

We are people who are taking time out of our business life and sticking our necks out with opinions and concepts that will likely cost us some speculator/investor clients. The smart thing for our business would be to stay quiet and just sell, but we care and want to try to help. We don’t pretend to have all the answers, but we might or might not have concepts that would be helpful.

I know Colin, not well, but well enough that I have his cell phone number. I have received text messages from him during past elections asking for support. This past April 18th I texted him “hello Mr. Mayor” and got a “Hi Blake” back. I responded in text about the focus group I am a member of and asked if we could get some time with him.

I didn’t get a response, not a word.

In May, this group of 10 Realtors had lunch to discuss the housing crisis affecting families in our city. Mayor Basran and most of the council coincidentally seated a table over from us. This prompted Colin to come over to me. He appeared a bit sheepish as he apologized for not getting back to me a month earlier. I told him I understood completely as I know he’s busy. I pointed out the focus group I had texted him about and he shook my hand as he told me he would be reaching out to discuss our ideas.

I haven’t heard a word from Mayor Basran.

Incidentally, I wrote a letter around the same time to BC Housing Minister David Eby who did take the time to personally respond about 3 weeks later and say that he was interested in hearing from Realtors who were concerned as we were. He said he was very busy and gave me contact information for his staff where we could send information to and asked if we could circle back to discuss. I’m a centre/right guy when it comes to politics so I'm not an NDP voter but I do respect some of their ideals. And I sure respect Mr. Eby for at least acknowledging me.

My experience with Mayor Basran is one of a Mayor who doesn’t seem to care about family housing but has all the time in the world for micro suites.

My experience with Mayor Basran is one of a Mayor who will ask me for help but ignore me when I reach out as a citizen on behalf of this city.

3. RON CANNAN

We have all heard about Mayor Basran swearing at Ron Cannan for attending his re-election announcement and telling him to “get the f_ _ _ out” (turns out Ron was actually invited to the event by someone on Colin’s team).

Anyone who knows Ron Cannan will agree that whether you agree or disagree with his politics, he is a pretty easy to get along with guy and pretty soft spoken. In any event, Ron was right when he told Mayor Basran “if we are both elected we have to work together” as he went to shake our Mayor’s hand. A true leader would have shook Ron’s hand and welcomed him, our Mayor swore at him.

The fact that our Mayor would become so unhinged as to lash out as he did shows he really would be out of his element when working in truly pressure situations on behalf of our city.

Mayor Basran has suggested that another Mayoral candidate, Tom Dyas couldn’t handle the Mayor’s chair because he hasn’t served on council. I’d suggest that between the other groups (including Chamber of Commerce) he has led, and his business success Dyas would be capable of the job (the Mayor isn’t alone after all).

Regardless, Mayor Basran’s attack on a council candidate should be a serious red flag and a bigger issue than it seems to be.

4. RCMP SITE

This summer I attended a public hearing on the downtown UBC building. I love so much of our downtown growth but do have some questions about the seemingly constant exceptions being made to our OCP and the height of the university building.

I stayed for the discussion on the building that would be going on the former RCMP site. In a nutshell this is what occurred.

The city put out requests for proposals to build on what was a 13 story site according to the OCP.

A winning bid was selected out of three proposals some months ago.

The developer proposed a building that by all accounts was pretty ugly.

Based on negative public feedback the developer re-submitted a new design. While this new design is a beautiful building, it has grown to 25 stories.

This design was approved at the public hearing.

There has been a lot of public feedback that a new request for proposals should have been sent out in light of this MAJOR change in height. Other developers bid in good faith on the project. Yes, this new building is beautiful but the optics are not, the optics and perception is bad.

A couple things that were very interesting to me on this night.

Council talked often about the initial design blocking the view of the Innovation Centre patio and the new design being better for the Innovation Centre needs. Lane Merrifield actually spoke at the hearing in favour of the new design because the site lines and set-back are such that it doesn't interfere with his building's patio view as the initial one did. I don’t blame Lane one bit for working to protect his site line, but he did know something was going to be built next door when he built his building. City council wanted to be sure to protect this wealthy owner's view. If views from decks are a concern downtown we might as well stop downtown development right now. Or is the city only concerned with view concerns from certain people and not others?

Council talked about Madison condo owners' views being better with this new building as opposed to the original design. The only 3 Madison owners in attendance on this night actually spoke against the building being approved. Two of these owners loved the design but said the city should put out new requests for proposals for the reasons of transparency.

City staff and council members stated that their lawyers have said they can make this switch. Perhaps legally it’s something that would stand the test in court but it’s really bad business and creates distrust. In my opinion trust and transparency is the most important thing in situations such as this.

This tells me trust and transparency aren’t important to our Mayor. But it gets worse.

5.TRUST AND TRANSPARENCY

When it was reported by Kelowna media that Mayor Basran was renting a multi-million dollar lakefront home from one of the province’s biggest developers (market value rent would have been far beyond a Mayor’s salary) our Mayor’s response was irresponsible and should be offensive to Kelowna taxpayers.

“I’m renting the home just like anyone else would rent a home and it’s a private matter that’s not anyone’s business,” Basran said. “Quite frankly, how I live my life as it pertains to where I live and where my children stay with me is not anyone’s business, as far as I’m concerned.”

The fact that Mayor Basran didn’t see in advance that renting such a home from a developer was potentially a conflict of interest is bizarre to me. The fact that he told taxpayers it’s none of our business is offensive.

It is our business Mr Mayor. If you don’t see that, if you don’t value public perception or the fair and logical questions of the people who pay your salary that’s a problem.

We have a great city, I don’t blame our council for some of the problems we face. Crime and homelessness are so complicated, there is only so much they can do.

But conversely so much of what makes our city great has nothing to do with council either. Mayor Basran just put out a campaign video boasting about what a popular tourist destination we are. Uh, Mr. Mayor, that’s mainly because of the lake and Ogopogo, not you.

Do I think Tom Dyas has all the answers, no I don’t. No person running for the Mayor’s chair does. But I do trust him to make the right decisions along with the right council around him.

Mayor Basran is a nice man so this letter may seem somewhat pointed. But I’ve lost faith and trust in him to make the right decisions for our city.

It’s time for him to go.

Blake Roberts
Kelowna

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