If social and environmental causes are guiding your vote during this month’s civic election, the Coalition for a Livable Sudbury has you covered.
They joined various other local organizations in drafting seven pledges they asked all of Greater Sudbury’s mayoral and city council candidates to sign. The results were released this week.
“I think we were really happy that so many candidates responded, especially among the mayoral candidates – a very high response,” Coalition for a Livable Sudbury chair Naomi Grant told Sudbury.com.
“We want people to be able to see where their candidates stand on the issues important to them.”
Although the majority of candidates responded, 19 of 49 did not.
Grant noted they had plenty of opportunity with three emails sent to candidates, followed by two phone messages.
The pledges, with additional context, include urgent climate action, housing for all, reallocating funds from policing to services, basic mobility, support for community initiatives, truth and reconciliation and better protecting land and water.
“These are all very interconnected issues,” Grant said, adding they were compiled by various community organizations via public outreach both in-person and online during the past several months.
The least popular of these pledges among candidates was No. 3, under which they were asked to support reallocating funds from policing to services. In full, the pledge is “to actively champion shifting 10 per cent of the GSPS budget to social services and supports such as affordable housing, community-based crisis response and harm reduction.”
Among the eight mayoral candidates to respond, only Brian Bigger (now withdrawn from the race) and Evelyn Dutrisac responded “yes,” while Don Gravelle, Bob Johnston, Paul Lefebvre and Mila Wong responded “unsure.”
Both Devin Labranche and Miranda Rocca-Circelli responded “no,” and David Popescu did not answer any of the pledge questions.
In his comments, Labranche wrote that the information presented in the pledge document was biased. “It’s my belief that we’re all after the same long-term goals although the way we get there will have many different paths and outcomes from those decisions.”
Lefebvre addressed the police question more directly in his written comments, clarifying there’s no doubt it’s “time to rethink how we deal with mental health and addiction crises on a massive scale.”
We need to create a system “that keeps everyone safe and well taken care of, which will require all levels of government and our education sector to come together to create the infrastructure to support such an emergency response system,” he added.
Police, he said, are not always the best option to dealing with the mental health and addictions crises. Social workers need to be better integrated into the department, and better training needs to be afforded to existing officers.
This is an issue the Police Services Board addressed in July in reaction to a significant jump in mental health calls, at which time Chief Paul Pedersen said it was an ongoing concern and point of discussion.
While candidates appeared divided on some pledges, they were near-unanimous with others.
Pledge No. 7: Better protecting land and water, had only four candidates say they were “unsure,” with the balance either not responding or saying “yes.”
The pledge is “to actively champion protecting land and water, inclusive of a sustainable, equitable and reliable fully-funded model for the Stormwater Asset Management Plan and a robust Residential Inflow and Infiltration Program to be implemented within this term of council.”
Those to respond “unsure” was Wong, Ward 9 Coun. Deb McIntosh, Ward 10 Coun. Fern Cormier and Ward 12 candidate Shawn Ouimet.
Pledge No. 5 and 6 came even closer to unanimous support.
Pledge No. 5: Support for community initiatives, urges, “I pledge to actively champion a one-stop-shop for community initiatives, with a ‘can-do’ attitude of providing the support to make great community-led initiatives happen, smoothly and easily.”
Ward 10 candidate Jolene Felsborg-Linton joined Ouimet in responding with “unsure,” while the balance of people to respond did so with “yes.”
Pledge No. 6: Truth and reconciliation, urges, “I pledge to actively champion implementing the Truth and Reconciliation Calls to Action, the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls Calls for Justice and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples at a local level.”
Labranche and Ouimet said “unsure,” while everyone else responded “yes” or not at all.
Pledge No. 2: Housing for all, was also well-received among candidates, with Labranche saying “no,” and Gravelle and Ouimet saying “unsure.”
This pledge is to “actively champion achieving functional zero homelessness within five years while supporting the dignity and human rights of unsheltered community members.”
For his part, Ouimet answered “unsure” to all questions, explaining in his written response that he was unwilling to provide yes or no answers without giving any reasoning and that he is “unbiased” toward one social group or another.
Although Coalition for a Livable Sudbury led the charge in the pledge exercise, various community groups contributed to the effort and helped guide its content. These groups include Poverty and Housing Advocacy Coalition, Black Lives Matter Sudbury, Bike Sudbury, Greater Sudbury Watershed Alliance, Junction Creek Stewardship Committee, reThink Green, Sudbury Workers Education and Advocacy Centre, Greater Sudbury Food Policy Council, and Sudbury and District Labour Council. It is further endorsed by Citizens’ Climate Lobby Sudbury, Global Gardens, Go Give Project, Myths and Mirrors Community Arts, Sex Workers Advisory Network of Sudbury, Sudbury Shared Harvest, and Sudbury Temporary Overdose Prevention Society.
For a full rundown of results and additional context regarding each pledge point, click here.
The pledges follow a mayoral town hall hosted at the Indie Cinema earlier this month, which focused on the same topics. A video of the meeting can be found online by clicking here.
Although the election is on Oct. 24, Grant said people should track candidates’ pledges to see what kind of followthrough they have.
“Democracy isn’t a one-day event, voting is important but after the election this is something to follow up on.”
Tyler Clarke covers city hall and political affairs for Sudbury.com.
