The City of Vancouver announced on Thursday that 38,556 people took part in advance voting for this Saturday’s municipal election, a 98 per cent rise over 2011.
But for the tens of thousands of people still expected to vote, Thursday offered one of the last chances for mayoral candidates Gregor Robertson of Vision Vancouver, Kirk Lapointe of the NPA, and Meena Wong of COPE to get out their message.
On West 4th Avenue in Kitsilano, Mayor Gregor Robertson spoke with potential voters – a long with a few citizens who wanted to give him a piece of their mind – and defended his party’s record over the past six years.
“Our record is a strong record. We have a record that we’re proud of,” said Robertson, mentioning his party’s record on homelessness and affordable housing as particular strengths.
In a scrum with reporters, much of the focus was on Robertson’s “apology” in a debate Wednesday morning, where he said he there were things he hadn’t “done particularly well.”
His rivals believed the apology should have been more specific.
“It made me wonder what he’s apologized for, it was so generic,” said Meena Wong.
“It was vague and grudging and didn’t single out an issue, and tried for a form of blanket forgiveness,” said LaPointe.
But today, Robertson was more specific, mentioning consultation over development proposals, particular along Commercial Drive, as areas his party didn’t listen to the public enough over.
“The city’s proposal there infuriated people in the neighborhood,” he said.
“I ultimately take responsibility for that, and I was just apologizing to people so they understand I’m committed to doing better, there’s no hard feelings there, and I wanted to be sure in the next term we find better ways to hear from people.”
The developments come a week after what had been a languid race picked up, with a leaked poll showing Robertson with just a four point gap over his main challenger LaPointe and a defamation lawsuit launched against LaPointe by Vision Vancouver.
READ MORE: New poll shows Gregor Robertson only has five percent lead over Kirk LaPointe
“I’m committed to doing better,” said Robertson.
“I’ve learned a lot in my six years as mayor. I really care about this city, and I want to do better for our city.”
There have been suggestions that Vision Vancouver polled residents ahead of time to see if an apology would help their fortunes at the polls.
However, political analyst Bill Tieleman, who is supporting Vision this election, says voters understand the political calculus being done during election season.
“Is it calculated to win votes? Sure, everything they do is calculated to win votes,” he said.
“It’s a sign that it’s a tight race, and they’re doing everything they can do get their vote out.”
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