Vancouver election heats up with seven parties and five mayoral candidates in the mix

Vancouver City Hall. Photo by Arlen Redekop /PNG

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For the first time in recent history — and possibly ever — Vancouver has five mayoral candidates, each with their own experience winning municipal elections, running to be the city’s next mayor.

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Their five parties — plus two other parties — are running slates of council candidates, so it’s shaping up to be a crowded campaign.

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If Vancouver’s 2018 election was defined by housing debates, and 2022’s by public safety, the key ballot-box question in 2026 depends on which party you’re listening to.

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Vancouver mayoral candidates, from left: Kareem Allam, Rebecca Bligh, Colleen Hardwick, Pete Fry, and Ken Sim.

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ABC Vancouver’s incumbent mayor, Ken Sim,  wants to focus on crime, disorder and public safety this time, as he did to great success in the last election. In a novel move, ABC has used its council majority to literally put public safety on the ballot this year.

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Last month, ABC called a council meeting, a rarity in August, to add a plebiscite question to this year’s election. The non-binding plebiscite asks Vancouver voters to weigh in on two questions: whether they want the city to “strengthen” its laws forbidding public use of hard drugs like meth and fentanyl, and if the city should ask the provincial government to convert parts of the old St. Paul’s Hospital property on Burrard Street, which is set to close next year when the new hospital opens, into a secure facility to hold 100 or more people with severe substance use and mental-health disorders.

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The move was opposed by rival councillors, and criticized for being a cynical way of using public money — with city staff estimating the plebiscite cost between $400,000 and $550,000 — for a political stunt.

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The issue where TEAM for a Livable Vancouver and the party’s mayoral candidate, former Vancouver Coun. Colleen Hardwick, differs the most from the other parties is housing and development. TEAM is pledging to repeal plans approved by past city councils to build more housing in several parts of the city, including the Broadway corridor.

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The three other main mayoral candidates are Rebecca Bligh of Vote Vancouver, Kareem Allam of the Vancouver Liberals, and the Green party’s Pete Fry. All three have focused a lot of their messaging on attacking ABC’s record over the past four years.

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Fry says he presents the only real progressive alternative to Sim and ABC because Bligh ran with ABC in the 2022 election and Allam managed the party’s campaign. Bligh and Allam both disagree with that. They say they believed in ABC’s 2022 platform, but the previously big-tent, centrist party has veered to the right under Sim’s leadership, not delivered on promises, and wasted time and political capital on distractions like trying to invest city money in cryptocurrency, abolish the elected park board and halt the work of the city’s integrity commissioner.

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Allam and Bligh both seem to be courting federal Liberal supporters, a vote-rich group in Vancouver. Bligh and others have accused Allam of trying to gain support from low-information voters who might mistakenly believe his municipal Liberal party, which he founded earlier this year, has some connection with the federal Liberals.