ABC campaign reflection: saying thanks for the opportunity to serve Vancouver
2022 was the year I turned 60-years-old. The above image comes from a 60th birthday gathering I hosted for friends at Polish Hall over the summer, who I deeply desired to bring together after being kept apart by the threat of COVID-19 spreading.
Turning 60 led me to reflect upon what one can do to give back during the rest of my days on this mortal coil. As an avid volunteer, I kept asking myself what I could do for my hometown of Vancouver, which I along with a chorus of my colleagues concluded had lost its mojo in recent years. I resolved to do almost anything short of running for office over concerns about the time commitment away from family and leaving behind important work happening at BC Care Providers Association.
But then Kareem Allam stepped into my life. It was his persistence that led me to discuss running for city council with my spouse and my employer. I think they both appreciated that this was an opportunity I would regret if I didn’t take it, notwithstanding the high probability of failure running in a crowded field with a nascent political party. On July 12th I was announced as the last of seven ABC candidates for council running alongside Ken Sim.
The best campaign advice I got came from my friend Cindy Shore, who urged me to knock on a lot of doors. Our ABC candidates did so in spades, and together we canvassed voters by knocking on tens of thousands of doors during the next 3 ½ months in every corner of our city. We could not have done it without an incredible campaign organization, thousands of donors, endorsements from community leaders, and of course a large contingent of volunteers, many of whom helped to build strong bridges to ethnic communities and to overcome our language barriers on the doorsteps. I tried to capture the scale of that effort in the video slideshow linked to this message.
On October 15th, ABC Vancouver had a historic sweep by electing all of our candidates for council, park and school board with a significant margin of victory. Ken Sim would receive the highest number of votes of any Vancouver mayoral candidate. We were sworn into office on November 7th and have since hit the ground running.
I am thankful for the bonds we built together and the contributions of every single member of what was dubbed our “ABC Family.” They include Stephen, Corey, Annie, Marie, David, Kareem, James, Trevor, Manuel, Chris, Rory, David, Taylor, Patrick, Zorra, Kanako, Mike, and Swan; our candidates, Ken, Sarah, Lisa, Rebecca, Peter, Brian, Lenny, Scott, Brennan, Angela, Laura, Marie-Claire, Jas, Victoria, Preeti, Josh and Alfred; and our volunteers Bootz, Rowena, Wah, Jerry, Wally, Jarred, Terry, Kathleen, Pall, Ed, Neil, Alex, Jeremy, Kyle, Carmen, Willy, Karen, Edward, Ian, Celena, Ching, Randy, John, Glynnis and many others (apologies if I missed any of you).
I greatly appreciate that Vancouverites have given me this incredible opportunity to serve them over the next four years. I know that together we will accomplish a lot of good things for our city. Thank you, all.
