Observations, oddities, and other trivia gleaned from the local government election results:
Closest mayoral race: Greenwood, where 13 votes was enough of a cushion for former mayor Barry Noll to defeat incumbent councillor C.J. Rhodes.
Closest council races: In Rossland, Tara McDougall secured the seventh and final council seat by two votes over incumbent Jeff Weaver. In Nakusp, incumbent Aidan McLaren-Caux won the fourth and final seat by seven votes over fellow incumbent Dolly Edwards.
Closest regional district races: In RDCK Area A (East Shore), Forrest Demman beat longtime incumbent Garry Jackman by five votes. However, there were four spoiled ballots, so we’ll see if the result withstands a recount. In RDCK Area E (Rural Nelson), Landon Verigin beat Erin Fitchett by 16 votes.
Closest school trustee race: Lynn Hango beat incumbent Susan Chew by eight votes to become trustee for Salmo/Taghum/Blewett.
Most votes: Nelson’s Kate Tait with 2,097. The incumbent councillor also had the most votes in the region in 2022.
Most votes for a mayoral candidate who didn’t win: Nelson’s Ramona Faust with 1,615. That total would have been enough to win any other local race.
Most votes for a council candidate who didn’t win: Nelson’s Devon Caron with 1,515. That total would have topped the polls everywhere else except Trail.
Biggest turnover: None of the incumbents ran for re-election in Slocan, although two of the five members of the new council have previous elected experience. All three incumbent regional directors in the Creston Valley were defeated.
Least turnover: In Grand Forks, mayor Everett Baker was re-elected along with four out of six incumbent councillors. The other two didn’t seek re-election.
Similarly, in Nelson, Janice Morrison was re-elected along with four out of six incumbent councillors. One other incumbent was defeated and the remaining one didn’t seek re-election.
In Midway, Doug McMynn was re-elected mayor along with three out of four incumbent councillors. Same thing in Montrose, where longtime mayor Mike Walsh was re-elected by acclamation and so were three incumbent councillors.
Highest turnout: New Denver (71%), despite not having a mayoral race. New Denver also had the highest turnout in 2022 (77%). Other top turnouts were Kaslo (63%), Midway (63%), Slocan (61%), Greenwood (52%), and Rossland (50%).
According to CivicInfoBC, in municipalities across the province, only about one in three voters showed up at the ballot box this time.
Lowest turnout: Fruitvale (26%) and Castlegar (28%) The same two communities were at the bottom end in 2022. Meanwhile, rural residents stayed away in droves: the highest total in the RDCK was Area G (Salmo Valley, at 31%) and the lowest was Area B (Rural Creston, at 18%).
No vote, part 1: The entire councils of Salmo, Montrose, Silverton, and Warfield were elected by acclamation. Warfield is an unusual case, though, because councillor-elect Warren Mirko is also running this week for the BC Conservatives in Kootenay-Monashee. Mirko says if elected provincially, he would not try to hold both roles. So Warfield may need to hold a by-election to fill the seat for a candidate who was never sworn in.
Additionally, the mayors of Nakusp and New Denver were elected by acclamation, although each place had races for council. All trustees in the Kootenay-Columbia school district were elected by acclamation. So were several trustees in the Kootenay Lake, Boundary, and Arrow Lakes districts.
In the Regional District of Central Kootenay, rural Kaslo director Aimee Watson, rural Nelson director Tom Newell, and rural Castlegar director Chris Popoff were all elected by acclamation.
In the Regional District of Kootenay Boundary, Beaver Valley director Ali Grieve, rural Grand Forks director Linda Kay Wiese, and West Boundary director Sharen Gibbs were similarly acclaimed.
No vote, part 2: One oddity this time around was the total lack of referendums. At least one referendum has been held in every local election dating back to at least 1999. There was supposed to be one in Castlegar this time, about borrowing money to expand the local recreation complex, but it has been pushed back to February.
Gender balance: While all 17 local municipal councils elected in 2022 had at least one woman on them, that is not the case this time, because Nakusp’s entire council will be male. Three women ran, including two incumbents, but none were elected.
Castlegar will only have one woman on council, incumbent Cherryl MacLeod. Four other women ran, including three incumbents, but none were elected.
Female mayors have been elected in five municipalities: Creston, Fruitvale, Kaslo, Rossland, and Silverton. That is one fewer than in 2022.
Women will also hold the balance of power in four places: Creston (five out of seven council seats), Nelson (four out of seven), Fruitvale (three out of five), and Kaslo (three out of five). That is the same number as four years ago.
Youngest incumbent: In 2022, at age 24, Maya Provencal topped the polls for Rossland council. In 2026, at age 28, she repeated the feat.
Blast from the past: Not many non-incumbents who served in local office prior to 2022 ran this time, but those who did were largely successful.
• In Nakusp, the top three vote-getters were former councillors Cameron Leitch (who served 2008-11), Ken Miller (1996-99), and Joseph Hughes (2008-14 and 2018-22).
• In Slocan, Jamie Ingram was elected mayor. He was previously mayor from 1996-99. One person who served on Ingram’s council was Dave Fredrickson, who topped the polls this time for council. Overall, Fredrickson served on council from 1996 to 2002 and ran for mayor in 2022.
• Gord Zaitsoff has been elected as director of RDCK Area J (Lower Arrow-Columbia). He previously served as director from 2002-14.
• In Creston, Tanya Wall, who topped the polls for town council, previously served on council from 2008-14 and then was RDCK Area B director from 2014-22.
• Among the former office-holders who were unsuccessful this go round: former Kaslo mayor and councillor Jim Holland and former Kaslo councillor Donna Cormie.
Two for one: The two candidates who ran for multiple positions this time were both unsuccessful. Tina Knooihuizen lost her seat on Nakusp village council and was not elected Arrow Lakes regional director either. Susan Chew lost the race for area director of RDCK Area G (Salmo Valley) and also narrowly lost her seat as school trustee for Salmo/Taghum/Blewett.
All in the family: Slocan mayor-elect Jamie Ingram is the father of councillor-elect Katie Strong. Two generations from the same family have served on several local councils before, and there is at least one other instance of it happening simultaneously: W.E. McArthur Jr. was on Greenwood council in the 1950s while his father was mayor. But this is undoubtedly the first time locally that a father and daughter have served on council together.
In Creston, mayor-elect Denise Dumas is the daughter of former mayor Ron Toyota, making them the first father and daughter to both serve as mayor of a Kootenay municipality. Ron is also the son of former council member Tak Toyota, meaning three generations have served on council. The Horswills of Nelson appear to be the only other family that can make the same claim.
Running in a different place: Incumbent Greenwood mayor John Bolt, who recently moved to Adams Lake, ran unsuccessfully for area director of Area F of the Regional District of Columbia Shuswap.
Former Grand Forks councillor Cathy Korolek ran for Powell River council for the second straight election but didn’t win.
Former Castlegar mayor Kirk Duff fell short in his bid for mayor of Grand Forks, but set some sort of record just by running. He also previously served on Kimberley council and ran for mayor there.
In a kind of symmetry, Grand Forks resident Donald Pharand ran unsuccessfully for mayor of Castlegar, inspired by concerns about slides that he says threaten Columbia River communities.
First to report results: Rossland, at approximately 8:35 p.m. on Saturday, little more than half an hour after the polls closed.
Last to report results: Kaslo, sometime after midnight but before 1:20 a.m. Kaslo was also the slowpoke in 2022.
