Councillor-elect celebrates New West Progressives' political breakthrough

Editor's note: we're getting to know the mayor-elect and councillors-elect through a series of pieces in the lead-up to their first council meeting on Nov. 7. Read more about mayor-elect Patrick Johnstone, as well as councillor-elect Paul Minhas.

It's a victory councillor-elect Daniel Fontaine says he's still trying to process.

The Quayside resident, who ran with the New West Progressives (NWP) was finally successful, placing sixth with 7,189 votes. In the last municipal election—which happened in 2018—he came in seventh, with 5,297 votes.

Fontaine, who is of Metis descent, recently served as the deputy minister and chief executive officer for Metis Nation BC. His resume also includes serving as the chief of staff in the Office of the Mayor of Vancouver when Sam Sullivan held the top post.

For perspective, fellow NWP candidate and local business owner Paul Minhas was just 63 votes ahead of Fontaine, while council incumbent and Community First candidate Chinu Das trailed Fontaine by 162 votes.

"It was the longest hour-and-a-half in a long time in my life ... the numbers did bounce around, and they went up and down," Fontaine tells New West Anchor. "Whether you were looking at the school board election or the council election, and even for a certain part of the mayoral election where it was within [at one point] four or five-hundred votes, it was really interesting to watch the votes coming in."

While just two of their party has made it to council chambers, Fontaine says he and Minhas will be leaning on the NWP for support to ensure some of the major points on the party's platform will be heard.

"We're planning to have an advisory group ... a number of people who are working with us throughout the community to rely upon, to be our eyes and ears as well, and to report in. I'm hoping that many of the [NWP] candidates who didn't make it across the finish line on Saturday will stay actively engaged in that process as well."

When asked if there was a message behind the numbers, Fontaine said there were some stats of note.

"I think... almost 60% of voters did not choose the current mayor-elect. I think that's a message in itself to the mayor-elect just to be careful that he doesn't read too much into having been elected, and to claim some overwhelming support or majority. I think it needs to be understood that there are a number of people who did not choose him, and he has to govern for the entire city."

Based on calculations from data provided by CivicInfo BC and the City of New Westminster, there were 15,923 people who voted; of those, 15,815 cast a vote for mayor. 6,676 of the votes were for Johnstone; there were a total of 9,139 between independent Chuck Puchmayr and the NWP's Ken Armstrong.

"We were running against [MLA for New Westminster] Jennifer Whiteside; Peter Julian, our member of parliament who had a campaign against us; the [New West and] District Labour Council [which endorsed Johnstone and Community First]. We were up against so many odds, effectively a David and Goliath battle to try to get into the top six."

On Oct. 7, a tweet with a video posted to the Community First Twitter page shows Whiteside speaking about Patrick Johnstone, affirming the endorsement. Three days prior, and from the same Twitter account, Julian also spoke in a video to endorse the Community First team. MLA for Richmond-Queensborough Aman Singh threw his support behind Chuck Puchmayr, in a video posted to Puchmayr's Instagram page. Both Singh and Whiteside ran with the BC NDP.

"When you talk about New West being overlooked, and the story of the night being missed because of the focus on Surrey and Vancouver ... what happened in New Westminster was the equivalent of a 7.0 on the political Richter scale."

While Fontaine is optimistic about the incoming group, he says the voter's shift to include two NWP candidates at council is something Johnstone and Community First will need to consider.

"If [Community First New West] continues to simply vote down all of our motions five to two for the next four years, I think the voters are going to look down on that type of activity and they're going to say that's not the kind of council they want. They're going to want a council that's going to work together."

In an interview Saturday evening after the election, mayor-elect Johnstone told The Anchor in a scrum he wasn't worried about co-operation between the two slates.

"I think we're all working together. I think everyone has the same goal ... to serve the city, and so I'm not concerned at all about ... building this team and getting everyone working together."

What's ahead for the NWP in the early days of council?

When asked about the Royal City moniker petition launched by the slate, Fontaine says it's one of the things that is top of mind—and he and Minhas plan to deliver. To date, 1,110 signatures have been collected.

"My intention and Paul's intention is to, at the earliest opportunity of this new council, bring that [petition] to council. And to also speak with council, recommend to council that they consider a recommendation to drop the Royal City moniker [issue]," says Fontaine. He believes there may be members of council who are willing to back off from the moniker question, including incumbent Jaimie McEvoy.

"Jaimie McEvoy is a person who is very much into history and the history of our city, and I think he'd be open to that, and I'm hoping at least one other councillor. Then we can put that to rest, and we can focus on the things we heard about in the campaign, which was getting our infrastructure done, making sure kids have swimming lessons, and making use [of] the tax dollars because it's going to be a tough budget," explains Fontaine.Fontaine will also spend the next few weeks prior to the first meeting of the new council—which will happen on Nov. 7—combing through the city's budget.

"I think leading up to Nov. 7 is going to be focusing on the budget and focused on preparing myself mentally and physically for the amount of work and hours it will take and making sure I have built into my process the ability to listen better to the community, make sure I am open and accessible to citizens."

He says he's also making plans to knock on doors to be able to stay in touch with residents, though that would likely happen from May to September. Fontaine says he hasn't finalized those plans—but he'll definitely need to take a bit of a walking break after racking up a step count over the last few months.

"Yes, my step count was extremely high [during the campaign]," he notes with a chuckle. "I knocked on over 3,300 doors."