New Westminster's outgoing mayor sits down with the Anchor

This is the first in a two-part series. Watch for part two in Thursday’s newsletter.

Some mayors might want to meet in their office for one of their final interviews; maybe at a coffee shop, but New Westminster Mayor Jonathan Cote would prefer to be outside on this sunny September day. “As long as there’s shade,” he says with a chuckle.

The next few weeks are the final stages in his political life: a 17-year career that’s included three terms of service as a city councillor, two terms as mayor, and a stint as chair of TransLink’s mayors’ council, a 21-member group looking at issues in Metro Vancouver transit and transportation.

“My background is in urban planning, so at times I felt like a kid in a candy store to be able to enact all the things I’ve loved and cared about, that I studied,” explains Cote, adding that being a passionate advocate for transit made the opportunity even sweeter.

Admittedly, Cote says his time as TransLink chair wasn’t always easy: he had ideas he wanted to implement, but the COVID-19 pandemic had other plans.

“I had big ambitions in terms of really keeping up and expanding transit. I had big visions in the City of New Westminster, of really moving forward with our seven bold steps for climate change.” While Cote says thinks those ambitions weren’t necessarily taken off track, watching certain events unfold—like transit ridership going down 80% during COVID-19’s 2020 peak—made things challenging.

“[These challenges were] actually, in my opinion, potentially even more meaningful to be able to provide that stability, to keep the transit system going to continue to actually think about the long-term plans of where we want to go as a region,” he says. “It’s not about one city winning over another. It’s about, how can we work together to actually achieve the greater regional goal? I hope the next mayor of New Westminster is able to take that perspective to those tables.”

In a similar vein to his regional role, Cote says his second term as mayor included some struggles. When asked about New West Anchor’s discussion with chief administrative officer Lisa Spitale, in which she talked about the staffing crunch at City Hall, Cote agreed it was sometimes tough to adjust. 

“There were some sectors of the community that were affected more dramatically or differently and certainly issues related to addiction, poverty, and homelessness; there are individuals where services that were available became no longer available,” says Cote, who noted that among all the stress he was proud of the way the city stepped up to prioritize its work.

“And yes, we had our yearly work plans that we were working on, things we wanted to achieve, but new priorities had to emerge,” says Cote, who notes he’s learned to balance high ambitions with what can realistically get done. “I think council has become more aware, particularly with the pandemic, and some of the staff shortage is that yes, we want to achieve big things, but we also have to be mindful that just because we pass a motion on the council table, doesn’t make it happen.”

Something else that took place during Cote’s time as mayor: the deaths during last year’s heat dome. As reported by the Burnaby Beacon, New Westminster had the highest death rate in the province at 41.8 people per 100,000.

“Hindsight is always 20/20, but recognizing New Westminster kind of has a south-facing slope community. The neighbourhood where the vast majority of deaths came from was the Brow of the Hill neighbourhood. It’s a neighbourhood of older wood frame apartment buildings, south-facing. It’s also a neighbourhood that has some of the lowest tree canopy in the city,” says Cote, adding that the area’s demographics include older people, as well as those who are lower income.

“We had heat plans in place but weren’t ever contemplating 40-degree weather. They were contemplating that 30-to-35-degree weather,” says Cote. “We recognized we needed to do more, and we opened up cooling centres in our community. Obviously, as we reflect upon that, and people did use the cooling centres, we didn’t get the word out enough. And we didn’t make sure people that needed to be in the cooling centres, or that needed to have access knew about them, but also had the ability to get there.”

New West Anchor asked about Cote’s choice to table the Royal City moniker motion in July—and while Cote agreed it was provocative, he believed it was a way to start an important conversation. Cote adds there were talks when he’d first got involved in civic politics about making the change, but this time people seem to be up for the dialogue.

“Thinking of work that city council has been doing, the work we’ve been doing on building an inclusive community…the work on reconciliation, I do feel there’s a mismatch,” explains Cote, who not only cited concerns about a giant yellow crown appearing at the top of city letterhead, but how awkward it is to give guests of the city a small yellow crown pin as a gift.

“I am perfectly open, and I think I saw the motion as a conversation starter. I do hope the next council does engage and take the time to have a good, meaningful conversation, and work through that,” says Cote. When asked whether his motion was tabled after consultation with any of the local Indigenous groups, he said it was not. “I definitely had conversations with our [manager of Indigenous relations],” he replied.

“I think sometimes people viewed the motion as a final decision or a final point, but to me I viewed it more as a starting of that discussion, a starting point of that engagement process,” says Cote.

In Thursday’s edition, we talk with Cote about why he felt the time was right to leave local politics, what’s next for him, and whether he’ll ever get back in a wrestling ring.