The Problem with the Greens

A quick google search of my name or a poke around this blog will probably reveal that I've been pretty involved with the Green Party, both Nationally and in Ontario, BC and Alberta. I've recently taken a pretty big step back from my involvement with the national party, but retain my support from the provincial party.

For those of you that follow polls at all, you might enjoy the site http://www.threehundredeight.blogspot.com/, they do a great job of tracking polling results in Canada. Polls have their flaws, but I think it's fair to say that the downward trend showing for the Green Party of Canada (GPC) reflects that the party is facing problems.

I'm not going to throw stones or rant and rave here. I have a number of people that I consider to be friends and one day hope to be good friends with that are working very hard to grow the party. I will say that I consider the biggest challenge the party is facing is a lack of people doing the work that my friends are doing: Out talking to people, knocking on doors, running events and generally trying to find ways to make their communities better places to live. I'm not sure what the leadership of the party is placing a priority on at the moment, but I hope it's building a narrative of the Green Party being a progressive option for Canada, and training it's members on how to spread that story. I worry that it's on building policy and spending a lot of time trying to be right or smart in the occasional media hit.

Rally to Restore Sanity and Rob Ford

This weekend I'm heading to Washington D.C. to attend "The Rally to Restore Sanity" hosted by a comedian on the Comedy Network: Jon Stewart. This rally is getting some flak from some of my friends, and some of the democratic establishment, in the states as it is attracting a crowd of what they perceive to be likely democratic voters two days before a major US election, a crowd that could be out doing Get out the Vote for the Democratic Party.

I, obviously, think this rally is a good thing. This rally is an attempt to engage people who have given up on the process. It's an attempt to talk to people who aren't bigots or hippies, but people who just go about their day to day lives and don't see how 'politics' has any impact on them. These are the people who just elected Rob Ford in Toronto by staying home, and the people who elected Mayor #Nenshi in Calgary by going to vote.

Ultimately they may both be about to get their way. In Calgary they will hopefully see a mayor who will bring new people into the process, and act on progressive values. In Toronto, they will see a mayor who believes in the power of spending cuts to solve all problems, and can't be bothered to talk to us.

During the Guelph municipal campaign, I had a brief interaction with a supporter who disliked my use of the term leader, as they felt it made them a follower by default. I believe a core aspect of leadership is inspiring new leaders, and I hope that this Rally, mayor Nenshi, and any other progressives out there are starting to build stories that inspire a new generation of leadership in Canada. We need it.

Guelph Municipal Election

Yesterday, I finished managing the campaign for Karolyne Pickett: Council candidate for Ward 1 in Guelph. Karolyne was a woman with minimal connection to her community beyond living in it, but had a passion for service and working to engage more people with the decisions being made by council that was affecting their lives.

Sadly, we lost: Finishing fourth out of eleven candidates. Perhaps more sadly, only about 33% of eligible voters in Guelph turned out to vote. I observed very traditional campaigns in Guelph, where candidates seemed exclusively focussed on debates, yard signs and 'knocking on doors'. On paper, this seems fine except that 'knocking on doors' seems to mean that campaigns were dropping off flyers without actually stopping to talk to residents. At most, campaigns seemed to spend less than a minute at doors giving a quick spiel about themselves then moving on.

33 percent is a problem. 33 percent means that the overwhelming majority of people in Guelph didn't feel it was important enough to vote. This is not the problem of the non-voters, this is the problem of our community leaders. We need to be finding leaders who are proactively going out and providing people with reasons to be interested in being involved in their communities. We need to find great communicators who can draw lines between how taxes create services, and the great things those services are doing. Great leadership will inspire people to become involved. Yard signs inspire people to do nothing.

This is achievable. We can find people who want to go out and talk to their neighbours about the kind of community they want, even if it's as simple as traffic calming or activities for their kids. We can find leaders who can inspire hope and passion for the community they live in. We should expect this of ourselves. Guelph failed at this in 2010, and I hope we can do better in the future.

First Post!

I've occasionally taken short stabs at blogging in the past, but having successfully used blogger in a recent election, I think I am more likely to run a blog where I post weekly! I have interests in a variety of different fields which I'll write about here. I hope you enjoy some of it.