Stewart ‘totally stoked’ for Vancouver mayoral run
Kennedy Stewart, a federal NDP MP for Burnaby South, announced on Thursday that he will run as an independent for Vancouver mayor.
Stewart, who will step down as MP, said he was “totally stoked” to kick off his campaign to be the city’s next mayor.
Stewart will run as an independent candidate instead of seeking the nomination of any municipal party, he said Thursday, because he believes it will give him the best chance to “bring all the progressive forces together.”
Like every major candidate that has announced their intention to run for Vancouver’s top job, Stewart highlighted housing affordability as the top issue.
“Everybody in the whole world knows that Vancouver’s in a housing crisis,” Stewart said at a news conference Thursday. “But you know, it doesn’t have to be like this. When I moved here in 1989, I was able to work as a printingpress operator, I used to drive a craft-beer truck and I was still able to rent a place in the West End, or in Kitsilano, or in East Vancouver. But now, that’s impossible.”
“Cities are not just for billionaires, they’re for everyone, and we have to get back to this,” said Stewart, who is in his second term as the MP for Burnaby South and serves as the NDP’s science critic and B.C. caucus chair.
Stewart added if he becomes mayor he would continue his staunch opposition to the Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain pipeline expansion. He was arrested in March at a protest outside the company’s Burnaby tank farm, as was Green MP Elizabeth May.
Special prosecutors were appointed in April to handle the cases of Stewart and May, and more clarity on the outcome there could be coming as soon as Monday.
In an email Thursday, B.C. Prosecution Service spokesman Dan McLaughlin said: “The matters involving the two elected officials arrested in connection with the Trans Mountain Pipeline protest have been adjourned to May 14, 2018, to allow the special prosecutors to conclude their charge assessments.” He added it may not be determined Monday, and “there is no current timeline for the completion of this process.”
Stewart, who has a PhD from the London School of Economics, is on leave from Simon Fraser University’s School of Public Policy, where he has worked as an assistant professor teaching and writing about democracy, public management and cities. A past resident of both Burnaby and Vancouver, Stewart said Thursday he has resided for most of the last three years in downtown Vancouver with his wife.
Last week, Stewart said he was seriously considering making a run at the mayor’s chair, calling it a “dream job,” The National Post reported. The Post reported: “Stewart said he’s leaning toward throwing his hat in the ring after a poll of Vancouverites this week showed that 10 per cent of respondents favoured him for the city’s top job,” a result that was fifth-most among the options presented.
Stewart, originally from rural Nova Scotia, had ties with the Coalition of Progressive Electors, Vancouver’s oldest left-wing party, and said he hasn’t been a member of any municipal party since doing organizing work for COPE in 1996.