Hall makes it official
Four years ago, Lyn Hall announced he was running for mayor of Prince George.
On Thursday, he announced he has no intention of leaving that position.
He is the first and only mayoral candidate to declare he will run in the Oct. 20 municipal election.
“It’s a great job and I feel so humbled to be able to do it,” said the 63-year-old Hall.
“I am absolutely passionate about this community. It’s a vibrant city and it’s a city that has so much to offer everyone.”
Hall says infrastructure improvements remain a top priority and he highlighted the need to work together with the federal government to secure grants to help the city pay for paving roads, building bridges, improving electrical, sewer and water services and upgrading telecommunications. His wish list includes having the city secure the investment needed to build a data centre, which he said would create local jobs and boost the city’s technology sector.
“Over the last four years we’ve invested over $24 million in refurbishing our roads, over $3 million in sidewalks, $150,000 in walkways, and $27 million in snow removal – these numbers are important and it’s important to talk about these issues because they’re the ones we hear loud and clear, year after year as city councilors,” said Hall.
Flanked by his wife Lorrelle and daughters Sydney and Jordan, Hall chose the front lawn of city hall to announce his candidacy, as he did when he ran in the 2011 and 2014 elections.
He hired a sound crew to set up speakers he thought would be needed to make his voice heard above the construction noise generated by the adjacent Park House condominium development.
But he said construction crews agreed to shut down their activity while he made his announcement.
He pointed to the site of the 153-unit condo development and the permanent residents it will attract as an example of downtown revitalization.
“The Park House condo development is something we are extremely proud to have here in Prince George, it was a necessity,” Hall said.
“We needed housing in the downtown and here we have it.”
I am absolutely passionate about this community. It’s a vibrant city and it’s a city that has so much to offer everyone.
— Mayor Lyn Hall
During his term as mayor, Hall said more than $400 million worth of building development has been poured into the city. He’s seen the city’s unemployment rate drop from 4.1 per cent, a decrease of 1.7 per cent from July 2017. He oversaw last year’s referendum which resulted in voters giving the green light to build a new fire hall and replace the Four Seasons Pool.
Asked what he considered his proudest accomplishment as mayor he mentioned a phone call he made to A&T Project Developments of Kamloops in January 2015 which he said helped pave the way for construction of the RiverBend seniors housing complex on Oak Street.
“That’s the one that really started our ability to attract development to Prince George and we’re seeing it across the way here,” said Hall.
BC Business magazine ranks Prince George as the best city in the province for housing affordability and Hall said he and his council will continue to work with non-profit organizations, the province and the federal government to attract investment in projects for low-income residents and seniors as a means to improve the downtown core.
“When we take a look at the issues we’re having downtown from a social perspective we’re very close to having some more opportunity for people downtown to utilize different resources and we’re working diligently on that,” he said.
“But this is one of the toughest things for any municipality to deal with. I’d like to see a wraparound service model where we provide those services in one single location. There’s no question there’s more work to do in our downtown. We deal with the homelessness issue, the mental health issue, the drug issue and we’re dealing with that head on.”
The city’s role in hosting the 2015 Canada Winter Games and its efforts to provide a safe haven for thousands of wildfire evacuees the past two summers gave Prince George national media attention, with Hall in a prominent role as the city’s representative, and he hopes to be given a new mandate from voters to continue to spread the word to outsiders what the city has to offer.
“That was a rallying point last year, over 10,000 evacuees and we had national coverage about what a fantastic city we are and what a fantastic job we did in making sure those evacuees were comfortable and were helped,” Hall said. “That was a big moment for this city, it really showed the rest of the county what we’re made of.
“We became known for our location geographically and people started to take notice. Now Prince George is on the map and we just continue to foster that and build on that. People understand and realized very quickly that this is a great place to invest and we’re starting to see investment from the coast and the Okanagan now because that’s just the trend.”
Hall took some heat during the 2017 wildfires for a policy which allowed senior city managers to charge overtime to deal with the month-long crisis but declined to offer specifics on whether he intends to change that policy if reelected.
“It will depend on council, we’ll see what happens after October 20th,” he said.
He said he will continue to make council members and city department managers accessible and accountable to the community through town hall meetings such as the weekly Talktober sessions he started in 2015.
Hall won the mayor’s seat after serving one three-year term on council and 10 years as a School District 57 school trustee. In 2014 he defeated Don Zurowski with 10,463 votes, winning by a 1,613vote margin.
So far, Hall is the only mayoral candidate for the Oct. 20 election, with nobody else in sight to contest him.
“We’re not second-guessing on who might throw their hat in the ring, we’re primarily concerned with how we run our campaign and that’s what we’re focused on,” he said. “As a matter of fact, the team is going out today to put up signs and we’re going to open up a campaign office in the next week or 10 days.”