Planning well underway for possible provincial election

Elections B.C. had barely finished counting ballots from the May 9 election before its staff began preparing to jump back into the electoral fray.

It’s their mandate to “maintain a constant state of election readiness,” said spokesman Andrew Watson.

Watson said Elections B.C. isn’t presuming a particular outcome from the legislature — the expected fall of Premier Christy Clark’s government or the potential failure of the NDP-Green party coalition to establish a stable government.

“We began preparing for the next provincial election when the results of the May 9 election were known,” Watson said in an emailed statement, “recognizing that, in a minority government situation, it is our responsibility to be ready to conduct an election on short notice if called upon to do so.”

Those preparations include lining up places to rent for district electoral offices and voting places, restocking supplies such as ballot boxes and recruiting election officials.

Watson said it’s too early to tell how much the additional preparations will cost, but said the agency — an independent office of the legislature — has the statutory authority to incur expenses under the Election Act.

“Per our usual practice, we will present a budget to the select standing committee on finance and government in the fall,” Watson said.

For the election year 2017-18, Elections B.C.’s operating budget was just over $46 million, compared with operating expenses of $9.4 million for the pre-election year of 2016-17 and $11 million in 2015-16.

As an independent office of the legislature, Elections B.C.’s responsibilities include administering provincial elections, enforcing election campaign financing legislation, and administering recall legislation and the provincial Referendum Act.

Before the 2017 election, the agency launched an investigation into allegations of improper third-party donations to political parties after an investigation into campaign financing by the Globe and Mail newspaper. Elections B.C. handed that investigation over to the RCMP so that it wouldn’t interfere in its ability to stage the May 9 ballot.