Last Saturday night, election night, marked a small milestone for me — it was my 15th election night.
To most, that may not sound like a big number, but to me, it’s pretty significant.
I started my career in Merritt with the Merritt News with my first taste of municipal politics. Then after freelancing in the Lower Mainland, I landed a job with the Squamish Chief where I covered two municipal elections, one federal and one provincial.
Here on the Sunshine Coast, since I took over as editor in 2003, there have been 10 elections — four municipal, three provincial and three federal.
All of these nights have brought about their unique challenges, surprising results — and lots of pizza and coffee.
But the one constant is the hard-working staff who have worked alongside me with the desire to get results out as quickly as possible to the residents of each community.
When I was working in Merritt, some 18 years ago, there was no such thing as electronic ballots — everything was counted by hand. Results were not emailed, they were faxed. There was no Facebook or Twitter. In fact, we put out a special election extra the day after to inform people of who won and who lost.
Things changed, of course, over the years. Email is now the norm. I can’t remember the last time I received an actual fax. Social media and websites are now the first places we turn to on election night to get our results. I spent more time on Twitter last Saturday than I have in a long time — and it was fascinating seeing the flurry of activity from journalists all over the province.
One other constant in all these election nights is the voter turnout. How did this community stack up against all the rest?
That too, of course, has gone up and down over the years. But this year, I’m more than proud of Sunshine Coast voters, who flocked to the polls to make their voices heard.
Gibsons finished at 62.5 per cent, up from 57.2 per cent in the 2011 municipal election, and was the ninth highest total in the province.
Sechelt saw a 10 per cent increase, with 52.87 per cent this time compared to 42.86 per cent in 2011.
These numbers are fantastic. Throughout this election campaign, we pounded home the message of how important it is to be informed, to be engaged, to get out and vote.
Through our coverage, our stories, pictures and videos, the election pull-out section we published on Oct. 31 and the many all-candidates meetings hosted by our Chambers of Commerce and community associations, we helped to get you informed so you could make a choice on Nov. 15.
We clearly did that, and you, the residents of the Sunshine Coast, responded. You accepted the challenge, picked up the ball and ran with it.
I’m proud of the role we played in this election, and I’m certainly proud of the role you all played, too.
