Ian Jacques/Editor
A group of citizens has filed a petition in Vancouver Supreme Court against the Town of Gibsons, seeking to overturn the council portion of the Nov. 15 municipal election.
Council candidates Brian Sadler and David Croal along with Town electors Agnes Labonte and Barry Reeves co-signed the petition that was filed on Thursday, Dec. 18.
"We have taken this action on behalf of the many citizens of the Town who value our democratic process and have expressed their disappointment and indignation with the conduct of our recent municipal election," said Sadler during a press conference held at the Coast Reporter office in Sechelt on Friday, Dec. 19. "The Local Government Act (LGA) is quite specific as to how municipal elections should be conducted."
The portion of the act under which the group is applying to the court is contained in Section 143.
"Specifically, we are asking the Supreme Court to set aside the Nov. 15, 2008 portion of the Town council election involving the Town councillors," said Sadler. "This is neither a frivolous nor inexpensive petition and both David and I state in our affidavits that this has nothing to do with the fact that we are unsuccessful candidates. The collective discontent amongst the citizens of the Town is virtually immeasurable and, because of this, we are seeking some answers for everyone within our community, through the provisions of the LGA."
Besides the four above mentioned, four other people have signed sworn affidavits to aid the case. Those people include council candidate Kenan MacKenzie, Jo-Anne McNevin, Donna Hobbs and Suzanne Smart. Hobbs and Smart were election night scrutineers for Croal and Sadler.
"We would not have the mechanical details of the petition itself without these other people," added Sadler. "The LGA goes on in some great length about all the procedures that are prescribed for an election. The raw data that we were offered by our scrutineers kept making us research into the LGA, only to find out that the observations were in contravention of the LGA.
"We feel we have a good case. The lawyers feel we have a good case - in fact a benchmark case for the LGA."
In a brief emailed press release to Coast Reporter Monday afternoon, Town of Gibsons chief administrative officer Paul Gipps said, "The Town will participate fully in this process and awaits the Jan. 7, 2009 Supreme Court hearing."
Sadler and Croal said questions about how the counting of ballots was done on election night and how the subsequent recount was handled days after the Nov. 15 election spurred filing of the petition.
"The unofficial result came down on election night and we said, all right, I guess that's it," said Croal. But then on Wednesday afternoon (Nov. 19) when the official results came out, the numbers just didn't add up. We started doing our own tables and charts and suddenly it was the numbers that started us talking."
Croal points out the difference between the preliminary results on election night and the official results was apparently due to 15 tally sheets that were not taken into the count.
"If you base things on 25 ballots per tally sheet, that would equal potentially 1,500 votes or 375 ballots, but with the missing tally sheets taken into account, we only have a difference of 338 votes," said Croal. "A school teacher of mine once said numbers don't lie. We rely on our civic officials to look after our best interests, and if they can't count, we've got a problem."
Croal further points out that the percentage changes of the results from election night to what the numbers say after the recount also don't make any sense.
"How can you have, for example, Kenan MacKenzie have 50 votes in the advanced poll in the preliminary results then go down to 32 votes in the advanced poll in the official results?" he asked. "After the recount, Bob Curry had an additional 101 votes or a 19.4 per cent change, yet LeeAnn Johnson, who led throughout, had only a 24 vote difference or a 2.9 per cent change after the recount. This just is not right. If the numbers are correct you should not have such a wide percentage change from the preliminary results to the official results."
Croal added this petition is only for the council portion of the election and not for mayor or for the referendum on water meters.
"We believe some improprieties took place based on the sworn information we have," he said. "There is no police force for the act. It is up to citizens to police the act. People may ask what is our vendetta, but it's not a vendetta. Government starts at a municipal level and if it's abused at that level then we might as well all go home."
Sadler said they are not alleging anything, rather documenting the miscarrying of the LGA requirements during the election.
"Basically this was done and this wasn't done," said Sadler. "For example, the famous recount done three days later was carried out unsupervised, and right in the LGA it states candidates and/or scrutineers are required to be there. The issue is mistakes were made and procedure was not followed. It will be up to the Town to identify who made those mistakes. All we're doing is identifying the mistakes."
A hearing has been tentatively set for Jan. 7 at which time a judge will hear from lawyers for both sides.
According to section 145 of the LGA, on the hearing of an application regarding the validity of an election, the court may declare that the election is confirmed as valid, declare that the election is invalid and that another election must be held to fill all positions for that office that were to be filled in the election that was declared invalid, declare that the election of a candidate is invalid and that the office is vacant, or declare that the election of a candidate is invalid and that another candidate is duly elected.
Sadler said as news of the petition has gotten out to the community, he has been overwhelmed by the outpouring of support.
"This morning it took me five hours to shave because my phone was ringing off the hook," Sadler said. "The offer of funding has come in - people are calling asking, who do I give my money to. We're not trying to be the Lone Ranger here. Somebody with the capability had to seize the initiative on behalf of the people who were tearing their hair out, and we were capable of doing that based on the raw data we had and our research of the LGA."
