Spring is here, the grass has riz and if you are wondering where many of those Vision party supporters “is,” well 500 of them were at the Coast Hotel on Comox Street in the West End Wednesday night. It was Vision’s Spring Fling thing.
Comox, as you might have guessed, is a street with a separated bike lane, of course.
Each donor was chipping in $150 for what is certain to be another multi-million dollar campaign in November. Once at the venue they could tap their toes to the up-beat PAL (Performing Arts Lodge) choir, shake hands with the receiving line of Vision politicians and shake their booties to live music.
And while on the subject of chipping in, before the festivities rolled out and the mostly vegetarian nibblies were being nibbled by the rank and file, there was a gathering “upstairs” so the politicians could schmooze with major donors. That — sources say — included Lululemon founder and grateful Point Grey Road resident Chip Wilson.
There are most certainly more people unhappy with Mayor Gregor Robertson and his Vision boys and girls as they go for their third term. Witness the plethora of political parties both left and right. But it is a fractured opposition which is all to Vision’s advantage.
And it is remarkable to witness the size of the Vision tent as it occupies the centre of the political spectrum. There are folks like Reputations managing director Michael Davis. He was once the president of the NPA and now runs the company that helped Sam Sullivan kick Christy Clark’s butt in the battle that was essentially between federal Tories and federal Liberals for the NPA mayoral candidacy. (Have I mentioned that this time around the NPA has yet to announce anyone as a mayoral candidate? But never mind.) Davis is joined by Greg Wilson who fled the NPA years ago to work in Vision’s back rooms.
Provincial Liberal apparatchik Brad Zubyk was there as were many Liberals who drifted to Vision and have stayed there as Vision has carefully cultivated good relations with Victoria.
Zubyk says a Vision win in the next election is “inevitable.” But that’s what was said about the NDP winning the provincial battle not many months ago.
Former COPE mayoral candidate Carmela Allevato turned up with her main squeeze to marvel at just how many people she didn’t recognize. But she would have known Allan Wong, a former COPE school trustee who now makes his home with Vision, and Brent Granby, who last time out ran with COPE and is now seeking a Vision nomination.
Former NDP premier Ujjal Dosanjh was there looking relaxed, sporting shoulder length grey hair and saying he is working on his memoirs.
There were of course the lobbyists from the local liquor establishments and the taxi guys. John Nightingale, the president and CEO of the Vancouver Aquarium, was there, admitting he goes to everyone’s fundraiser. But in particular, you’d have to think he turned up because of the threat posed by Vision park board commissioners who want to set free whales and other cetacean critters regularly drawing crowds at Nightingale’s operation which is on the verge of expanding and not eliminating that attraction.
Vision senior staffer Stepan Vdovine informed me that “Gregor is going to say a few words and he will be tightly on script this time,” which is not as much fun for us ink-stained wretches than when he is allowed off leash.
But you got the impression Vision was different than all the competition. Robertson managed to mention the word “diverse” three times in as many minutes: the crowd was diverse; the party was diverse and the West End where the gathering was taking place was a “fabulous diverse neighbourhood.”
He also used the opportunity to showcase Vision’s newest council candidate, park board commissioner Niki Sharma who got schlepped up to the podium but remained mute for the remainder of Robertson’s tightly scripted comments.
Robertson concluded with the observation that Vision meant “lots of fun, lots of parties together and working hard.”
Presumably making them different from those grumpy geezers over at the NPA, about which not a word was whispered, at least not this time.
