Vancouver, BC (November 2, 2011)

Unlike other debates, Last Candidate Standing doesn’t just focus on the frontrunners – all 61 registered candidates running for mayor or council have been invited to make their case before an expert panel and a sold-out audience of more than 200 voters.

Candidates will be on the clock as they respond to the panel’s questions covering a broad range of campaign issues. The candidates with the best answers, as judged by the panel and audience, will move on to the next round – those that don’t measure up will be eliminated. At the end of the night, only one candidate will be left standing.

“This event is a great opportunity for voters to learn about the diversity of candidates who are seeking office in our city,” says Anthony Hamilton, coordinator of the VPSN’s Democratic Spaces working group. “We’re pushing the boundaries of the debate format to have some fun while creating a more inclusive public forum that represents the full spectrum of viewpoints in this election.”

Last Candidate Standing will be hosted by Vancouver-based writer and broadcaster Steve Burgess. Panelists include:

• Theresa Lalonde, reporter, CBC Vancouver
• Matthew Soules, assistant professor, UBC School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture
• David Beers, editor-in-chief, The Tyee
• Alissa Sadler, vice-chair, Vancouver Public Space Network

The sold-out event takes place from 7 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. at UBC Robson Square. In between rounds of the candidate showdown, local band Wee Boy Pretty will provide musical entertainment. Limited wait-list spots available: lastcandidatestanding.eventbrite.com

Last Candidate Standing is part of the VPSN’s Vancouver Votes initiative. Throughout the civic election campaign, the VPSN has been maintaining www.vancouvervotes.ca as an up-to-date, non-partisan resource collecting candidate survey responses, election news, and essential voter information. Vancouver Votes is also active on Twitter at @VanVotes.

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More information:
www.vancouvervotes.ca
www.twitter.com/vanvotes (event hashtag: #LCSVan and #VanElxn)

Media contact:
Anthony Hamilton
Vancouver Public Space Network
604.565.1213
anthony@vancouverpublicspace.ca

While this sort of strategy does raise questions about the idea of broader civic engagement in Vancouver, we do, nevertheless, feel that it’s important to test initiatives like this.

Assuming that the expected caveats around the safety and security of online voting platforms can be met, we offered a few additional items for consideration — a note about starting the project with online voter registration (something we argued for in our 2008 Public Space Manifesto), and a further comment about not reducing the number of physical polling stations.

The Vancouver Public Space Network supports in principle the idea of a pilot project to explore the feasibility of on-line voting in upcoming local elections. We believe that increasing opportunities for residents to participate in municipal elections is a useful mechanism with which to support citizen engagement.

In offering this support, we wish to note two items for your consideration:

(1) On-line voter registration – We understand that there are questions about the time and resources that would be required to launch this pilot for the 2011 municipal contest. In the absence of actual on-line balloting in the 2011 election, we feel that making on-line voter registration available could be a logical first step that could improve engagement with the election process. It is likely that this would not require the same resource considerations and could play a useful role in phasing the implementation of this pilot.

(2) Physical polling stations – We wish to clarify that a pilot project of this sort would not result in the reduction of physical polling stations.