By Jennifer Smith - Vernon Morning Star Published: November 18, 2008
Coldstream’s new council members are eager to take the reins of their community. Along with Mayor Jim Garlick, the familiar faces returning to council are Doug Dirk and Bill Firman. Another councillor, formerly from the neighbouring jurisdiction of Vernon, is Pat Cochrane. Gyula Kiss is also a recognized name, as he was mayor for three years and councillor for six in Coldstream during the ‘90s. The other candidates who will make up council are lawyer Richard Enns and retired geologist Maria Besso. Besso and Kiss are the two Coldstream Ratepayers Association members on council. “There definitely will be some challenges,” said Cochrane of the new council. But, he adds: “I think we will work well together.”Yet, other candidates say the new council members will work better than the last.
“I like the new council, I have more in common with them,” said Firman, who is confident they will be able to manage development better versus his prior feeling that development was running the community. Firman also shares the delight of several of the new councillors to see Garlick voted in as mayor. “I didn’t think there was anyone in the Coldstream who could beat him,” said Firman, a criminal lawyer who is entering his second term on council. Firman says there is a great group of professionals on the new council. The fact that two of them are lawyers (himself and Enns), leads him to believe people must really like lawyers, despite what they say.“I think secretly they do because they know they’re all going to need one sooner or later.”
Besso is also pleased to see the level of professionalism on the new council. “I think it’s got quite a lot of experience on it. It’s a very strong council,” said Besso, who will be sitting down to her first term on council. “I think I can learn a lot from all those people.” Besso was also pleased with the results of the mayoralty race, with Garlick beating Glen Taylor by more than 1,000 votes. “It could’ve gone either way but it was very comforting that the decision was so decisive.”
Kiss is equally pleased with the election outcome, along with its popularity on his blog website. His Coldstreamernews site had 830 hits Sunday, 350 of which were new hits. Kiss says the CRA news blog will be a link between council and the rest of the community. Having worked with three different councils, Dirk has no reservations about starting a new term with a new group of people. “It’s a new opportunity with some new faces.” Dirk, who has the same council experience as Cochrane (12 years) lends this advice to the newbies. “There’s lots to learn. You need to be a good listener and you need to not have your mind made up before you go into something.”
Mary Malerby, who was not voted back onto council, wishes the new mayor and councillors well. While she is a great believer in democracy she is surprised by the election outcome. “This whole set up was really something. They (CRA) ran their slate of these people. Then they ran all these extra people.” The mayoralty outcome was also a shock to her. “I didn’t think there’d be that much of a division.”
Enns could not be reached for comment by press deadline. Most of the candidates agree that a priority is examining the situation with the Coldstream Fire Department.
