One month from now residents of the riding of Cloverdale-Langley City will go to the polls to elect a Member of Parliament.
Now the Cloverdale District Chamber of Commerce and the Surrey Board of Trade (SBOT) will co-host an all-candidates meeting Dec. 2 for the byelection.
Wheatley said both he and the SBOT’s Jasroop Gosal wanted to get the meeting in a few days before advanced voting starts. With the byelection set for Dec. 16, and advanced voting days scheduled for December 6, 7, 8, and 9, that meant having the meeting at the beginning of December.
"We are going to work with the Surrey Board of Trade on it,” explained Wheatley. “Langley was going to join in too, but they can’t, logistically, for a number of reasons.”
The electoral district of Cloverdale-Langley City is about 60 per cent Cloverdale, about 25 per cent Langley, and about 12 per cent Newton. The riding is about 60 square kilometres in size with a population of more than 130,000. As of Nov. 10, there were 88,348 people on the electors list.
Wheatley said because the riding crosses both municipal and board of trade boundaries, he felt it was important that multiple chambers of commerce attempt to work together on the meeting. He said that has always been the case for other important events and issues of mutual interest.
Wheatley added that he expects to have all four candidates running in the byelection at the meeting. They include: Tamara Jansen (Conservative), Madison Fleischer (Liberal), Pat McCutcheon (Greens), and Vanessa Sharma (NDP).
The meeting will be held at 5 Star Catering. Wheatley said the Fraser Valley Real Estate Board will again be a sponsor. (They sponsored the provincial election all-candidates meeting held at the Clova Theatre ahead of the B.C. provincial election.)
The byelection for Cloverdale-Langley City was officially called on Nov. 10. On the same day, Elections Canada opened a riding election office at 6279 202nd St. in Langley.
The riding has been without an MP since John Aldag resigned earlier this year to run in a failed bid to win a seat for the B.C. NDP in the provincial election. (He ran in the riding of Langley-Abbotsford and lost to provincial Conservative Harman Bhangu by more than 5,600 votes.)
Jansen lost in the last election as the incumbent to John Aldag, who had in turn lost as the incumbent to Jansen in the election prior. Jansen won the Conservative nomination to run in the electoral district Oct. 21.
Fleischer runs a business in Langley and received the official nomination Nov. 10 from the Liberal Party.
Pat McCutcheon told the Cloverdale Reporter Nov. 11 he will run for the federal Greens. McCutcheon recently ran for the B.C. Greens in a bid to win a provincial seat in the riding of Surrey-Cloverdale. (That riding was won by Elenore Sturko of the B.C. Conservatives).
On Nov. 13, the federal NDP announced Vanessa Sharma would be their candidate. Sharma works for FortisBC and volunteers for several groups.
Wheatley said attendees must pre-register for the all-candidates meeting by visiting the Chamber’s website. He noted that all questions for the MP hopefuls must be submitted in advance. Questions can be emailed to info@cloverdalechamber.ca by Nov. 29.
5 Star Catering is located at 5640 188th Street in Cloverdale. Doors for the meeting will open at 5:30 p.m. with the event running from 6 to 7 p.m.
For more info, or to register for the meeting, visit cloverdalechamber.ca and click on "Events List."
For info on how to vote, where to register, or anything else about the byelection, visit elections.ca.
