SURREY - While she may have been unsuccessful in her bid to become Surrey's next mayor, Barinder Rasode said she wouldn't be leaving the city's political scene anytime soon.
Despite Surrey First taking all council spots in a clean sweep Saturday (Nov. 15), Rasode said she and her One Surrey team won't be disbanding anytime soon.
"So we're going to keep One Surrey active as a group," said the current councillor. "All of the candidates and people who supported the campaign are really interested in making sure One Surrey continues to play an active role in the political landscape with the city."
What that role may be will be determined in the coming weeks, but for now Rasode is looking to spend some time with her kids and get back into the workforce.
"I'm going to look for opportunities because I do have a number of things I can look at doing and I just need to decide where I'm going to go with it," she explained.
Rasode's previous work experience includes serving as a labour-relations officer and sales executive. Coupled with her experience on council, Rasode said she has plenty of options ahead of her.
"My nature is that I like to keep busy so I'm just going to find other stuff to do," she said, adding "but I'm still going to remain very active in the community. I don't believe you need a title to serve residents in the city and just like the many volunteers that do that now, I will continue to do that."
Rasode said there were no hard feelings between her and her fellow Surrey First members, with whom she has one more council meeting on Dec. 1. "I left (Linda Hepner) a message that night congratulating her and joked that she'll have to change her voicemail from councillor to mayor," said Rasode. "I think it's really important that everyone works together with the mayor... And I'm very happy that she was elected."
Asked if, in hindsight, she would have done anything differently during the campaign Rasode said she wouldn't have.
"One of the things that I'm really proud of is how we were able to raise important issues in this campaign and I really do think that was noted," she said. "I've learned that it's really important to reach out to the undecided voters and I think we ran a great campaign with a lot of support from young people who had never voted before, so I'm very proud of the campaign that we ran."
As for parting words as a councillor, Rasode wanted to thank council and city staff for the past six years and hoped the issues she's worked on like domestic violence, developmentally disabled youth and police continues. She also said this wouldn't be the last the city would be seeing of her.
"I will always be a very strong voice for my home, and Surrey is my home," she said.
cpoon@thenownewspaper.com