Candidates running for Prince George mayor, city council and even for School District 57 trustee are being peppered online by a handful of people asking for the candidate’s opinion on COVID-19 vaccine mandates.
Some of the questions ask whether the candidate believes workers who lost their jobs for refusing to be vaccinated should be reinstated.
Stupid question.
For starters, school district trustees and Prince George city council do not (and most certainly should not) have the authority to make hiring and firing decisions beyond their single employee. For School District 57, that is the superintendent and at city hall, that is the city manager.
Secondly, as a growing number of court decisions are showing, the provincial public health officer’s legal power to issue mandates, restrict public gatherings and so on applies to both individuals, private companies and local governments. What’s the old saying – you can’t fight city hall? Well, in this case, city hall can’t fight public health orders.
Thirdly, the vast majority of workers at the City of Prince George and School District 57 are represented by unions, who will fight for the rights of their members around vaccine mandates or any other issue.
Now here’s a smart, simple question to ask mayoral and council candidates: Do you pay taxes to the City of Prince George? Put more directly: do you live in city limits?
A weird provincial rule allows people to run for political office in communities where they don’t actually reside. That’s right – any adult living in Prince George can legally run for mayor of Kamloops, so long as they get the required number of supporting signatures and paid the nomination. If you think someone who doesn’t actually pay City of Prince George taxes should be allowed to decide what you, as a City of Prince taxpayer, pay each year, that’s your right, but you’re also well within your rights as a voter to ask the candidates whether or not they actually live in city limits.
Another smart question: what are your plans with the FortisBC gas deal money?
Leave the question hanging like that. The serious candidates will know what you’re talking about and have a thoughtful answer. The wannabes won’t have a clue.
The decision on how to spend that $28 million might be the most important decision the new mayor and council will make in their first year of office.
There are 28 million better reasons to ask the city council candidates that question than to ask them about their view on vaccine mandates and other issues they have little or no control over.
Editor-in-chief Neil Godbout
