Green party has plans for Winnipeg

Candidates hope to improve the city’s sustainability

JENELLE PETRINCHUK STAFF

Six members of Winnipeg’s Green Party are running in the 2006 civic elections for city councillor, in various wards. Despite a few challenges that have occurred throughout the campaigning period, the candidates are enveloping many of the party’s platforms and mandates, and believe a municipal Green Party is essential to Winnipeg.

David Danyluk, who is running in the ward of Elmwood East- Kildonan, co-founded the Winnipeg Green Party about a year ago. One of the party’s main goals is to make the city government more transparent to citizens, and to maintain a fair democracy.

According to Danyluk, the party also wants to try to stop the provincial parties, “especially the provincial NDP,” he adds, from “meddling in the city politics . . .”

Danyluk expressed a concern that there isn’t enough attention directed towards all of the different aspects of the election. “There’s only one race that’s going on in this election right now, and that’s the mayor’s race,” he said, “It’s very disappointing.”

In addition to this concern, party politics at city hall have been an issue for the Green Party. Some of the Green Party candidates are upset that they have been denied party affiliation on the ballots for the upcoming election. This is due to a clause in the Manitoba Municipal Council and School Boards Elections Act that states “No reference to a candidate’s occupation, degree, title, honour or decoration may appear on the ballot.”

According to a press release on the issue, the party has made a request for the provincial minister of intergovernmental affairs to amend this legislation so that municipal party candidates will be able to include their party name on the ballot in the future.

Some of the issues that the Green Party candidates are hoping to deal with if elected city councillors are things like roads, sewers and police. It is important to note that the Green Party is not just about the environment but as Danyluk put it, “it’s more about sustainability . . . and living in your means, and living well within your means.”

One of the party’s main philosophies is not to build onto the city until it is able to sustain existing infrastructure. Danyluk explained that they have a strong belief in maintaining and improving the services the city has to offer before trying to move onto bigger things.

He said this applies to transit as well, one of the hottest topics of the civic election this year.

Another focus that Danyluk mentioned was to ban all VLTs in Winnipeg. “We consider VLTs the crack cocaine of gambling,” he said, “We think the provincial government is addicted to the revenue.” There are over 2,000 VLT machines in Winnipeg and Danyluk says a proper debate is needed as to whether or not the majority of people really want the machines in the city.

“It takes a brave political party to come forward with such a platform,” he said, “but prevention is the most feasible and economical solution . . . we just live in reality and say ‘hey, we can’t do this forever.’”

The party also questions things like, “why are chemicals such as pesticides illegal in Quebec, but not in Winnipeg?” They think chemical sprays aren’t needed in Winnipeg as they are poisoning the citizens. According to Danyluk, if elected, they won’t even apply for the permit that allows pesticides to be sprayed within the city.

Currently, candidates from the Green Party are running in six of the 15 wards, with most of the candidates covering suburban or partial suburban areas. The party wants to continue building itself within the elections and are hoping to have more people from the party run in the next election.

They’re hoping to become a voice for citizens at the civic level, to give people a group to turn to that isn’t related to the provincial government.

“There is a more responsible way to make decisions,” said Danyluk, “and we’re not going to disappear, even after the election is over.”