Young politicians say they intend to keep organizing, bringing up the next generation following electoral losses
Photos courtesy of Jack Sandor, Zac de Vries, and Sam Holland. Collage by Declan Snowden.
Southern Vancouver Island saw a high volume of youth candidates in this year’s municipal elections. In the District of Saanich, several candidates under 35 ran for mayor and council, including two current UVic students — Finn Fairbairn and Noah Fruttarol — and a current nursing student in the Camosun-UVic bridge program, Sierra Wicks-Irving.
Similarly, the City of Victoria saw several young candidates run, including Jack Sandor, a 28-year-old electrician who was elected to council, receiving the fifth highest vote share. UVic alumna Bella Lee also ran but was not elected. In Oak Bay, UVic alum and community organizer Sam Holland ran for mayor, and in Langford, 30-year-old UVic alum Colby Harder was the sole incumbent re-elected for Langford city council.
Also on the island, Sacha Christensen, who graduated from UVic last year, was elected to View Royal Council, and in Vancouver, Solomon Yi-Kieran, UBC’s former vice president of external affairs, was elected to council.
Though many of the young candidates this year ultimately did not win their races, the sheer number of young candidates who participated this year stood out to many.
“Seeing so many young candidates run for office across the Island has me feeling incredibly optimistic,” Zac de Vries, a former two-term councillor and mayoral candidate in Saanich, said in a statement to the Martlet. “Our communities will make better decisions when those who will live with the consequences for decades to come have a meaningful voice in shaping them.”
“If we aren’t in the room, no one’s gonna be representing our voice,” Holland said on the importance of having young people elected. “I think that there’s a lot of folks my age who are increasingly disillusioned with the political system.”
Holland decided to run for mayor of Oak Bay partially due to incumbent Mayor Kevin Murdoch being acclaimed to the position — elected by default due to a lack of other candidates — in 2022.
Holland ran on a platform that he described as “explicitly ‘yes in my backyard,’” in a district that is frequently stereotyped as a “not in my backyard,” or “NIMBY,” area. Despite this, and despite his loss to Murdoch, Holland said the reception to his campaign was largely positive, sharing that many older residents in Oak Bay were happy to see young people getting involved with politics.
“It was also quite nice to have so many folks I talked to in Oak Bay say, ‘you know, I might not agree with everything you stand for, but it’s really good to see someone who’s younger running,’” Holland said.
Though he did not win, Holland plans to keep pushing for his beliefs as a community organizer, and is going to start teaching community organizing classes with Greater Victoria Acting Together, so young people can more effectively impact their communities.
“Organizing is fundamentally building community and building institutions, and we have lost so many of our institutions — and our civil society is so much weaker — than I think it should be in a democratic society,” he said.
“If we want to live in a strong democracy, if we want to live in a place where the political agenda is directed primarily by the needs of all people, and not just a select few with connections,. I think the only tool that we really have is organizing.”
Like Holland, Sandor, who was elected to Victoria city council, said the reception to his campaign was largely positive, and that he “received a strong signal that people want more young people in politics.”
According to Sandor, his team knocked on over 10 000 doors for his campaign.
“It’s encouraging to see young people step up a bit and realize that we need to have a say in the future. We’re going to be living with the consequences of this stuff longer than anyone else,” he said. “[There’s] an unfortunate cycle where young people don’t see themselves and their interests represented by the political system, so they don’t vote … I think young people will have to break [the cycle].”
Sandor told the Martlet that he got campaign advice from de Vries, who was first elected to Saanich council right after he finished his degree at UVic, and served two consecutive terms before running for mayor of Saanich this October.
In a statement, de Vries told the Martlet he’s “always taken the long-term view” when it comes to bringing young people up in politics.
“We can’t solve everything ourselves. It’s important to invest in the people who will come after us and create opportunities for them to grow as leaders. That’s been a focus of mine in offering my time and advice to people like Jack Sandor, Colby Harder, and Bella Lee.”
Following October’s dual municipal and provincial elections, which saw a “supermajority” conservative government be elected, de Vries says youth “voice[s], courage, and compassion is more important now than ever.”
“I encourage young people to get involved, organize, support one another, and keep working toward the things they believe in,” he said. “I’ll do everything I can to help them.”
