Why Vancouver's 2026 municipal election could feel like a test

Voting in Vancouver’s municipal election this Saturday might feel a bit like taking a high school exam, with each voter asked to mark their ballot as many as 32 times.

If they also opt for that day’s advance voting location for the provincial election, they could hit 33 votes in a single day.

Vancouverites will be asked to answer three questions relating to borrowing money to fund capital spending and two non-binding plebiscite questions, and choose as many as 10 candidates for city council, nine for school board, seven for park board and one for mayor.

It’s a lot. And this campaign has, at times, felt like a lot — even before a provincial election campaign was dropped on top of it.

Regardless of the result, one thing that will define the 2026 Vancouver election is those two plebiscite questions added by the current council’s ABC majority: one around cracking down on public drug use, and another about converting part of the old St. Paul’s Hospital, or a similar site, into an “involuntary-care” facility for 100 or more people with severe mental-health and substance-use problems.

ABC and the party’s incumbent mayor, Ken Sim, campaigned heavily on what they call the “public safety plebiscite,” with a big advertising buy urging voters to vote ‘yes’ on both measures, and also vote for the whole ABC slate. That has been the key message the party has presented voters as they seek a second term: a vote for ABC is a vote for public safety.

The other parties all blasted the plebiscite as a political stunt that will cost taxpayers $500,000. However, the mayoral candidates differed on how they would respond, if they’re elected and the public supports the plebiscite measures.

Green mayoral candidate Pete Fry said he doesn’t want people continuing to use drugs in public, but instead supports diverting them to daytime shelters or other places with washrooms and counselling services.

Fry did, however, say he would “thoroughly reject” the proposal made by ABC during the campaign (but not actually included in the plebiscite ballot question) to direct police to confiscate people’s drugs, arguing that could push them to do dangerous and potentially violent things to get more drugs. Rebecca Bligh and Kareem Allam have mounted similar arguments during the campaign.

Vote Vancouver mayoral candidate Bligh criticized the plebiscite itself saying, “the mayor of Vancouver doesn’t need a plebiscite to do the job,” but said, “regardless, if voters clearly support either measure, I’ll respect that and act on it.”

TEAM for a Livable Vancouver mayoral candidate Colleen Hardwick called the plebiscite “a distraction from Ken Sim’s four years of failure on public safety,” but said, regardless of the outcome of the plebiscite, TEAM will support enforcing existing laws against public drug use, and involuntary care for people with severe addiction and mental illness.

Allam came out more forcefully against the St. Paul’s proposal, saying he doesn’t want “a prison in my downtown core.”

Sim said ABC will respect the will of the people if voters reject the plebiscite, but the party expects “an overwhelmingly positive return.”

In the campaign’s final days, all seven major Vancouver parties were touting endorsements from labour groups, business leaders, and municipal, provincial and federal politicians past and present.

One endorsement that was newsworthy in 2022 and notable for its absence this time around was the Vancouver Police Union. Four years ago, the VPU broke with decades of tradition to make a political endorsement, publicly backing ABC and Sim. This time around, the union decided against endorsing any party.

The Vancouver Fire Fighters union chose not to endorse anyone for mayor, or any member of council’s current ABC majority, instead endorsing only five council candidates from three other parties: OneCity’s Lucy Maloney and Frances Bula; the Greens’ Annette Reilly and Camil Dumont; and Vote Vancouver’s Rebecca Hasdell.

ABC did, however, draw endorsements from some prominent business leaders, including Amar Doman, B.C. Lions owner and Futura Corp. founder; CAI Capital Partners’ Tracey McVicar; and Fiore Group CEO Frank Giustra (which comes despite Giustra’s public criticism of Sim’s 2024 proposal to invest taxpayer money in cryptocurrency, a move the mining magnate called “reckless and stupid.”)

Mike Harcourt, former Vancouver mayor and B.C. premier, and ex-councillor Geoff Meggs previously supported OneCity mayoral nominee William Azaroff, who dropped out of the race in early September, as part of a deal between OneCity, the Greens, and COPE, to rally behind a single “unity” mayoral candidate for the left, which ended up being Fry. But after Azaroff’s withdrawal, Harcourt and Meggs didn’t throw their support behind Fry, instead announcing on Oct. 2 they would back Bligh.

In a joint statement along with former Non-Partisan Association councillor Peter Ladner, the trio said: “On plenty of issues, we still disagree. On this one, we don’t. Rebecca Bligh is the best choice to be Vancouver’s next mayor.”

Bligh has said this key cross-partisan endorsement, as well as public support of other left-wing politicos, challenges the idea that voters who identify as progressive or left-leaning are necessarily supporting Fry as a consensus candidate.

Meanwhile, Allam and the Liberals say the diversity of their support reflects the “big tent” coalition they’ve built. That includes local hotel worker’s union Unite Here, former NPA councillor Elizabeth Ball, prominent B.C. NDP-ers like Michelle Mungall and Arminder Randhawa, and ex-Liberal MP Joyce Murray.

OneCity and COPE’s council candidates have, once again, been endorsed by labour organizations like the B.C. General Employees’ Union, and the Vancouver and District Labour Council.

Fry and the Greens have been endorsed by federal and provincial NDP politicians like Jenny Kwan, Libby Davies and Melanie Mark, among others.

Recent polling, including Leger’s poll conducted for Postmedia News between Sept. 23 and 30, found Vancouver residents in an especially dissatisfied mood. While just over half of Metro Vancouver residents believed their city was on the “wrong track,” negative sentiment was particularly pronounced in Vancouver, where 62 per cent said the same thing. While that high desire for change usually could often spell doom for an incumbent mayor and party, Vancouver’s crowded field with five party-backed mayoral candidates could enable Sim and ABC to win a second term with far less support than their overwhelming mandate from 2022.

Or, a ‘change’ election could bring a historic result, whether that’s Vancouver’s first Green mayor, first female mayor or first Liberal elected. Depending on how those 32 votes get dispersed, it’s conceivable Vancouver could elect members of seven different parties — almost certainly another historic first — between the school board, park board, council and the mayor’s office.

Whoever wins in Vancouver this weekend will likely be closely watching next weekend’s provincial election to see who they’ll be working with in Victoria. And then we’ll be watching to make sure they get down to work, together, very soon after that. There’s a lot to get done.