Josie Osborne’s reign as Minister of Municipal Affairs lasted all of 15 months, as a minor provincial cabinet shuffle sent her into the newly created Ministry of Land, Water and Resource Stewardship (henceforth known as Land WaRS). 

She’s replaced by Nathan Cullen, the former high-profile MP who became significantly less profiled after a nomination controversy somewhat derailed his transition into provincial politics. 

What it means for municipal governance in the long-term isn’t immediately certain — unlike his predecessors, Cullen has no experience in local politics, and sits in the northwestern-most riding in B.C., with a single community of over 5,000 people. 

But in the short- and medium-term, the province has made clear what’s on the agenda: a review of municipal finances and legislation that could override cities on some housing density decisions. 

And in this week’s budget, the province committed $120 million in new funding to the Community Emergency Preparedness Fund, the biggest of a number of spending commitments municipalities had been asking for. 

In other words, it’s hard to see Cullen making any immediate news in his new portfolio.

An interesting dispute has been growing in Coquitlam ever since last September’s election.

Councillor Bonita Zarillo was elected for the NDP, forcing her to step down from local government. Under provincial law, you can only reject having a byelection if the vacancy happened in the same calendar year as a general election. 

But given municipal elections take place in October, Coquitlam thought holding a byelection to elect a single councilor for less than a year wasn’t worthwhile. They asked the province for an exemption. And last month, the province told CBC News that they formally told Coquitlam it had not been granted.

“We understand the timing is unfortunate,” the ministry said in a statement, “However, [exemptions are] reserved for unforeseen or emergency circumstances that arise during an election process and does not apply in this case.”

However, the city didn’t schedule a byelection, in spite of this. And this week, a former councillor served notice to Coquitlam that he would sue to force a byelection. 

The City of Coquitlam confirmed they received the legal notice, but declined further comment.

On the surface, it would appear Coquitlam doesn’t have the strongest legal case, given the public facts at hand. 

Which might suggest there’s some piece of information we still don’t know.

By now, local political Facebook pages — full of concerned citizens campaigning for or against certain candidates in municipal elections — are nothing new. 

But what if you didn’t know who was running those pages?

That’s the question behind Squamish Voices, a page that has put out a number of videos and memes critical of Mayor Karen Elliott and councillors that generally support her. Many of the posts criticize the town’s growth strategy, arguing it benefits developers at the expense of local residents.   

As first pointed out by Squamish resident Michael Coyle, according to Facebook data the page has spent several thousand dollars on ads. And according to the data, the ads are produced out of Toronto, with a phone number linked to Canada Proud, an Ontario-based advocacy group “working to defeat Justin Trudeau,” as they say on their homepage.

We reached out to Squamish Voices and asked if they wanted to “clarify what their connections to Squamish are,” and while they saw the message, they declined to respond.

Municipal battle lines on growth and development debates don’t line up as neatly with provincial or federal political affiliations. And local people hiring national advertising agencies to help in political battles is nothing new.

But as far as changes to how municipal election campaigns are conducted in mid-sized towns, this page bears watching.

Finally, it appears that after four years and dozens of hours of meetings, the Campbell Heights expansion is going ahead.

For those unaware of the saga, Surrey has long wanted to rezone land in its rural southeast quadrant to increase the size of the Campbell Heights industrial park. But because the land falls outside the regionally-agreed upon “Urban Containment Boundary,” it required regional approval. 

That was rejected in 2018, and a revised proposal was deferred just a month ago due to concerns of lack of consultation with the Semiahmoo First Nation. But even though Surrey had not really consulted since then — only committing to do so — Metro Vancouver narrowly approved their request. 

It was a debate that touched on virtually every hot-button issue in regional politics at the moment: green vs. industrial space, what constitutes “meaningful consultation,” tying transportation and land-use plans together, respecting the autonomy of local councils vs. ensuring coherent regional planning. 

It’s part of the reason it became such a contentious decision. Because of that complexity, whether it sets precedents for future regional decisions is another question.