Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - July 18, 2015, Winnipeg, Manitoba C M Y K PAGE A15 IDEAS �o ISSUES �o INSIGHTS THINK- TANK A 15 Winnipeg Free Press Saturday, July 18, 2015 B RIAN Bowman is addicted to the political virtues of the cheap, quick digital photograph. He's constantly using pictures to show he's busy at public functions and his fondness for selfies with other Winnipeggers at those events is legendary. He's even filling his social- media feed with photos of empty foyers, pretty views or architectural features. Winnipeg, meet your photographer- in- chief. There are two prevailing views about this addiction. The first view is that this is a refreshing sign that the mayor " gets it" when it comes to showing some 21st- century personal transparency. It's probably a minority view, but it's widely held, especially with voters who are social- media addicts themselves. The other view is that this addiction is proof Bowman is a gadfly or a lightweight who simply can't handle the job of being mayor. My own view falls somewhere in the middle. On the one hand, mayors are expected to be extremely visible, available and accessible. If you don't get that, you don't understand the job. For example, former Chicago mayor Richard J. Daley routinely spoke at several public dinners on busy nights, and he famously paid his respects at five different funerals in a single day. More recently, former Boston mayor Thomas Menino was so accessible, local pollsters confirmed that over half of Boston voters - in a city of almost 700,000 - had personally met their mayor at some point. Some mayors even refuse to leave town for their vacations, preferring to rent a local hotel suite so they'd still be nearby if a crisis hit. And there's good cause for Bowman to overcompensate on this front. Remember, his predecessor was mocked for habitually skipping events that other mayors never miss, including police graduations, business summits and even a Remembrance Day event. Katz was a guy who used the word " showmanship" in casual conversation, but he showed little concern for the " first citizen" expectations of the mayoralty - and over time, it cost him. That said, Bowman is taking a risk if he doesn't dial it down soon. The problem isn't that the endless grip- and- grin photos aren't part of his job. The problem is that Bowman isn't doing enough of the rest of his job, and the contrast is starting to show. Take this month's short war over the city's new bike and pedestrian strategy. Despite several missteps by Coun. Wyatt, the five councillors who attacked the plan were well- organized in their effort to paint the plan as a dud, carefully scheduling their attacks to introduce a fresh critique each day over several news days. It created fodder for the media with pundits and other councillors weighing in. So, where was Bowman? As mayor, he can hold a news conference every day if he wants to, and it would've been worth it to reassure voters about the details of the plan before it was debated. But he didn't. It wasn't for lack of time, since he's been busy with public events this month. We know, because we have the pictures to prove it. Consider a similar missed opportunity on another front: affordable housing. On July 6, Bowman's picture was everywhere as he worked on a construction site with Habitat for Humanity. Again, these sort of events are part of the job. But anyone can lift a hammer for the cameras. Two weeks earlier, Bowman had a chance to do something much more mayoral. Habitat was at city hall fighting not- in- my- backyard residents who tried to stop 18 new homes in St. James. Bowman could have intervened in that fight to make a point. Someone needs to start convincing Winnipeggers to make room for infill housing, and who better than the mayor? Or, he could've taken action to open up additional land for groups such as Habitat. But photo ops still take precedence over actual progress. Team Bowman still thinks of city hall as a world of symbolic gestures, without grasping that the symbols are supposed to be a small part of something much larger. " The medium is the message." In Bowman's case, the selfie is a medium that is starting to reinforce his lack of a message. If there's no goal, no objective, no progress behind one's political communications, photo ops and selfies start to become a self- parody - a self- defeating rather than self- promoting exercise. Think of former prime minister Jean Chr�tien, the 1997 flood, and Manitoba's hostile reaction after Chr�tien tossed a sandbag for the cameras before returning to his election campaign, and you'll get it. Bowman hasn't reached self- parody quite yet. But if nothing changes, it's pretty certain he will, sooner rather than later. Brian Kelcey is a public policy consultant. He previously served as a senior political adviser at city hall and in the Ontario government. I T'S a risky way to approach voters, many of whom understand that we live in a country where you can only count on having about 60 truly warm- weather days, and that those days come in July and August. It's also risky as far as your own party is concerned. Elected officials look forward to summer for two main reasons. First, just like other Canadians, politicians want to take advantage of what little warm weather this country offers. Second, after spending most of the other months slaving away in and around legislatures, summer is the time they reacquaint themselves with constituents - something that helps elected officials get re- elected. So, with all these inherent risks, why would Prime Minister Stephen Harper consider starting the upcoming election campaign in August? In simple terms, these are perilous times to be a federal Conservative and Harper is looking for every advantage he can muster. The election date would remain the same, Oct. 19, but Tory sources indicate Harper is considering starting the campaign as early as Aug. 8. A more likely date seems to be Aug. 20. This means a longer election campaign, which automatically becomes a more expensive campaign. In fact, this could be one of the most expensive federal campaigns in history. At nearly $ 700,000 a day in a 36- day campaign, a registered political party would be allowed to spend in the neighbourhood of $ 24 million. Increase that writ period to 60 days, one of the scenarios that sources claim is being considered by Harper and total allowable expenses go to $ 45 million, nearly twice the limits in a shorter campaign. Manitoba Conservative sources confirm Harper wants a chance to pound the Liberals and NDP with campaign advertising at a rate neither opposition party would be able to match. This is an advantage for Tories who are the best at fundraising. Beginning the formal campaign sooner would also relieve the Tories from having to endure a barrage of anti- government, third- party political advertising. Third parties specifically targeting the Harper government are allowed to spend an unlimited amount on advertising before the writ is dropped; once the campaign starts, however, their spending is capped. Despite bringing in a law ensuring fixed- date elections, in part to stop governments from manipulating campaigns for their own benefit, Harper is showing he is as devious and competitive as any prime minister who has come before him. He is now manipulating this campaign to use his party's superior financial resources to outlast the opposition in an electoral war of attrition. Coupled with the changes to electoral laws, some of which will undoubtedly prevent some Canadians from voting in the upcoming election, this is destined to be one of the most cynical elections in Canadian history. All that being said, will stringing out the campaign work for Harper? Generally speaking, incumbent governments have traditionally preferred shorter campaigns, and for good reason. Longer campaigns typically include more opportunities for stumbles and mistakes that can give challengers a boost. Longer campaigns also give opposition parties greater opportunity to exploit an incumbent's political baggage. And Harper most definitely has some baggage going into this campaign. There is scandal, primarily the ongoing criminal trial of suspended Tory Sen. Mike Duffy that has already drawn in a number of key Conservative operatives. Former MP Dean Del Mastro became the latest in a string of Tory elected officials and staff convicted for violating election laws. Earlier this year, he was sentenced to a month in jail. However, that is not the only problem facing the Conservatives. Canada's first ministers met in St. John's, N. L., and enunciated a long list of grievances, including the need for a national energy strategy, a lack of meaningful investment in infrastructure and inadequate levels of funding for health care. The big problem for Harper is that the length of the campaign does not eliminate or even mitigate the biggest problems he faces going into the election. His government is increasingly seen as corrupt and selfish. Although Harper's personal leadership ratings are still strong, he has lost ground to NDP Leader Thomas Mulcair and Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau. These dilemmas are plainly evident in the preelection polling trends. The Conservatives find themselves in second place in most polls. Most seat or election projections now show the NDP with just as much chance as the Tories at forming government in the next election. Yes, the Tories have more money than their opponents. But as a Liberal source said, even though they will not be able to spend dollar for dollar with the Tories, they will be competitive. There is a point in any campaign where voters become saturated with campaign advertising. You can keep buying more ads, but there will be a diminished return. When you stack up all these factors - campaign finances, polling trends, political baggage - you start to see that creating a longer campaign isn't Harper's best strategy for re- election. It's really the only strategy he has left. dan. lett@ freepress. mb. ca Twitter: @ danlett I T was a great stunt, designed to get a media response. Put up amendments that were rejected at city council on the mayor's office door, with the inscription " democracy denied." This is what Transcona Coun. Russ Wyatt did Wednesday, and it raises a good question: what is democracy? Usually, this is the kind of broad, philosophical question that could be debated at length in a graduate political science seminar. But it is also a very practical question, one that has real implications for how political decisions are made - or not made - based on whether a particular event or tactic is seen to be democratically legitimate. In recent weeks, some Winnipeg city councillors have been suggesting there is something illegitimate about the way the city's activetransportation plan was developed. They criticized the consultation process and the report it produced. Then, these councillors aired radio ads in an attempt to rally public opinion against the 20- year, $ 334- million strategy. When they tabled 20 motions at Wednesday's council meeting that would have amended the plan, the majority of council voted against their efforts to essentially filibuster the passage of this plan by tabling all of these motions at once. This move - which, it should be noted, was completely council's prerogative and within the rules - led Wyatt to engage in a bit of political theatre. So was democracy thwarted in this case? In the practical context of politics and public opinion, democracy is usually defined as being a situation where decisions are made based on the will of the majority. In a city where most citizens drive to get to the places they need to get to, it is likely, although not completely certain, the majority of Winnipeggers would oppose the plan to expand active- transportation infrastructure. In a related example, last year a Probe Research survey showed 71 per cent of Winnipeggers wanted a chance to vote on whether to extend bus rapid transit to the University of Manitoba. When asked how they would vote in a hypothetical plebiscite, 53 per cent of Winnipeggers said they would vote against funding Phase 2 of BRT. Despite the public pressure to put rapid transit to a vote - and a clear indication the majority of Winnipeggers opposes spending money on bus lines - 13 out of 16 democratically elected members of council ( or 81 per cent) voted against holding a plebiscite. In that case, did the vast majority of councillors ignore the will of the majority? Technically, yes. But those elected representatives are chosen to do just that - represent us - for four years at a time. And they also have an obligation to lead rather than blindly follow public opinion, whether that comes in the form of a scientific poll or what they're hearing at the doorstep. Public officials should know what the public is thinking and must be responsive to their concerns, but they do not have an unbending obligation to always side with the majority of citizens ( or, in many cases, the vocal minority who appear to be a majority based on how much noise they make). They have an obligation instead to steer public opinion rather than to blindly follow it. Case in point: former premier Duff Roblin had the vision and foresight to build the Red River Floodway after the 1950 flood, even though he was loudly criticized by those who felt this massive public works project was an expensive and potentially unnecessary undertaking. There was no poll taken of Manitobans in the 1960s regarding what they thought of the floodway, but rest assured that if people then were anything like today, they would oppose spending such a massive sum of money on something that may or may not be required. Thankfully, the floodway was built, and today if you polled Winnipeggers you would be hardpressed to find more than a handful of citizens who believe building it was a bad idea. We know from quarterly surveys that Winnipeggers strongly believe the most pressing political priority for the city is to address our infrastructure challenges. But something very strange happens when we start to talk about " infrastructure" a little more broadly. When there is a proposal to spend money on bus rapid transit or active transportation, suddenly the debate is framed in zero- sum terms where a dollar diverted to bike lanes or bus corridors is a dollar stolen from filling potholes or widening regional streets. What you get then is the sort of dumbed- down rhetoric and fear mongering that we have heard over the activetransportation strategy, where the efforts to develop a long- term plan that takes cars off the road and makes cycling less dangerous are attacked as being the nefarious work of a sinistersounding " bike lobby," a well- connected minority subverting the wishes of the car- driving majority that just wants their streets re- paved. This sort of discussion - and suggesting democracy has been thwarted when you don't get your way - is not helpful. If a majority of Winnipeggers is truly upset about what happened at council this week, they will have their opportunity to make their voices heard at the ballot box in 2018. Curtis Brown is the vice- president of Probe Research Inc. His views are his own. curtis@ probe- research. com Twitter: @ curtisatprobe CURTIS BROWN The majority doesn't always win DAN LETT Early election call a Tory strategy? BRIAN KELCEY ' Selfie' mayor needs substance MELISSA TAIT / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS FILES Luke Nolan snaps a selfie with Mayor Brian Bowman the morning after his election win. Bowman's obsession with selfies, rather than policy pronouncements, weakens his effectiveness. A_ 15_ Jul- 18- 15_ FP_ 01. indd A15 7/ 17/ 15 9: 00: 55 PM ;