NWTU - Election 2026

This page is a WORK IN PROGRESS and will slowly grow in the lead up to the October 17th municipal election in New Westminster. It's a summary of the efforts and results of tenants union members organizing to put housing and renters rights on the agenda for the next four years of government.

For right now, you can read the results of our Research Team's deep dive into the last four years of housing and rental issues on council. The following document, about 36 pages long, summarizes what each councillor currently running for re-election said and did whenever the topics of housing and renting came up. This also includes the mayor, who is also seeking re-election.

In preparing this document, our Research Team was given strict instructions to report on but not evaluate candidates. Every attempt was made to use neutral language and simply summarize what was said and done without making inferences about intent or judgments about whether the comments or actions were good or bad. The purpose of this project is to leave the evaluation up to the members. The Research Team was assembled this year and is made up of volunteers from the community.

If you find any issues in the document, please contact us. Issues must be specific (including what page the issue is on, why the information is incorrect or unfair, and some kind of citation of where the correct information is). We will make corrections if the issue can be verified.

Ahead of our upcoming grading event, we will also upload here a PowerPoint presentation summarizing the findings per-candidate that'll be a little easier to digest and give a higher altitude view of each candidate's record.

Otherwise, keep an eye on this page, because soon it'll include...

• Other background research on the candidates
• The rubric and instructions graders were given
• The final report card with scores averaged from attendees at the grading event

Other Documents

This is the speech read by a Tenants Union volunteer at the City Council meeting on Monday September 21st at Queensborough Community Center with about 30 NWTU members in the audience.

This the final list of the questions, decided by about thirty members at our August 25th Public Meeting, that were sent to each candidate on September 14th†. Their answers are what will be graded by members for the report card

† With the exception of Independent candidate Geoff Homel. Apologies to Geoff Homel. They were sent the questions on September 25th.

How Can I Participate?

Right now, the two biggest things you can do are

• Attend our Grading Event on Tuesday September 29th at 6:30pm
• Register to distribute the final printed report card in your building by either door-knocking, sliding it in mailboxes, leaving it laundry or common rooms, putting it on a billboard, or whatever else you feel comfortable with

To RSVP for the Grading Event or to register to pass out the final report card, just contact us at nwtenantsunion@gmail.com or leave us a voicemail at 778-358-2680.