Rebecca Bligh pledges to end “bro culture” at Vancouver City Hall and represent the middle class

With less than two weeks before Vancouver’s civic election and municipal elections elsewhere in B.C., Vote Vancouver mayoral candidate Rebecca Bligh says she is the right choice for the city. She is seeking to become Vancouver’s first woman mayor. In an interview with Daily Hive Urbanized, Bligh said some voters are dissatisfied with the ABC majority and concerned about worsening street disorder and homelessness. She cited Mayor Ken Sim’s white tennis shoes at a Remembrance Day event and his comments about Bitcoin as examples of what some voters remember from the past four years. She said voters want both a change in leadership and someone able to address the issues, which requires a strong platform and relationships with provincial and federal governments.

Vote Vancouver’s housing platform proposes using public land to build permanently affordable homes for middle-income earners, with non-profit child care in new developments. The party says many Vancouverites earn too much to qualify for deeply subsidized housing but cannot comfortably afford market prices. Bligh said the private sector cannot build the level of affordability the city needs on its own and that the province must be involved. She said middle-income residents start small businesses, work in hospitals and schools, and work hard to build a life in Vancouver. They are asking whether anyone is paying attention to them, she said. Bligh added that she rented until a few years ago and said she would represent that experience of living in Vancouver.

Bligh said ABC Vancouver’s proposed public-safety plebiscite has caused friction among residents. She said it comes up at roughly a dozen debates she has attended and argued that its wording is inherently biased toward one answer, undermining its validity. Responding to suggestions, including from ABC, that public safety and homelessness have improved, Bligh said conditions have worsened in many neighbourhoods. She said she has worked in the Downtown Eastside for eight years and has never seen it this bad. She also pointed to provincial funding programs that ended without replacement. Those programs helped people on the margins access community supports, particularly in the Downtown Eastside, she said. Bligh criticized ABC for directing all the funding to policing and said police have moved affected people around without resolving systemic problems. She argued that municipal government should not make things worse and that decisions under Sim and ABC may have done so.

Bligh also proposes extending free transit to youth under 18. Children in Vancouver currently ride transit for free until age 13. She said the first year of the expanded program would cost less than extending the Granville Street pedestrianization for seven weeks, and that the city could deliver it in partnership with TransLink and the province. Bligh said younger Vancouverites are already asking bus drivers for free rides. COPE Vancouver is also calling for free transit for youth under 18.

At an Oct. 2 event, Bligh accused Sim of bringing “bro culture” to Vancouver City Hall. She said he had turned council meeting rooms into personal gyms, treated public office as a personal playground and confused attention with leadership. “A city is not a startup, public money is not venture capital, and the Mayor’s Office is not a personal brand,” she told the audience.

As the campaign approaches its final days, Bligh said the field is not as crowded as it is often described. She called herself the only centrist candidate who supports labour, public services and strong social infrastructure while also being business-friendly, fiscally responsible and focused on the city’s sustainable financial future. She said a united centre would best serve Vancouver and argued that swings to the far left or far right have not served the city well over the past decades. Bligh said she is best equipped to serve what she expects will likely be a multi-partisan council. She also noted that Vancouver has never had a woman mayor in its 140-year history, and said it may be time to leave “bro culture” behind at the Mayor’s Office and try a different style of leadership.