The election of so many incumbents in Saturday's civic elections suggests Tri-City voters were either happy with the status quo or hadn't learned enough about challengers and simply chose names they knew on the ballot.
In Coquitlam and Port Coquitlam, all but one council incumbent each were returned to office. In Port Moody, the three incumbents were re-elected to council, a sitting councillor was made mayor and three new faces filled the openings at the council table. But, then, Port Moody's is the only one of the three city councils to experience a healthy turnover in the last 15 years.
As for the board of education, all incumbents were returned to office, Coquitlam voters even re-electing longtime Trustee Gail Alty despite the fact she has called Vancouver Island home for two years. (She has said she can do the job via email and she commutes by ferry to a few meetings a month. If that's all it takes, maybe there's no need for a school board at all - but that's another editorial.)
But while having elected bodies full of experienced officials is good for continuity - especially with the Evergreen Line purportedly on its way - and long-serving incumbents deserve our thanks for plugging away year after year, there is always a danger of calcification when people stay too long.
There may soon come a time - 2014 sounds right - when some of the old guard should step down and into a well-deserved retirement. No doubt many of these longer-serving individuals believe they still have the passion for the job while others may have become too comfortable with the taxpayer-funded paycheques supplementing their own retirement income. Whichever is the case, organizations can become stagnant without turnover.
Which is where voters come in. In order to get new blood on civic bodies, they need be engaged and informed. Voters: You have three years to pay attention and prepare to cast informed ballots.
And to long-serving politicians: While you're still in office, make the most of your time not to grind old axes or simply push your own points of view but to be leaders and change-makers by encouraging citizen involvement and mentoring the next generation of politicians who will lead us into the future.
