BACKGROUND:
Burnaby-Lougheed is bordered by Sperling Avenue, Kensington Avenue, Lakefield Drive, Highway 1, 10th Avenue and North Road. It includes Simon Fraser University and Kinder Morgan’s Westridge Marine Terminal. The riding was originally known as Burquitlam up until 2009.
It's a swing riding. NDP MLA Jane Shin is not running again, so the seat is up for grabs. Shin won by only 743 votes in the 2013 election, narrowly defeating Liberal candidate Ken Kramer. Before Shin, the riding was held by the Liberals, who won three straight elections with Harry Bloy. Before that, it was an NDP stronghold for decades.
The Green vote has seen somewhat of a decline in Burnaby-Lougheed. In 2001, Green candidate Stephen Mancinelli had 2,668 votes (13.5 per cent), followed by Carli Irene Travers (7.5 per cent) in 2005, Helen Chang (6.76 per cent) in 2009 and Darwin Burns (8.2 per cent) in 2013.
On May 9, the choices will be: former Global B.C. morning host Steve Darling for the Liberals; Burnaby school trustee Katrina Chen for the NDP; Joe Keithley, most famously known as the lead singer of punk band D.O.A., for the Greens; computer scientist Neeraj Murarka for the B.C. Libertarian Party; and Independent Sylvia Gung.
DEMOGRAPHICS:
Similar to the other three Burnaby ridings, Burnaby-Lougheed has a diverse and multi-ethnic population.
According to 2011 census data, 27,095 residents out of 56,235 said English was their mother tongue. Nearly 12,000 people noted they speak a Chinese language, followed by Korean (2,630), Italian (1,170) and Punjabi (1,000). The median age within the riding is 40.
HOT ISSUES:
The Kinder Morgan pipeline – need we say more? Construction of the Edmonton-to-Burnaby pipeline is scheduled to start this September, but not without a fight. Burnaby Mountain residents and organizations like BROKE have long expressed concerns about a potential fire at the tank farm. There have been numerous protests on the issue. In January, Christy Clark announced Kinder Morgan’s proposal met the province’s five conditions. The Greens and NDP have both said they’re against the pipeline and they’ll do whatever it takes to stop it.
And as with all ridings in the Lower Mainland, housing is another top-of-mind issue in Burnaby-Lougheed. Many folks are renters. The 2011 census data shows the total number of occupied dwellings is 21,160, with 40 per cent living in an apartment, 27 per cent living in a single detached home and 18 per cent in a row home (those numbers are likely higher today). Even though the B.C. Liberals’ foreign buyers’ tax has slowed down the number of transactions in the region, prices are still going up. The idea of home ownership is long gone for many city dwellers, and affordable rents are hard to come by.
Post-secondary education is another hot topic, especially in a riding full of SFU students. The NDP is promising students interest-free loans and a $1,000 completion grant. The Greens, meanwhile, say they’ll implement “needs-based grants” for post-secondary students and offer up to $2,000 a year in tax relief (for up to five years) in repaying tuition debt. Will SFU students show up and vote? In the 2013 election, 48 per cent of B.C. voters were between the ages of 18 and 24, and another 40 per cent were between the ages of 25 and 34.
WHAT TO EXPECT:
This will definitely be a riding to watch. Will Darling’s local celebrity status win him the election? Or will people, who have traditionally voted NDP tick off Chen’s name? Chen has established deep roots within the community over the last decade, working as a constituency assistant for NDP colleagues Raj Chouhan and Peter Julian. She was elected as a school trustee in 2014, when she ran as part of the Burnaby Citizens Association slate. But it could be a Liberal win in the end if Keithley splits the anti-pipeline vote with Chen.
-With demographic statistics compiled by Mike Xue
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