The Burnaby Citizens Association regained a monopoly on school board after sweeping all seven seats in Saturday’s municipal election.
The NDP-affiliated civic party returned all five of its incumbent candidates and two rookies.
Veteran trustee Gary Wong topped the polls with 18,616 votes, winning a fifth term on the board.
Jen Mezei, who had served as chair for two years before the election, garnered 17,389 votes to earn a second term.
Bill Brassington and Peter Cech also won second terms with 17,140 votes and 16,055 votes respectively.
And longtime trustee Larry Hayes held onto his seat for a seventh term with 14,105 votes, beating out Burnaby Green Party candidate Harinder Parmar to capture the final seat on the board
The BCA’s rookie candidates Kristin Snider and Mikelle Sasakamoose captured 17,230 votes and 14,972 votes respectively.
For the past four years, Burnaby Green Party trustee Christine Cunningham has represented the only opposition to the BCA on school board, but Cunningham decided not to run for a second term.
And Green trustee hopefuls Parmar and Jeff Courson fell short of regaining any seats for the Greens.
Wong said he wasn’t sure not having any opposition will make all that much difference to how the board has operated over the last four years.
“Everyone that participated in the decision-making process brought their own perspective, and that continues on,” he told the NOW. “I think there is a diversity of voices at the table.”
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