The Editor,
Congratulations Richmond Centre for Disability!
You put on the most engaging and revealing all-candidates meeting I've ever seen.
The mayoral bout between heavyweight Malcolm Brodie and bantamweight Richard Lee had the full house on the edge of their seats. The bantamweight bobbed out of reach and weaved in to score points.
The council bout was a battle royal with talented new candidates in place of the usual challengers, who are often hard to picture as councillors. Many challengers are real contenders.
The "new blood" thrived on the loose officiating with ref Frances Clark stepping in just enough.
As I saw it, challengers Chak Au, Carol Day, De Whalen, Michael Wolfe and Alexa Loo were a good match for the incumbents.
Several incumbents did mutual back-patting, like at televised council meetings. Too bad the cameras weren't there to show the event on the community TV channel. It would be an eye-opener for electors.
As it is, name recognition, big-bucks advertising and votesplitting will keep most of the contenders out. I think highly of almost all the incumbents, but it's sad the wider electorate couldn't evaluate all of the applicants in Tuesday's great job interview.
Jim Wright Richmond
