I recently sat down with several people running for Sarnia City Council for longer conversations about the city, the issues facing it and how they approach the work of council. I’m sharing those conversations one at a time. This one is with Andrew Stokley.
Andrew and I started with his family’s connections to Sarnia and his summers working behind the scenes at Bayfest. From there, we got into housing, bike lanes, supportive services and the relationship between police and the community. I enjoyed talking through his argument for building more homes within existing neighbourhoods, and his ideas about different ways to operate city facilities and bring activities to the waterfront. We kept coming back to a familiar frustration: Sarnia has plenty of ideas, but getting them off the page and into the city is another matter.
I’m also running for council, so my own views and experiences are part of these conversations. These are a handful of candidates I chose to sit down with, rather than a comprehensive interview series with everyone running.
Whoever gets elected will have to make decisions together. I wanted to spend some time listening and talking through ideas, and give people a chance to hear the kind of conversation they might otherwise only have with a candidate over coffee.
A conversation with Sarnia council candidate Honie Chumko
A conversation with Sarnia council candidate Josh Coutts-Smith
Originally published in The Sarnia Journal.
