Thursday #skvotes Links

Over 40,000 voters went to the polls in the first day of advance voting. But particularly for the many people who haven't yet cast a ballot, here's the latest from Saskatchewan's election campaign.

- Laura Sciarpelletti reports on Elections Saskatchewan's warning that it's facing a shortage of poll workers - making it all the more important that people who have the ability to do so get to the polls early.

- Nicholas Frew reports on the grades provided to Saskatchewan's parties by OUTSaskatoon and Saskatoon Pride - with the NDP ranking at the top, and the Greens just behind. And the Provincial Association of Transition Housing and Services grades the NDP with an A for its plan to deal with interpersonal violence - while lamenting that no other party has bothered to respond. 

- Meanwhile, Danielle Chartier discusses the desperate need to strengthen Saskatchewan's mental health care system.

- Murray Mandryk offers somewhat of a reminder of the 2017 Sask Party budget which began their current term in office. But it's worth noting that the well-justified public backlash was based not on Mandryk's deficit-scolding, but based on the callous slashing of services - and as others have pointed out, SaskForward provided an indication of the choices involved:

- Finally, Adrienne Ivey discusses a few of the issues seen as most important to rural Saskatchewan, while pointing out how their impact is felt throughout the province.

On delayed releases

I'll have plenty to catch up on over the next few days. But I'll start by pointing out the background behind what's become one of the most-discussed stories of the past week on the Saskatchewan political scene.

It's well and good that we've eventually learned the results of the report from the Saskatchewan Chamber of Commerce and SaskFilm showing just how much return we get from investing in the film industry.

But a week ago, that report was still being hidden from public view by the parties who commissioned it. And it took a public challenge from NDP MLA Danielle Chartier to both determine who had the authority to release the report, and make sure that the facts were eventually made public - notwithstanding that the contents were apparently known to the government a month earlier:

Culture Minister Kevin Doherty said the study, which was commissioned by the Saskatchewan Chamber of Commerce and Sask-Film, was presented to him about a month ago during a meeting that also included representation from the Saskatchewan Motion Picture Industry Association.

"What the report shows is that there is an economic benefit to the province of Saskatchewan from the film industry," Doherty told reporters on Monday at the Legislative Building after question period, during which the issue was raised by NDP culture critic Danielle Chartier.

Chartier said she has heard the study shows the net cost to taxpayers from the old refundable film employment tax credit was less than the $1 million per year budgeted by the government for its new, non-refundable replacement.

And that sequence of events raises more than a few questions. For example, would we ever have heard about the actual costs of the Sask Party's decision if Chartier hadn't heard about - and raised - the issue? Why did the parties who commissioned the report choose not to let the public in on a matter of public concern? And how much more information about the negative effects of Saskatchewan Party policies is being similarly withheld from the public?

New column day

Here, on how the Saskatchewan NDP's leadership rules (PDF) are nicely set up to encourage a broad outreach effort by candidates.

For further reading...
- The NDP's leadership page is here.
- Buckdog is running a dedicated blog for leadership news.
- And Cam Broten is the first candidate to formally announce that he's running. But perhaps the more noteworthy development from Broten's launch was the presence of MLA Danielle Chartier - which signals that another speculated candidate won't be entering the race herself.

On democratic diversity

Saskatoon Riversdale MLA Danielle Chartier provides a strong response to Murray Mandryk's column on female candidates within the Saskatchewan NDP. And while there's no doubt that the party has a long ways to go, there's reason for optimism based on both the strategy already in place and the recognition that diverse representation is essential to good government:

Across Canada, political parties of all stripes are not doing enough to ensure that our legislatures and Parliament are more reflective of the diversity of our provinces and our country. We need to elect more women, First Nations and Métis people, people of colour, people with disabilities, and people from the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.

This is not about diversity for its own sake. This is about ensuring all perspectives are brought to the decision-making table so that public policy actually addresses the needs of all citizens.
...
(A)ll four (Saskatchewan NDP) leadership candidates reaffirmed their commitment to nominating and electing more women. Promising, yes, but problematic, as there was still no strategy in place. The dialogue continues under our leader, Dwain Lingenfelter, and I am pleased there is now a strategy in place to support and develop women candidates for nomination in 2011 and beyond.

I believe this multi-faceted strategy to elect more women is a step in the right direction. Is it going to get us to 50 per cent women nominated in 2011? Perhaps not, but the recent nominations in Regina South and Regina Coronation Park have re-ignited within the party as a whole the much-needed dialogue on how we get there.

The strategy includes formal mentorship of all female candidates. This may be controversial to some, as MLAs have traditionally distanced themselves from nominations. But the words of Albert Einstein are particularly relevant here: "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

If we want to nominate and elect more women (and more First Nations and Métis people, people of colour, people with disabilities, people from the LGBT community), and we have not had the desired success thus far, we need to do things differently.

Of course, there's room for discussion as to what the NDP's candidate diversity strategy actually should include. And the recent nomination races offer some fodder for discussion on both sides of the question of whether a combination of mentoring and explicit focus on diversity will get the job done.

To be sure, the fact that two strong female candidates fell short in their campaigns has to be a major concern for the party. But there's more to the story than that.

After all, in Regina Coronation Park it was a candidate who spoke strongly about his immigrant background who won a race featuring three diversity candidates. So while the end result may have made for a disappointment from a gender parity standpoint, it can't be seen as a negative when it comes to the NDP's goal of assembling a more diverse and representative caucus.

What's more, while the female candidates came up short in both nomination races, it's worth noting that the one who placed a much more direct focus on gender representation as an issue achieved substantially better results. And that may signal the value of highlighting the NDP's commitment to diversity and the role a candidate can play in it, rather than counting on members to pick up on the issue for themselves.

Fortunately, there are plenty of nominations left for the NDP to learn from recent events and encourage strong candidates of all kinds of backgrounds. And hopefully the continued discussion of the need for diversity will encourage candidates and potential supporters alike to maintain it as a primary focus as the party puts together its slate of candidates for 2011.

On positive discussions

Anybody who's been keeping tabs primarily on the Sask Party's actions over the past little while may be wondering if there's anything at all positive happening in Saskatchewan politics. Fortunately, the answer is "yes", as the Saskatchewan NDP's policy renewal process got underway last weekend - and for those who couldn't make it, there's plenty of information available about the proceeedings.

In particular, Kent has blogged about his impressions of the event, while the NDP itself has posted videos and slideshows from the forum. And even better, the party is facilitating the generation of new ideas by anybody interested in sharing them.

Of course, the most important part of the policy review will be working with those ideas to shape the NDP's vision - and that's the one part of the Moose Jaw proceedings which isn't yet being made public. But at the very least, Saskatchewan citizens can take heart that at least one party is working to encourage discussion and debate about where the province is headed - and hopefully we'll see many more people involved as the process continues.

By-election aftermath

Obviously the most important result of last night's by-elections was the fact that both Saskatoon Riversdale and Regina Douglas Park stayed in NDP hands. But let's take a closer look at last night's results to see what they may mean for each of the parties involved.

For the NDP, the percentages are probably close to the best that could have been expected. With all parties focused entirely on the by-elections, the outcome figured to be closer than would normally be the case in a general election setting. And indeed the percentages narrowed far less in both of the ridings decided last night than in the 2008 Cumberland by-election - signalling that the NDP has managed to substantially improve its lock on traditional party turf compared to just a year ago.

That said, there seems to have been at least some disconnect between the NDP's expectations and the actual outcome. In Regina Douglas Park in particular, the Lingenfelter campaign spent much of the latter part of the campaign trumpeting record numbers of signs and identified votes. But those obviously didn't translate entirely into votes when it counted - and in fact the latter number actually exceeded the NDP's final tally at the polls.

So there are a couple of lessons to be taken from last night's results. First, the NDP needs to stay focused on the final result rather than taking too much pride in side projects like sign totals. And second, the voter identification process could probably use some tuning up - likely including both additional verification of identified supporters, and a stronger push to ensure that identified voters are kept involved throughout the campaign.

For the Sask Party, the by-elections served primarily as a test as to whether a combination of any remaining honeymoon period for the Wall government and a fairly negative air campaign against Dwain Lingenfelter could create enough of a head start to make up for the NDP's advantage in feet on the ground. And the answer there was a resounding "no", even with the Sask Party able to focus on only a single riding in each of Regina and Saskatoon.

But that doesn't mean the by-elections were a total waste for the Sask Party. Presumably the anti-Lingenfelter ads will serve Wall's purposes in framing the NDP for future elections even if it wasn't enough to put either of its candidates over the top this time out. And the absence of any meaningful Lib vote (by choice in Regina Douglas Park, but not in Saskatoon Riversdale) looks to have operated to the Sask Party's favour in both ridings, hinting at some changes in the dynamics likely to affect Saskatchewan's urban results in 2011.

To the extent any candidate could claim a stronger performance than expected, that honour would have to go to the Greens' Victor Lau in Regina Douglas Park, who increased his raw vote total from 2007 and nearly doubled his share of the vote. But even that result leaves Lau far from any serious contention for the seat - and it's doubtful that circumstances will get any better for the Greens in 2011, particularly if the nuclear question has been decided one way or the other by then. (Meanwhile, the Greens' campaign in Saskatoon Riversdale was a fairly thorough flop, as Tobi-Dawne Smith took a lower share of the vote than the previous Green candidate.)

Finally, there are the Liberals - or what's left of them. On paper, they seemed to have an opportunity to put themselves back on the political map in Saskatoon Riversdale: for their first by-election under a reasonably well-hyped leader, they managed to recruit a candidate who won over 34% of the vote in an adjacent riding under the Sask Party's banner in 2007. And of course most of the Libs' seeming strength should have been in Saskatoon, where former leader David Karwacki was the only Lib candidate to top 16% in a riding which featured a full slate of opponents.

But instead of building on any combination of her own history and any Lib machinery in Saskatoon, Eileen Gelowitz barely nosed ahead of Smith for a distant third place with 2.6% of the vote. And that complete absence of a party capable of assembling even a minimally successful campaign even under the most friendly of conditions would figure to make it next to impossible for the Libs to recruit similar candidates in the future.

The results are in

Congratulations to Dwain Lingenfelter and Danielle Chartier on their by-election victories. And RIP Saskatchewan Liberal Party, 1905-2009.

(Edit: fixed wording.)

E-Day

Today's the day for voters in Regina Douglas Park and Saskatoon Riversdale to have their say in two provincial by-elections, with polls opening at 9 AM and closing at 8 PM.

Both NDP candidates have apparently shattered previous records for sign locations, signalling that a strong volunteer effort has translated into plenty of public support. But the count that matters comes today - so I'll encourage voters in both ridings to make sure their voices are heard, and anybody interested in volunteering to stop by the NDP's campaign headquarters (Tommy Douglas House in Regina, 1030 Avenue L South in Saskatoon) to pitch in.

The races are on

While the NDP has been laying the groundwork in both ridings for some time now, the by-election campaigns in Regina-Douglas Park and Saskatoon Riversdale are now officially underway.

The current conventional wisdom is that the timing is set up to avoid a federal election campaign later this fall. But from my standpoint (and acknowledging that the NDP isn't about to take anything for granted), the timing would seem to suggest that Brad Wall's goal is primarily to have a losing set of by-elections register as little with the public as possible rather than seeing them as opportunities to pick up seats. After all, one would have to think that a short campaign at the end of summer which is bound to be overshadowed to at least some extent by the release of Dan Perrins' nuclear development consultation report will make for about the worst possible set of circumstances for the Sask Party's chances of making up the gap in two strong NDP ridings.

On selective reporting

When the party who came in a distant second in Saskatoon Riversdale in 2007 nominated its candidate for the upcoming by-election, the Star Phoenix reported it immediately.

And likewise with the party who came in an even more distant third. (Though it omitted the noteworthy detail that the candidate was apparently poached from the Sask Party's 2007 slate.)

But when the party which has held the seat in all but one election since 1967 nominated the likely next MLA? The crickets have been chirping since Monday, and there's no evidence that they'll stop soon.

Update: In comments, Jan points to a link to a story from Tuesday which oddly didn't show up on Google News searches for either Chartier's name or the riding name. My mistake to a point - though both the title attached to the link and the lack of search results still seem off.


Update 2: And now the Star Phoenix mentions Eileen Gelowitz' party switch.

Nominated

Word comes out that Danielle Chartier has been officially nominated as the Saskatchewan NDP's candidate in Saskatoon Riversdale. In case anybody was still operating under the misapprehension that Chartier figures to be anything short of a "heavyweight", she managed to assemble 165 Facebook fans and a substantial support network even before the nomination race was over - so while there's plenty of work to be done to elect her as well as Dwain Lingenfelter in the next set of by-elections, she figures to be in excellent shape to carve out a major role within the NDP for years to come.

Leadership 2009 - Ryan Meili Afterword

I've discussed earlier some of the possibilities for Ryan Meili after his remarkably narrow defeat in the Saskatchewan NDP leadership race. But the main choice facing him is similar to the one in front of Yens Pedersen - and all indications so far suggest that Meili is headed down exactly the right path out of those options.

To see how that's so, let's look in a bit more depth at the forces at work behind Meili's decision not to run for the NDP's nomination in the impending Saskatoon Riversdale by-election.

For the most part, Dwain Lingenfelter's statement that he'd like to see Meili and Pedersen in the Legislature as soon as possible can and should be seen as a sign of unity coming out of the convention. But there's another possible side to it as well, as it might also hint at a preference to move the two renewal candidates into roles where they'd be subject to caucus discipline and heavier influence from Lingenfelter's loyalists - in effect co-opting them personally as a means of minimizing the effect of their supporters within the party.

And that perception would only have been stronger if Meili had pushed ahead with the Saskatoon Riversdale nomination. With Danielle Chartier having spent a substantial amount of time building a membership base in the riding while Meili was busy with the leadership campaign, Meili would have faced at best an uncertain road to victory based on the amount of support he could muster before the membership deadline.

To have more than a highly uncertain chance of winning, then, he'd have had to lean on Lingenfelter either to implore members to vote for Meili over the candidate who signed them up, or worse to state an intention not to recognize a Chartier victory. Which would have run counter to Meili's commitment to democratic nomination processes and created a huge split between him and at least some of his leadership-contest base.

Instead, Meili has lived up to his message from the leadership campaign, rightly passing on an opportunity to advance his own political career at the expense of the principles which made him such an appealing alternative to Lingenfelter. And that can only reinforce his credibility as a leading voice for progressive New Democrats in the years to come.

And there's no lack of areas where that brand can only be a positive for the Saskatchewan NDP. Within the party, Meili's effective leadership platform and strong reputation for listening to the party's membership make him a natural choice to lead the impending policy review process. And in the department of expanding the NDP's tent, the party will surely want to apply Meili's organizational skills and innovative outreach techniques - particularly to bring in support from the left which will be coming together around issues like the Sask Party's nuclear push.

That may make for a heavy workload over the next couple of years even if Meili doesn't find another by-election to pursue in the meantime. But among the other lessons learned during the course of the leadership campaign, we surely now know better than to underestimate what Meili and his movement can accomplish.

(Edit: fixed typo.)

On non-stories

It's a plus that Murray Mandryk has realized that the Sask Party's facade is far different than what lurks below the surface. But it would be even better if he didn't feel the need to toss in several paragraphs of unfounded concern trolling about the NDP in doing so:

Lingenfelter announces Monday that he will be running in the Regina Douglas Park seat that is being vacated by 23-year MLA Harry Van Mulligen -- what should be a good-news announcement for the NDP. However, with Van Mulligen winning 52 per cent of the popular vote in that riding in 2007, any Saskatchewan Party candidate coming within 20 percentage points (its Douglas Park candidate received only 30.9 per cent in 2007) wins a moral victory.

Now, it's probably fairest to say that Van Mulligen's announcement was less a good-news announcement than an entirely expected one from the NDP's standpoint. But it's downright remarkable that Mandryk manages to both present a misleading analysis about what would be a "moral victory" for the Sask Party (since by-elections figure generally to result in a closer race with all parties able to focus all their attention on one or two ridings) - and then assume that outcome in advance in order to claim bad news for the NDP.

But wait, there's more:

Tuesday's news that NDP leadership runner-up Ryan Meili won't be seeking Lorne Calvert's Saskatoon Riversdale seat means that Meili and Lingenfelter won't be sitting together in a unified Opposition caucus, allowing the Sask. Party to hammer away at the perceived split in NDP ranks for a while yet.

Of course, it's almost certainly true that the Sask Party will look to "hammer away at (a) perceived split" regardless of what happens in reality. But there's no apparent reason why Meili's decision to work outside the Legislature would offer any actual evidence of a split. And indeed, Meili's decision not to run in Riversdale is best taken as evidence that he wants to keep the NDP's members working in the same direction for now rather than facing a potentially divisive decision in the riding.

(As a bonus, let's offer up a counterfactual: if Meili had declared his intention to run for the Riversdale nomination, how long would it have taken Mandryk and others to point out his competition with a strong female candidate as an indication of fissure within the NDP? Yeah, I thought so.)

Finally, there's this:

But perhaps more importantly, this signifies a strategic change for the NDP.

For most of the past four decades, the NDP's two safest seats (Riversdale and what's now Regina Elphinstone-Centre) were occupied by the NDP's leader or deputy leader. With all due respect to current Regina Elphinstone-Centre MLA Warren McCall and political novice Danielle Chartier (who likely will be the NDP candidate in Riversdale), we are no longer seeing NDP heavyweights in these rock-solid seats. In fact, many of the party's safer Regina and Saskatoon seats are occupied by MLAs who aren't exactly heavy contributors.

Now, it's worth noting that Mandryk's premise looks to be faulty in the first place. McCall can already claim the contribution of a major report as well as significant cabinet experience well before the age of 40, and given Chartier's strong bio and organization to date there's every reason to think she'll join any list of "heavyweights" in a hurry.

But even taking the premise to be true, is it really such a plus for Wall if Meili runs in a riding which the Sask Party might otherwise have some hope of winning - or better yet, uses his developing public profile to flip a riding currently held by the Sask Party?

If anything, one essential element of any 2011 victory for the NDP would seem to be attracting the strongest possible candidates in the closer ridings which will determine which party holds power. And while Meili may yet find a safe riding in which to run, I'd have to think any Sask Party MLAs or candidates who might have to face off against him in a riding with more potential impact on an election outcome would have to be less comfortable than if Meili and his enthusiastic base of support were safely ensconced in Riversdale.

Of course, it may be that a few speculative or ill-advised shots at the NDP are a minimum requirement for any CanWest column which dares to point out internal problems in the Sask Party ranging from "explosive frustration" to potential retirements or defections. But if the non-issues raised by Mandryk are the worst dangers the NDP faces, then Wall may really have reason to worry in 2011.

On deferral

Ryan Meili has announced that he won't run for the NDP's nomination in Saskatoon Riversdale, citing the announced candidacy of Danielle Chartier as the main reason.

Now, it'll be a bit disappointing for Meili not to be pursuing a seat until a future by-election or even the 2011 general election. And there's always some concern when nominations are seen as being claimed rather than contested - no matter how strong the candidate may be, and there appears to be plenty to like about Chartier.

But on the balance Meili likely made the right call: it ensures that Meili's positive perception coming out of the leadership race won't be stopped in its tracks by a nomination battle, avoids any rift with Chartier's already-established base of support, and allows him to keep his focus on building the movement which coalesced behind him during the leadership race. And hopefully it don't be long before Meili finds himself in the Legislature representing another riding.

Update: See the official release here, with a heavy focus on Meili's plan to be at the centre of the NDP's policy review process.