Municipal elections will be held across British Columbia this Sat., Nov. 19.

For the past four weeks, the Fitzhugh has been running a series of candidate profiles to give readers across our distribution region an idea of the important issues in McBride and Valemount, and to help our readers in those communities make an informed decision when they cast ballots to elect their village councils.

In this edition, we present our final installment of profiles of candidates who agreed to be interviewed. These include Dallas Bullock, who is running for Valemount council, and Joe Kolida and Irene Rejman, who are running for council in McBride. 

Valemount candidate brings youthful ideas

Dallas Bullock wants to be a youthful, fresh voice for Valemount’s village council.

With a passion for her community and both its economic and environmental success, she said she’s the right person for council.

The Tête Jaune Cache resident said although she lives outside the village, she is invested and committed to the community, and she would like to see it succeed.

One way to make Valemount successful, she suggested, is through the development and expansion of the recreational activities that are offered in the community.

“We have unbelievable mountains here,” she said. “We need to bring in activities to attract more youth and more families and our neighbours next door in Alberta.

“We can wait until the cows come home for a big industry to come in and save Valemount, but I think in the meantime we need to start working locally with what we have in abundance, which are the mountains.”

Bullock pointed to the Crystal Ridge Ski Hill and the mountain bike park as positive examples of this.

“I think that these are the things that are going to attract our demographic,” she said, referring to young families.

Bullock and her husband John moved to the Robson Valley to start a farm. She and her family, which now includes baby Violet, have been living in Tête Jaune Cache for three years and have lived in the valley since 1999.

Bullock said she would like to see Valemount as a sustainable community. She suggested one way of achieving that goal is by giving attention and support to the businesses that are already successful in the community, because they set the example for new businesses and have the power to inspire entrepreneurs to relocate to the area.

She said she knows the issues facing Valemount won’t be fixed overnight, but with the right approach and attitude things can only get better.

“I think it’s important that we go forward without fear of failure and if we fail we try again,” she said.

McBride councillor seeks re-election

Long-time McBride resident Irene Rejman said she’s running for her fourth term on council because she’s dedicated to her community.

“I’m still interested in the community and believe it’s worth fighting for,” she said.

Rejman said she’s not a one-issue candidate because she believes that a councillor needs to keep an open mind.

But she did say that McBride needs to focus on creating jobs that will keep families in the village because there are too many cases where husbands have to work out of town, leaving their families behind. That separation causes unnecessary stress and that’s not an attractive feature for families looking to move to McBride, she said.

“My vision ... is to keep (McBride) a safe and clean place to live and to be able to provide jobs.

“For families to survive, they need that,” she said.

Council needs to start looking for new ideas and strategies that can help improve the local economy, said Rejman. 

She said she is hopeful that the proposed ecoTECH project will come through, providing around 200 jobs to the community.

Beyond that project, Rejman said the community needs to work toward finding smaller industries and businesses, so that it doesn’t get too dependent on one company or industry.

That will make the community more sustainable, she said, noting that if there are multiple industries, if one suffers, it doesn’t affect the entire community.

“We can no longer put all of our eggs in one basket. We can’t depend totally on logging or whatever, you have to be more diversified,” she said.

With her experience in the community and on council, Rejman said she is an ideal candidate and she hopes she will again be re-elected.

“I really care about the community and the people,” she said. “I’m dedicated to giving it the best that I can.”

Like father, like son for McBride candidate

Joe Kolida is following in his father’s footsteps and taking a stab at McBride village council.

Kolida’s father, Steve Kolida, served on council for many years in the community. Kolida said that close contact to the village fostered his own interest in municipal politics and now he has reached the age where he has the time to devote to it.

“I’m always interested in the community,” he said. “I was born and raised here and although I don’t ever want to die, I will die here.”

Kolida owns the Gigglin’ Grizzly Bar and Grill. He is also a contractor and currently works in Tumbler Ridge.

One of the reasons Kolida said he’s running for council is to try to create jobs in the community, so he and others like him don’t have to leave their families behind to work outside of the village. 

“I live here. I’d love to work here. We need to get some industry in town. 

“We definitely have to concentrate on keeping our little community going, keep it strong, keep our schools, keep our hospital, keep our policing. It’s a snowball effect. If we happen to lose one of any, we’ll end up losing them all sooner or later.”

That doesn’t mean the community needs one big business to come in and save the day, he said. 

“I feel personally that opportunity is endless. It’s just a matter of finding that right one, bringing it to the community. 

“We need to go after any interested parties and different items, whether it’s the forestry sector, even tourism, small business, whatever it might be, we need to keep a positive outlook and keep trudging ahead.”

Kolida said he’s been through the good times and the bad in McBride and the most important thing is that the community stay positive. 

“I just feel if you’re positive and want to put in the time and effort, there’s always a reward at the end.”