With the three major federal parties having already nominated local candidates, the Green Party is starting their process at a meeting on Saturday.
The party is re-organizing under the boundaries of the new riding of South Okanagan-West Kootenay (SOWK) at an annual general meeting (AGM) in Penticton on November 22.
The meeting will choose a new executive and will likely establish a nomination committee, said Celeste Kitchen, chief executive officer of the riding association in the old B.C. Southern Interior.
While Kitchen couldn’t give any names, she said several people have expressed interest. The association will consider potential candidates for nomination at the meeting.
“We don’t really want to go for just a paper candidate to fill the spot,” said Kitchen. “We like to go for someone who’s gung ho, but our funding is somewhat limited.”
She acknowledged that a contested nomination with several potential nominees would likely generate more interest both in the media and among party members.
The new SOWK electoral district, which includes Osoyoos and Oliver, adds a major new population base in Penticton. It loses some of the Kootenay communities such as Nelson, which were in the old riding of B.C. Southern Interior.
Kitchen said there were about 200 members in the old riding association, but she wasn’t sure how many there would be when memberships are transposed to the new association.
In the last general election in 2011, Green Party candidate Bryan Hunt received 3,163 votes, putting him in distant third place after the winning NDP’s Alex Atamanenko and second-place Conservatives, but well ahead of the fourth-place Liberals.
Nominees for the other parties in SOWK are Richard (Dick) Cannings of the NDP, Marshall Neufeld of the Conservatives and Connie Denesiuk of the Liberals.
The Green Party’s AGM is Saturday, Nov. 22 from 1:30 to 4:30 p.m. at the Shatford Centre in Penticton.
RICHARD McGUIRE
Osoyoos Times
