Nominations for the October municipal election got off to a slow start last week, but by 4 p.m. on Friday, the nomination deadline, 10 people had filed papers for the four councillor positions.

There will also be votes to choose between two candidates for mayor and between three candidates for two school board positions. There are three candidates for two positions as water councillors in water districts 8 and 9.

Only two incumbents — C.J. Rhodes and Jim King — are running as councillors.

Carol Youngberg had been undecided until Thursday, but chose not to run (see story on Page 3).

The only other incumbent, Mayor Sue McKortoff, faces a challenge from Doug “Stone Dan” Pederson, a perennial candidate running on a platform to make Osoyoos the home of the “Pot Hall of Fame.”

Councillor Mike Campol announced last January that he would not be running again.

The new candidates for council are Kenny Music, Sy Murseli, Jane Long, Shelley McIntyre, Myers Bennett, Sherani Theophilus, Brian Harvey and Egon Nielsen.

There are three people running as water councillors in water districts 8 and 9. In addition to incumbents Sarabjit Rai and Claude Moreira, challenger Kuldeep Dhaliwal is also running.

In school board elections, incumbent Casey Brouwer is running again, as are newcomers Brenda Dorosz and Penny Duperron. There are two Osoyoos representatives on school board.

The other incumbent, Marieze Tarr, is not running this time.

Dorosz is known for her involvement in fighting the closure of Osoyoos Secondary School in 2016. Duperron ran as a trustee in a by-election in 2016, but Brouwer defeated her by 40 votes.

Mark Pendergraft will be returning by acclamation as the Electoral Area “A” director in the Regional District of Okanagan-Similkameen.

The Osoyoos Times attempted to reach all non-incumbent candidates for council for short interviews about their backgrounds and why they are running.

Kenny Music did not respond. Sherani Theophilus responded, but wasn’t available to do an interview at this time.

The following are short profiles of the other six candidates in the order in which they filed papers. Longer profiles and information about their positions on issues will follow in coming weeks.

Sy Murseli

Sy Murseli, 68, has never been elected to council, but it’s not for lack of trying.

This election will be his eighth time running in Osoyoos.

Murseli said he is “100 per cent pro-electorate, pro-taxpayer” and he wants to protect their interests by challenging the mayor and councillors both in camera and in open meetings – “without any loyalty to mayor or councillors, particularly absolutely no loyalty to administration,” he said. “I will be calling a spade a spade.”

Murseli said he has been “officially” the council watchdog since he first called himself that in 1996.

He has never run for any elected office except to become a councillor and he admits that he would not be qualified to serve as mayor.

Murseli is particularly upset about electronic vote counting and says he doesn’t trust it.

“I do not trust the official chief electoral officer (Janette Van Vianen, director of corporate services) and Mr. (Barry) Romanko (town CAO),” he added.

He said he believes the 2014 mayoralty election was above board, but choosing his words carefully, he said the vote for councillor and the referendum on a new fire hall “was not the wishes of the taxpayer.”

Murseli came to Osoyoos in 1981 after immigrating to Canada from the former Yugoslavia, in the part that is now Kosovo.

Jane Long

Jane Long, almost 36, was initially unsure whether she had time to juggle her responsibilities as a mother of three children, who runs several businesses, with serving on council.

But after discussing it with some people, they helped to convince her that those responsibilities were exactly the reason she should be running – they give her a unique voice.

She said she would obviously be listening to the public, but many of the issues people in the community face are ones she deals with herself.

“I have the same concerns myself,” she said. “I live it every day, so I think that gives me more of a push to really fight for things.”

Although she has never served on a town council, she said she has served on several boards, including the Vernon Jazz Society and the Alumni Association for Okanagan College.

She briefly was on the board of the Osoyoos Lake Water Quality Society, but the timing wasn’t good and she had to drop that.

Long has lived most of her life in Vernon, but she also lived for shorter periods in Vancouver and Penticton. She came to Osoyoos six years ago.

She runs a home-based accounting business, and runs a store, Desert Babies & Kids Boutique. She also teaches CPA (Chartered Professional Accountant) students online.

Shelley McIntyre

Shelley McIntyre, 49, who came to Osoyoos with her husband in January 2017, says she’s running for council because she’s always been community minded.

“I’ve always done a lot of volunteer work and I’ve been a part of the community wherever I’ve lived,” she said. “So I feel like I do have something to give. I might have a few different perspectives on old problems. I might have a different way of approaching things that other people don’t.”

McIntyre was born in Winnipeg, but grew up in Kamloops. Her most recent move was from Nanaimo.

She’s worked in dental offices, as a dental assistant for more than 20 years, as well as being a receptionist. Currently she works as a receptionist at Osoyoos Dental Centre.

She also took a “women in trades” program in Nanaimo and worked operating heavy equipment for six years.

As for past community involvement, she’s volunteered with food banks, been youth group leader at church, volunteered at a hospital.

“I’m in choirs, I do book drives, we do toy runs on our motorcycles and we do a prostate cancer ride. I’ve done kidney marches and coordinated things for Alzheimers and I’ve worked in and sat with people in hospice and elderly homes,” she said.

She also ran a museum in Kamloops and created a special program for deaf children, learning sign language herself.

Myers Bennett

Myers Bennett, who gives his age as “over 65,” is the only one of the non-incumbents we’ve interviewed with previous municipal council experience.

“I did two terms when I was up in Vanderhoof on council and I really enjoyed it,” he said, adding that he’s retiring at the end of October and will have the time.

“I just thought I would throw in my hat because I’ve got a lot of experience and I know a lot of people in the communities,” he added.

In his work in commercial insurance, Bennett said he knows all the current people on council and people from Princeton, Keremeos, Kelowna, Penticton and Oliver.

He also has business experience, most recently running a Subway restaurant, a dollar store and a vitamin store in Kitimat. And he’s worked as an electrician.

He grew up in Vanderhoof, but went to school in Oregon on a track scholarship. He lived in Penticton for 10 years and has been in Osoyoos for another 10 years.

Bennett has been active in chambers of commerce in Vanderhoof, Kitimat and Osoyoos, serving as president in these communities. He was also involved with the amalgamation of chambers in Osoyoos and Oliver, becoming the president of the amalgamated South Okanagan Chamber of Commerce.

He’s also been active in other organizations such as Rotary.

Brian Harvey

Brian Harvey, 60, said he decided to run because he’s now working part time and he has some extra time.

As a lawyer, his previous work was for the federal Department of Justice in the litigation section, doing civil litigation.

“So an interest in public affairs predates my application (for council),” he said. “I talked to a number of people and they thought I might make a suitable candidate. So it’s a little bit of give to the community. I’ve got the time and capacity and I think the background.”

Despite his knowledge of the legislative process at the federal level, he has never served in an elected office. Nonetheless, he thinks his ability to read and interpret legislation will be a helpful skill. He’s also done policy development.

Harvey has been in Osoyoos for the past four years after moving here from Ottawa. He grew up in Toronto, but has lived most of his life in Ottawa.

In Osoyoos, he’s been active with the Lake Osoyoos Sailing Club and in past years has been on boards of the Desert Park Exhibition Society and the Osoyoos Lake Water Quality Society.

Egon Nielsen

Egon Nielsen, 75, has lived on Anarchist Mountain since last November, moving here from Surrey.

He’s now retired, but said he’s still a minister with Christian Fellowship International (cficommunity.org), even though he couldn’t generate enough interest to establish a church here.

He lived much of his life in Nipigon in northwest Ontario before moving to the Lower Mainland.

He’s never run for or served in elected office before, though he did try to get nominated in Nipigon.

“I did try to get my name in, but the clerk of the municipality at the time was looking after it and didn’t like me,” he said. “So he made sure my thing didn’t go through.”

He did manage a federal conservative candidate’s election campaign during the Pierre Elliott Trudeau years and was proud that his candidate won twice as many votes as the others combined.

He served in the Royal Canadian Navy between 1961 and 1964 and worked many years in the publishing business.

Nielsen said he decided to put his name forward as a candidate after reading in last week’s Osoyoos Times that only four councillor candidates had been nominated by last Tuesday.

“I’ve decided to leave my name on,” he said Monday. “I was going to cancel it today, but then I thought, no, let’s just leave it on.”

Friday night he took down his Facebook page that had posts on such topics as the idea that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is promoting pedophilia. The Osoyoos Times saw it before it was taken down.

He said he took it down because a local resident accused him of being a racist and he doesn’t want to create problems. He denies the charge.

“Of course not,” he said. “God made all the different races so we’re all under one.”

RICHARD McGUIRE

Osoyoos Times