In April 2023, I found myself in a downtown Vancouver cafe with Mayor Reid Hamer Jackson. Relationships between the Mayor and Council were already pretty tense and, after a long day at a Union of BC Municipalities (UBCM) housing summit, I asked him if he would like to go for a drink. He graciously accepted.

I remember I was trying to convey the point that even a Mayor needs at least four other members of council (out of the total of nine on Kamloops Council) to really make anything substantial happen and that Mayors should really try to build good relationships with all council members.

The Mayor made the point that he had a mandate and referenced some newspaper polling that suggested his early actions as Mayor were popular with the public.

I don’t think I’ve sat across from the Mayor and had a real conversation since then. Truth be told, increasingly, I really haven’t wanted to. Things have gotten too toxic in the past couple of years. It’s also really hard for me to understand why the Mayor would file a police complaint (later dismissed by the RCMP) against Castanet’s Tim Petruk for a pat on the back. I wouldn’t want something I do to be misconstrued and wind up in a police file.

But…

What keeps coming to mind for me is the saying “an eye for an eye makes the world blind”. Arguably, there are three camps right now in Kamloops — Team Reid, Team Council, and Team Throw all the bums out. If all these camps do is fight with each other, we are in a bad place in our community. We will be diminished in our collective capacity to meet the opportunities and challenges of our day.

Could we do a better job of understanding each other’s perspectives?

As someone in Team Council, I hope I can find the open mindedness to really hear and engage with the perspectives of those in the other camps. I don’t need to vote the same way as someone else to respect them, to acknowledge their hopes and concerns, and even to trust them.

Just a couple of weeks ago, at a business networking event, I had a great conversation with someone who helped our Mayor get elected. He expressed frustration about city hall bureaucracy and red tape. While we didn’t agree on everything, we agreed on quite a bit.

Our elected officials might be too caught up in the day-to-day tension to really lead us in these types of conversation. As citizens, we may need to lead this from the ground up.

So, if anyone who sees merit in some, many, or all of his proposals, would like to meet, coffee (or something stronger) is on me. Same goes for those who feel all of council needs to be thrown out. This isn’t an invitation to a fight or an inquisition, it’s an invitation to be heard and to be treated with respect and in the spirit of friendship.

Have a wonderful September.