Emma Durand-Wood has won the byelection for the council seat in Winnipeg’s Elmwood-East Kildonan.
Durand-Wood won more than 31 per cent of the vote, with a total of 1,567 votes. Candidate Abel Gutierrez came in second with about 18 per cent or 887 votes, and Braydon Mazurkiewich came in third with about 17 per cent or 842 votes, according to unofficial results posted on the city of Winnipeg’s website Saturday.
While speaking on Saturday after her victory the 44-year-old promised to help to build a “stronger, happier and more connected community.”
“I’m really excited to get to work, and it’s an honour to have been chosen and I’m going to try my best to be the best councillor that I can, and keep working every day for everyday people.”
Durand-Wood, an Elmwood community activist who has pushed the City of Winnipeg to plant more trees and allow more infill housing, said before the campaign she thinks residents in the area are tired of negativity and want solutions, from more frequent buses to better youth programs.
“I’m just excited to keep getting back out into the community, meeting more groups, meeting more people and finding out what the needs are and how we can support them,” she said.
She said she will be focused as a councillor on “investing in community.”
“I think people are looking for solutions, so the idea of investing in community, it does resonate They know that those are the solutions to building a stronger community and reducing poverty and lifting everybody up.”
While knocking on doors during her campaign, Durand-Wood said two issues that kept coming up with constituents was reducing crime, and reducing poverty.
“For reducing crime and homelessness, I’m in favour of housing first,” she said. “Get people into unconditional housing, and then get them the services they need to treat their addiction or their trauma, or whatever there challenges are.
“And for reducing crime, the best thing we can do is reduce poverty, so working on housing, working on food security, working on having a viable public transit that works for everybody, they are all things that help people stay out of poverty, or lift themselves out of poverty.”
Default Caption: Emma Durand-Wood hugs friend and campaign helper Joshua Oliver after winning the byelection for the Elmwood-East Kildonan city council seat on Saturday. (Gavin Axelrod/CBC)
Eight-year-old Joshua Oliver helped with door-knocking Durand-Wood’s campaign. He said “being a door-knocker is great” because it taught him that “connection with people is important” — except for when people don’t answer their doors.Â
“She’s a great candidate and that’s only because of her kindness. She cares about the city,” Oliver told CBC News on Saturday.Â
The Saturday byelection was called in the northeast ward after the death of Jason Schreyer, the area’s former councillor, in April.
Durand-Wood was one of seven candidates who ran to fill Schreyer’s seat. Candidates also included Abel Gutierrez, Braydon Mazurkiewich, Carmen Prefontaine, Kyle Roche, Zekaria Selahadin and Chris Sweryda.
Sweryda, who was endorsed by family members of Schreyer, came in fourth on Saturday with 740 votes.
In total 4,977 of the 31,819 eligible voters — only 15 per cent — cast votes in Saturday’s byelection in Elmwood-East Kildonan, according to the city.
Byelections were also held Saturday for school trustee positions in Louis Riel School Division Ward 3 (southeast Winnipeg and part of the rural municipality of Ritchot) and Pembina Trails School Division Ward 1 (southwest Winnipeg and part of the rural municipality of Headingley).
Peter Bjornson, a former NDP cabinet minister, was voted to represent Louis Riel School Division Ward 3 and Samantha Pope was voted to represent Pembina Trails School Division Ward 1.