u/Belle_Pepperoni

Stew Young is Langford's "weekend parent"

We're all familiar with this trope, right? The Weekend Parent, the Fun Parent, the one who gets to take the kids to Disneyland while the other parent manages doctor appointments, school supplies, and dealing with the meltdowns after telling the kid they can't get the pony they were promised?

Well, just like that stereotypical Weekend Parent, as Mayor, Stew Young loved to make big promises and hope that someone would sort out the details later.

Maritime Museum, Planetarium Theatre, & Performing Arts Center

"All of this came together relatively quickly, with the first ‘chat over coffee’ between the martime [sic] museum and Langford just last year." (Maritime museum, conference centre and performing arts theatre underway in Langford, Island Social Trends, 25 February 2020).

The Maritime Museum of B.C. pulled out in March 2021 - "“We had to have a look at where we are and where we are going in the future,” he said. “That was a really big project and it was just too costly.”. (B.C. maritime museum sinks plans for new location in Langford, Chek News, 30 March 2021.) The land is still undeveloped. (Update: and was possibly sold? It's a little hard to follow the parcelling.)

Trans-Canada Highway (Langford's oceanfront property.)

"In July, a motion to consider issuing a temporary use permit for the site to allow for eco-tourism and recreation uses was passed by Langford council and Hutchins said community members can expect to start making use of the site by the spring." (Langford buys $2.2 million oceanfront property with plans for eco-tourism, recreation, Victoria News, 2 November 2019).

The City has spent over $6M trying to make this property suitable for public use. As of September 2026 this property is still inaccessible to residents due to safety concerns.

Sooke Lake Road Baseball Diamonds

"There is a plan to build a splash park, tennis court, pickleball court and a playground on the site as well. “It’s just going to be a full service, top level, recreation centre for the community,” said the mayor. The City of Langford has applied for a $6-million grant from the Canada Community Building Fund to assist with the construction of the facility, which the mayor said will be completed in a year." (New baseball diamonds a 'massive game changer' for Langford, CTV News, 8 September 2022.)

This grant was never awarded. The land is still undeveloped.

Now in campaign mode, Fun Stew is back to his old tricks.

Stew Young's campaign page is dangling the promise of a North Langford recreation center.

There was a North Langford Rec Center - which Stew sold to Bear Mountain in 2020. Apparently, the rec center was old and needed refurbishment, and Stew "didn’t want to put the money in..." (Langford set to sell rec centre at Bear Mountain, Times Colonist, 30 August 2020).

Don't worry, this new rec center won't come out of your allowance. Stew Young is going to work with developers and find creative funding solutions. That's what we did with the Langford Aquatic Center, and look how that turned out!

Some of the things he's saying makes me wonder if he even knows his own city's middle name...(Glen Lake Rd Connector)

So while the other parent (the current council, in this overstretched analogy) gets the hate for making Langford go to bed on time, they're also making sure the city has the basic things a city needs like an Asset Management plan for dealing with public infrastructure, a Transportation Plan for long-term planning and development of the city's transportation network, and fully staffed fire stations.

Now... who wants ice cream for breakfast?

Langford residents have an important decision to make in October: Will incumbent Mayor Scott Goodmanson be re-elected to a second term, or will former Mayor Stew Young be given another chance to add to his previous 30 years in the Mayor’s chair?

Lately I’ve spent time reviewing Langford Council meeting minutes. I wanted to get a better sense for some of the real differences between Stew Young and Scott Goodmanson. There are many subjective differences, but I’m a numbers guy. I wanted to see what trends stood out to me that can be measured more objectively. Two specific things that I looked at… attendance at Council meetings, and the amount of time actually spent in Council meetings.

The contrast is stark. This post is a summary of the last 4 terms in office for Stew Young and the current term to date for Scott Goodmanson. Many of the numbers speak for themselves, but here are some of the takeaways that caught my attention:

1. Stew Young’s attendance at Council meetings was pretty bad. He showed up with greater frequency over the course of his last 4 terms, but still never got better than 78% attendance. In his 2008-2011 term he only attended Council meetings 55% of the time.

In contrast, Scott Goodmanson’s attendance at Council meetings has been excellent. He has been in attendance for 131 of the 137 Council meetings to date during this term.

2. Stew Young’s Council terms featured considerably shorter meetings than what we see today. At its speediest pace, the average meeting duration in the 2011-2014 term was only 26 minutes.

The current Council has an average meeting length of 2 hours and 19 minutes. They’ve also met far more frequently than the Councils of any of Stew Young’s last 4 terms.

The result? Scott Goodmanson has spent more time as Mayor actually in Council meetings this term than Stew Young did in his last 4 terms combined. By a wide margin.

I will be making a follow-up post that dives into this topic in greater detail comparing Council to Council.

I will be the first to point out that attendance and time spent in meetings is not indicative of performance. Merely showing up does not warrant praise. On the flip side, a history of failing to show up is something that I seriously question when considering who has earned my vote in October.

A few notes and caveats for those that have read this far:

- Includes Council meetings only (excludes committees).

- Does not differentiate between in-person and remote attendance.

- Does not factor in late arrivals, early departures, or recusals.

- One meeting during the 2014-2018 was excluded from duration statistics due to the minutes missing the time of meeting adjournment.

- Two special in-camera meetings during the 2014-2018 term were excluded due to published meeting minutes not being available.

Edit: I have been asked a couple of times for the data to support this analysis. Here is a link to the Google Drive that contains PDF copies of the meeting minutes for every meeting included in the analysis, as well as an Excel file that lists the meetings along with attendance and meeting duration information.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1Mx5pDd-R92QT5V8rzFwMX5rsUEplbvUJ?usp=sharing

Whose campaign paid for these LuLuLemon sneakers?

Does anyone happen to have any information about Pierre Poilievre/the Conservative Party of Canada hosting a campaign event at the Champ 8 boxing match?

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I saw a Facebook comment saying it was a great match, "until it became a political venue for p.p."

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From what I can find:

-The Conservative Party of Canada website has an RSVP form on their website for the match (https://www.conservative.ca/champ-8-boxing-match/) but I can't find any details about what their campaign event was.

-There's no mention of it in the promotional materials for the event and I'm a little surprised that it wouldn't be included. I assume they would have needed permission from the match organizers to host a campaign event.

-There are photos being shared of Pierre Poilievre meeting people at the event, so he was there personally.

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Anyone have more information? Was the event sponsored by the Conservative Party, was the campaigning limited to a private meet & greet, or what?

I admit I'm not a huge attendee of sporting events, is this typical?

Update to original post: It's now been made clear that PP was not just doing a private meet and greet. He was brought onto the centre ring by Bryson Hill, co-owner of Champ 8 and gave a speech.