The Green Party of Vancouver’s Pete Fry emerged Tuesday as the consensus mayoral candidate between Vancouver’s three main left-leaning parties ahead of the Oct. 17 municipal election.
After months of public and private discussions about which of Vancouver’s three left-of-centre parties — the Greens, OneCity, and COPE — should drop out of the mayoral race to unify behind a single progressive candidate, the path forward for Fry appears to have percolated over a pair of tea-time chats last week.
Last Monday, the three mayoral nominees — Fry, OneCity’s William Azaroff, and COPE’s Stephanie Allen — met at Allen’s home over tea to discuss the state of the race. Although no final decisions were made at the meeting, less than 48 hours later Allen publicly withdrew from the race, urging the remaining two left-leaning parties to “do the right thing” and unite behind a single mayoral candidate.
Then last Thursday, the day after Allen’s announcement, Azaroff hosted Fry at his east Vancouver home, for tea, cookies and another conversation.
By the end of that afternoon, Azaroff was coming around to a difficult decision.
“I think on Thursday it started becoming really obvious to me what the dynamics were,” Azaroff said Tuesday.
He took the Labour Day long weekend to confer with the OneCity team and people close to him, he said, looking for someone to provide a “super-compelling” reason for him to stay in the race. None came, and Azaroff communicated his decision to step down to his party-mates on Monday, and to the public Tuesday morning at a news conference outside city hall.
” … Probably Thursday afternoon, my heart kind of knew,” Azaroff said Tuesday. “But my brain decided yesterday.”
To defeat incumbent ABC Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim next month and win a progressive majority on city council “we have to unite behind a single progressive mayoral candidate,” Azaroff said. “This is what the people have asked for, and this is what the progressive parties have committed to. Pete Fry, who is here, he and I have spoken a number of times recently, and I see in him a commitment and a personal desire to bring competence and ethics back to the mayor’s office.”
Public polling released over the summer showed Sim, the incumbent, leading among decided voters, with Fry and Vancouver Liberal candidate Kareem Alleem tied in second, with Azaroff and Allen well behind.
Azaroff said Tuesday that while he took the summer poll with a grain of salt, he believed stepping down was the right move.
“As long as there are two progressives or three progressives on the ticket, Ken Sim wins. What I’ve always loved about OneCity is we’re pragmatic progressives. And this is the pragmatic move.”
Azaroff became visibly emotional at times during Tuesday’s news conference, as did the OneCity candidates for council, park board and school board who stood behind him as he spoke.
“I want to wish these amazing candidates, who are still in the race, our incredible OneCity candidates, so much success. I also want to wish Pete Fry, the Greens, and COPE the absolute best of luck,” Azaroff said. “I’m counting on you, and our city is counting on you.”
OneCity council candidate France Bula, a former longtime civic journalist in Vancouver, also addressed the crowd at Tuesday’s news conference.
Bula said most Vancouverites she has met campaigning in recent months didn’t appear to know an election is coming next month. But she expects Vancouverites will start paying attention over the next 39 days, she said, and hopes “they’ll be paying attention to the plan from OneCity that hopes to deliver them a voice and a place and a future.”
Fry, a second-term Vancouver councillor, and Allen, a former non-profit housing executive, both attended Tuesday’s news conference.
Speaking after Azaroff’s remarks, Fry thanked the former OneCity and COPE candidates, both of whom he has known for years, and said the three parties “share a lot of the same values” and are united on “the need to get rid of Ken Sim.”
OneCity mayoral candidate William Azaroff, left, and Green candidate Pete Fry speaking outside Vancouver city hall
Fry said there are no continuing discussions between the Greens and the other three parties running mayoral candidates: the Vancouver Liberals, TEAM for a Livable Vancouver, and Vote Vancouver. Those other three parties, all led by former political allies of Sim, “are really Ken Sim-esque,” Fry said, and voters “who are upset with the last four years and feel they were misled in voting for ABC, I think that they are not interested in more of the same.”
Asked whether anything was promised to Azaroff, Allen or their parties in recent discussions in exchange for dropping out of the race, Fry said: “There was no promise made at all, other than the original negotiation that we would figure it out, and only run one mayoral candidate among the three of us.”
After Azaroff finished his public remarks at Tuesday’s news conference, he had a little chat off to the side of the plaza with Allen and Fry. As the three broke after sharing some quiet words, handshakes and hugs, Fry borrowed COPE’s frequent rallying cry, quipping: “All right, now let’s evict Ken Sim.”
In the hours after Azaroff’s announcement, TEAM and the Liberals issued their own respective statements thanking him for his contribution to the campaign, and making the case for why their party should get your vote.
Second-term Coun. Rebecca Bligh, who was elected in 2022 with ABC before being expelled from the party early last year and is running this year with the new Vote Vancouver party, said Tuesday she’s not considering dropping out. Bligh questioned whether supporters of COPE and OneCity would actually consolidate behind Fry, when the three parties have been at odds on many policies as recently as this year.
“When Vancouverites go to the ballot box, they’re going to vote based on who puts forward a platform and solutions that are going to solve their biggest issues. And we haven’t even gotten started yet,” Bligh said. “The race essentially started today.”
With files from Stephanie Ip
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