Cavers takes lead in high-tech civic-election campaign

In the midst of dreary debate about permissive tax exemptions and traffic bylaws and open-pit mines, it’s good to know our civic lawmakers are able to cut through to the important things — such as fashion.

During Tuesday’s City council meeting, James Peters of TV7 got into a Twitter exchange with candidate Arjun Singh, with the latter claiming to be “very well dressed. lol.” (He was in jacket and tie, though with white socks.)

To which Peters replied, “True, but @petermilobar has upstaged you by breaking out the pink shirt and tie.”

The mayor, sitting out a conflict of interest in his office while council debated a liquor licence amendment, then tweeted in, “The pink plays well wirh (sic) the blue in my eyes. Thanks for noticing.”

Indeed, Milobar’s pink outfit would be better left in the closet. But the point is not another discussion of ties or even yoga pants or other Kamloops fashion faux pas; rather, the use of technology in politics, specifically the election campaign.

As of this writing, there are officially five candidates for councilor (Peter Milobar was on his way to City Hall on Wednesday afternoon to file for mayor), though many more have taken out nomination papers and announced their intentions to run.

More than a few have entered the electronic age; some have been familiar with it for quite some time.

Singh, for example, started his Your Kamloops blog years ago and has turned it into an election platform, in addition to Facebook and Twitter. Of all the candidates, including incumbents, he’s the most consistent blogger, and his content has the most depth.

Of those I’ve seen, second-time candidate Nelly Dever is probably second to Singh. Though her website is a bit cheesy (do we really need to watch a video discourse on the shape of her earlobes?), it’s easy to navigate.

And, of course, she’s on Facebook. As are Nancy Bepple, Chris Ortner, Marg Spina, Ray Nyuli, Donovan Cavers, Milobar, and John DeCicco.

(Under his achievements, by the way, DeCicco lists “upgraded Cariboo College to full university status.” Hmmm.)

Nyuli has a blog and is to be commended for setting up pages on it dedicated to the parkade and Ajax mine, but I wasn’t able to open them.

So though lawn signs and newspaper ads will still play a role, the electronic age of campaigning has clearly arrived.

Cavers, though, is using an additional, and different, type of technology — the bus wrap. He’s getting fine mileage out of putting his face and message on four City transit buses.

Some of that mileage comes courtesy CHNL’s cranky-pants editorialist Jim Harrison, who gave Cavers a thrashing this week over his stand against a secret meeting with KGHM Ajax, and his bus wraps.

Which gave Cavers, ever alert to opportunities for “earned media,” a golden opportunity to capitalize by calling a press conference for this morning to respond.

Fact is, those bus wraps are drawing more attention to Cavers than all the Tweeting and Facebooking and blogging of the other candidates put together.

He says most of his campaign budget is going into the bus wraps. At this point, it would seem to have been a wise investment, and earns him this week’s prize for best use of technology.