Peter Kent made a fiery pledge to Sea-to-Sky voters, and he intends to keep it.
The newly-elected Squamish city councillor promised if the turnout in Saturday’s vote improved over last election’s dismal 39 per cent, he’d light himself on fire.
Sure enough, the voters did their part.
“I’m really grateful to the voters of Squamish for coming out,” Kent told CTV News Monday.
“I’m going to honour [my promise]. I can’t walk in on my first pledge as a councillor and back away from that.”
Preliminary results indicate turnout was up more than three per cent over 2011.
Kent, who ran unsuccessfully once before, is a former stunt man who doubled for Arnold Schwarzenegger for 15 years.
His experience doesn’t diminish the danger of the stunt, however. Kent said he’ll be using state-of-the–art fire gels and a professional fire team to pull it off.
The date and details haven’t been confirmed yet, but Kent said it’ll last roughly as long as he can hold his breath.
“If you suck the fire down your throat, basically you’ll burn your throat,” he said. “You just hit the ground and the team hits you with a fire extinguisher and puts you out.”
Kent hopes to get the stunt together before Christmas, but the timing hinges on how quickly the city grants him the proper permissions.
“To burn on a street, you have to have a permit for that,” he said.
With a report from CTV Vancouver’s Scott Hurst
