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Kennedy Stewart’s Forward Together ticket releases platform as Vancouver mayor race tightens

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Forward Together, the party led by Vancouver mayoral incumbent Kennedy Stewart, released its election platform on Tuesday.

The plan includes some new ideas and also recycles some unfulfilled promises made by Stewart four years ago.

The most ambitious part of the platform relates to housing and calls for 220,000 new units to be built over the next decade with 140,000 of those being rentals.

"We're going to change how we approve housing in this city to get it done faster. I understand people are finding it tough. I know what it's like to live with the stress of housing insecurity,” Stewart said.

“But no other platform is going to address this. No one else has the knowledge and know how to get the funding from provincial and federal governments."

Forward Together is also promising to do away with the city’s at-large system for electing city councillors and replace it with a ward system where residents only vote for the councillor representing their section of the city.

Stewart made a similar pledge four years ago when he ran as an independent but it went unfulfilled.

Asked about it Tuesday, Stewart said he brought it forward but didn’t have enough support on council to make it happen.

As part of his 2018 platform, Stewart also promised to “end big money influence on elections.”

There is no similar commitment in Forward Together’s platform this election.

Last month, a resident found a fundraising document linked to Forward Together on the sidewalk on West Broadway.

It lists several of the city's most prominent and wealthy developers as fundraising captains with specific dollar amounts listed next to their names.

Embattled Vancouver Canucks owner Francesco Aquilini had a fundraising goal of $110,000 listed next to his name.

Asked about it on Tuesday, Stewart would only say Forward Together follows campaign finance regulations.

“Under Elections BC rules, corporations and unions cannot donate to parties, only individuals can,” Stewart said. "If you look at our disclosure on the website, you'll see the amounts that individuals are giving and that is what is required by Elections BC rules and that's what's being reported,” said Stewart.

The platform release comes just as new polling data shows the mayor’s race tightening.

According to numbers from Research Co., Stewart has the support of 36 per cent of decided voters, with Ken Sim of the ABC Party just behind at 34 per cent and Colleen Hardwick of TEAM For a Livable Vancouver polling in third with 14 per cent support.

Stewart beat Sim, then with the Non-Partisan Association, by less than a thousand votes to win the mayor’s seat in the 2018 election.

"The phone calls to those supporters are going to be coming in hard in the next couple of weeks because with an election this close, it's ultimately about who can get their vote out,” said Research Co.’s Mario Canseco.

Public safety, crime and street disorder have been the key campaign priorities for both Sim and Hardwick while Stewart has made affordable housing his central plank.

The Forward Together platform does include some promises related to policing, public safety and the opioid crisis.

Stewart says if re-elected, he will support fully funding Vancouver Police Board budget requests.

He has also promised to turn a section of East Hastings Street into what he calls a ‘wellness corridor’ with Indigenous-focused facilities and services and a new neighbourhood park.

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