Two days after the Vancouver election, the Non-Partisan Association's Ken Sim is ready to accept defeat.
The first-time candidate, who came within 1,000 votes of victory in the unofficial results, issued a statement Monday afternoon congratulating rival Kennedy Stewart on his win.
He said Stewart fought a "spirited campaign," and that the city is better off for each of the mayoral, council, school board and park board candidates who threw their hat in the ring.
“I apologize that it has taken time to acknowledge that Kennedy Stewart won the mayoral election," Sim added. "Given the close nature of the result, we believed that we owed it to our supporters and the city to ensure we had the correct result. This was not done to take away from Kennedy Stewart or his team’s accomplishment in any way."
The CTV News election team declared Stewart the winner at around 11:15 p.m. on election night, but the NPA held out hope they could turn the tide until the city released its unofficial results at nearly 1 a.m. Sunday.
Even then, Sim, a wildly successful businessman who co-founded the Rosemary Rocksalt bagel franchise, was unwilling to concede.
"The race is incredibly close," he told reporters early Sunday morning. "We're going to be talking to our advisers to see what options we have."
Despite polls in the lead-up to the election that saw Stewart enjoying a comfortable double-digit lead over his rivals, the unofficial results put him at 49,812 votes to Sim's 48,828.
The NPA noted that the City of Vancouver is undergoing a routine verification of the results. The final tally is set to be released by the chief election officer by 4 p.m. Wednesday.
While the NPA failed to elect a mayor, the party earned five seats on council – as many as the Green, COPE and OneCity parties combined.
