“I had two speeches written out, and I threw out the right one.”
That’s from Prince George Mayor-elect Garth Frizzell after coming out on top during Saturday’s Civic election unseating incumbent Simon Yu and two-term councillor Kyle Sampson.
Frizzell who stopped by our radio stations this morning (Monday) for his first interview as mayor told MyPGNow.com he is intrigued at how all the puzzle pieces will fit with five new counicllors at city hall.
“We’re all going to be working together and at the same time figuring each other out. But the problems aren’t just building fences. They’re like public safety, economic development, parks, roads, trails, just the basic functioning, keeping taxes low. These are not simple problems.”
He cautioned though the new blood will need to learn how to play the political game – something he knows how to do quite well.
“Last term I was watching as a number of different councils lost their elected officials within the first few months because those were people who had run expecting they could get in and then flip a switch and things would change. And then you realize that there’s a lot of work to get people to see your way, to get the five or seven or hopefully nine votes that you need to get something through.”
“I’ve spent the weekend pouring over the backgrounds of the team that we’ve got together, and we don’t have that. The folks who are coming in, come in with a vast range of life experiences, education, skill sets that are going to be really invaluable. So, I don’t think you’re going to see Prince George needing the ramp-up time that other communities might have needed.”
Once all the smoke had cleared on Saturday’s civic election, Frizzell noted it was great to get an embrace from incumbent mayor Simon Yu.
“I think he is a class act, a quality guy. I really appreciated the early hours of after the election was over, getting to connect with him right away and start planning, because his eye isn’t on Simon Yu or Garth Frizzell, it’s on Prince George.”
Frizzell won’t get much time too breathe as he will be keeping a close eye on a provincial election this weekend, that could right down to the wire.
“A lot of our hopes and plans, some of the things we’ve carefully built for more than a decade, rely on the government in power continuing their their commitments to Prince George. We’ve gotten some amazing accomplishments with provincial governments, whatever side of the fence they’ve been on, and you have to work with whatever government you get.”
A lot of big health care projects are in motion in Prince George including the new Acute Care Tower as well as nailing down what will be done on a potential helipad in the northern capital and a mental health and addictions facility.
He noted the tower will shift to the Regional Health District’s tab in 2027 creating additional costs.
“We’re already the sixth-highest spender in regional health district, and that’s about, we might go to number one. We got some big challenges ahead.”
According to Civic Info BC, PG had a roughly 30% voter turnout.
Something going on in the Prince George area you think people should know about?
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