Calgary Mayoral Election and the Controversial Candidate.

The Residents of Calgary on October 18 get to go out and vote for the next mayor of Calgary with current city Mayor, Naheed Nenshi stepping down and announced early on that he would not seek reelection and some people would describe him as one of Calgary's greatest Mayors navigating 2013 flood to the controversial plan to bring the winter Olympics to the city.

The Candidates that are running for mayor used to be 28 candidates but dropped down to 27 candidates after former controversial Liberal minister Kent Hehr dropped out of the race due to personal concerns. However, he is not the most controversial candidate to be running for the chance to be Calgary's next Mayor that honor falls to Kevin J Johnston who served jail time for causing a disturbance in the Core center for his anti masking agitation. That is not even close to the worst thing he did not only is he wanted for assault in British Columbia and hate crime charges in Ontario he also threatened the safety of health care workers who are working continue to try and provide care to those suffering from Covid- 19.

Kevin J Johnson should not have been allowed to even run for the position of Mayor with him being wanted for the crimes he is wanted for in Ontario but city rules allow him to run despite the danger he poses to other people. A person can run with a criminal at the federal level similar to what Mr. Johnson can do but can be expelled by the house of commons which would deny them the ability to run in the next election.

The requirements to run for the mayor of Calgary are very minimum with some of the usual rules you would expect when running for any political office in Canada like being a Canadian citizen, being at least 18 years old but where it takes a different turn comes to residency. A potential candidate running to be the next mayor must have lived in Calgary for six months and also reside here on the day of the election. What is odd to me is that on the the city's site outlining the requirements that makes a person not eligible to run for mayor is that the candidate must not of committed an offence in the last 10 years and to refer to the local authorities election act.

I took a look at the local election act and the offence that they mention has more to do with the paying of taxes and not owing money to the municipality and does not cover criminal offences done in the past or offences that the candidate is still wanted for. This is the reason that Kevin J Johnson has been allowed to continue running in the mayor election in Calgary is that he has not committed an offence that is part of the local authorities act.

It also seems that Mr. Johnson has continued to ramp up crimes against him in Calgary back in September 660 news in the city published a story that he was sentenced to 40 days in prison and then fined 20,000 dollars for holding and attending gatherings where people did not follow the local health guide lines. Now you would think this would be enough to get him removed from the mayoral race no it did not because these violations occurred after he had already secured the nomination therefore not violating the authorities election act.

Looking at what Mr. Johnson is running for getting rid of all medical mandates, promising to end lockdowns forever when the hospitals are dealing with an influx of those who refuse to get vaccinated it is best that you look for another candidate who wont make things worse. A lesson from this that you can use in any election is to look through all the issues the candidate has listed that they intend to deal with and think to yourself how is this going to effect me and those around me. Don't be one of those people who votes for the first person that shows up on the ballet or who looks good you might just regret it in the end.