The Editor,

Re. “Two candidates meetings – but no Tory contender” (The Tri-City News, Nov. 4).

The Burquitlam Community Association has no political affiliations and is dedicated to representing our neighbourhood’s interests and making it an even better place to live. We have been holding all-candidates meetings for more than 10 years and pride ourselves on our ability to provide a fair and balanced forum that assists residents of our community and the broader area to get to know their candidates and make better electoral choices.

This is why we were saddened to learn through The Tri-City News that Mike Martens, manager of the Diana Dilworth campaign in the federal byelection, characterized the meeting we held during last year’s general federal election as “incredibly biased” and “unruly.”

Mr. Martens’ comments are the first of this kind that have been brought to our attention and we are struggling to comprehend what could have motivated them. The feedback received from both residents and candidates regarding our all-candidates meetings has always been overwhelmingly positive. Our format has been both consistent and reliable over a number of years and allows for an unbiased and controlled forum. We only accept questions in writing and these are read to the candidates by the moderator.

The Dilworth campaign was notified of this in advance. In the lead-up to our all-candidates meeting, we had several contacts with Ms. Dilworth’s campaign staff and were informed that she could not attend due to scheduling conflicts and the fact that she was already committed to appearing at several other all-candidates meetings. At no time did we receive any indication that her non-attendance was due to concerns regarding our meeting.

Our association would like to express its gratitude to candidates Ken Beck Lee, Fin Donnelly and Rebecca Helps, as well as the more than 60 community members who attended the meeting we held Nov. 5. Thanks to everyone who was present, we were able to have what was by all accounts a very successful session with a wide range of issues addressed.

Jess Bossert, Director, Burquitlam Community Association