Vancouver city Coun. Rebecca Bligh was acclaimed Sunday as president of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM).
It’s a role she stepped into late last year after previous president Geoff Stewart failed to win back his mayor’s seat in a general election in Colchester County, Nova Scotia.
Bligh, a two-term city councillor, went unchallenged Sunday at the FCM’s annual conference in Ottawa and will serve one year in a job that essentially makes her the chief lobbyist for Canadian municipalities.
“It's a tremendous honour, it's a tremendous responsibility,” said Bligh in an interview from her office at city hall. “It comes at a time when municipalities are absorbing a lot of decisions—for better or for worse—that other orders of government are making.”
At the same time, she said, Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government has made commitments to municipalities to build more housing and invest in infrastructure, which Vancouver can strongly benefit from considering the city’s housing crisis and $500-million capital deficit.
That commitment is also coming from a former Vancouver mayor in Gregor Robertson, who was appointed federal minister of housing and infrastructure. Robertson served 10 years as mayor and repeatedly pushed for more investments from the federal and provincial governments to tackle the housing crisis.
Carney told FCM delegates last Friday that “collaboration between the federal government and all municipalities is more important than ever, as we are at a hinge moment in Canada's history.”
The prime minister later sat down on stage with Bligh for a brief interview, and then privately with her and Carol Saab, the FCM’s CEO. Bligh said Carney was both sincere and genuine in his commitments to municipalities.
“What I have heard is some honesty about what is going to happen and also what isn't going to happen in the short term,” Bligh said.
'A good perspective'
Raymond Louie, a former Vancouver city councillor who served as FCM president in 2015, said it was important to continue that relationship with the prime minister, so he fully understands the needs from municipalities.
“As smart and accomplished as Prime Minister Mark Carney is, I expect there's more to learn and I think he'd be surprised at how detailed and complicated running a local government can be, and how many issues that are dealt with at the local level, and what's required,” Louie said.
“This opportunity that Rebecca has to help the federal government understand it is very important. She's well equipped to do that, having served a couple of terms now in Vancouver and served at the regional level, as well.”
Added Louie: “She's got a good perspective, and her policy direction on a number of different files is good. It's rounded.”
Louie said the job a president can be influential in getting governments to invest in municipalities. He cited the creation of a major infrastructure investment fund under the Justin Trudeau government and an increase in gas tax funds to B.C.
He recalled then-finance minister Bill Morneau highlighting in his budget book the investment in the North Shore wastewater treatment plant.
“I know that there's a bunch of issues with it now, but at the time, it was a struggle to try to get the funding necessary earmarked for that project,” said Louie, who served as a councillor from 2002 to 2018.
The FCM’s push to have the federal government return to investing in housing—an area Louie said former prime minister Stephen Harper didn’t subscribe to—also saw gains under the federal Liberals, with a national housing strategy announced in 2017.
Gregor Robertson
Both Louie and Bligh consider Robertson’s role as Minister of Housing and Infrastructure to be an advantage for Vancouver, no matter what a person’s politics or criticisms of his failed promise to end street homelessness by 2015.
“I think [his promise] was said in earnest that he wanted to end street homelessness because he fundamentally believes that people ought to have access to housing,” Bligh said. “That belief isn't actually as easy to create and develop programs that politicians should be able to deliver on.”
Robertson has previously said his goal to end street homelessness was made in hopes the provincial and federal governments would provide the necessary investments. He has since said publicly as minister that he wants to protect homeowners’ equity while also addressing affordability.
In the meantime, Louie and Bligh said Robertson’s depth of knowledge as to how cities work—and his time as a BC NDP MLA — should make for improved alignment with municipalities, they said.
“I don't think we have any choice right now but to believe good things will come of this,” Bligh said.
Bligh left NPA, expelled from ABC
Bligh’s appointment as FCM president comes less than four months after ABC Vancouver expelled her from the party.
In a Feb. 14 email statement to media, ABC president Stephen Molnar said that “time and again, councillor Bligh has shown that she is not a core value fit with ABC Vancouver. Rather than working with caucus to find common ground and advance solutions, she has chosen to put her own views ahead of the collective work of the team.”
Bligh, who now serves as an independent, disputed the claims, telling BIV in an interview a few days after Molnar’s announcement that Mayor Ken Sim said during the 2022 election campaign that he valued diverse opinions and lived experience.
“And what I've experienced over the last two years is a shift away from that as a value that I believe ABC was about when we ran in 2022 to more of a top-down approach to policy, and being updated and informed, as opposed to collaborative, generative discussion around policy,” she said.
Her expulsion came a few weeks after she questioned the mayor’s push to pause any “net new” supportive housing in Vancouver. Bligh also later voted against ABC Coun. Brian Montague’s push to reverse a ban on natural gas for heating and hot water in construction of new detached homes.
In her first term as a councillor, Bligh was elected as a member of the NPA. Sim was the party’s mayoral candidate in the 2018 election but failed to get elected.
Bligh left the NPA in 2019, citing concerns over anti-SOGI beliefs and misogynist comments connected to some of the new board of directors.
Bligh and Sim were integral in the creation of ABC in the run-up to the 2022 election. The party won a landslide but has since seen some of its park board commissioners and a school trustee leave the party.
Mayoral run in 2026?
With Bligh now serving as an independent, rumours persist that she will challenge Sim in the October 2026 election. Asked about the rumours, she wouldn’t rule out a run but said her focus is on serving in her dual roles as councillor and FCM president.
“Nothing’s off the table,” she said, confirming people have approached her about running for mayor.
She referenced a speech that David Coletto, CEO and founding partner of one of the country’s leading polling firms, Abacus Data, made at the FCM. She said that Coletto talked of the need for people to be “reassured” by governments at all levels.
“They want to feel confident in their government, and I think even moreso in Vancouver, they want to feel proud of the leadership in the city,” Bligh said.
“So if there's still that vacuum, which appears to be there right now, folks are going to have to figure out who they're going to want to support to step into that role.”
Sim, meanwhile, is in Ottawa June 3-6 to meet with ministers and lobby for investments in housing, infrastructure, public safety and transit. Sim has said he will seek re-election in 2026.
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