Corinne Lonsdale was first elected to Squamish council in a byelection in 1983. She won re-election to the job in 1984, 1986 and 1988. She first ran for mayor in 1990 against fellow Coun. Egon Tobus, losing by six votes, but then won the mayor's race in 1993, '96 and '99, serving as mayor from 1993 to 2002.
In the 2002 she chose to run for council again and won a seat in '02 and '05 and '08. Now 67, she decided not to seek election this time around, but she's not ruling out the possibility of a run in the future.
During her 25 years of service, Lonsdale has gained a reputation as a feisty, no-nonsense leader who seldom pulled punches. She admits her reputation for being pro-industry, while accurate in some respects, is in other ways not a true reflection of her overall intent.
Chief columnist Helmut Manzl recently advised those seeking office in the 2011 municipal election, "Who better than Corinne Lonsdale to offer an insider's take on muni hall over a cup of java?"
That's exactly what Chief Editor David Burke did recently, sitting down to chat with Lonsdale for almost an hour. What follows is almost a transcript of the discussion, with short parts edited out for the sake of brevity.
In the first in a two-part series of Q&As, Lonsdale offers her thoughts about her time at municipal hall and her legacy in the community.
CHIEF: I understand you first gained a seat on council in a byelection in 1983. Can you recall the circumstances - including what was happening in your own life at the time - and why you decided to run?
LONSDALE: I was really involved in the community in 1983, primarily with youth activities, kids' sports and whatnot. I was very involved with Minor Ball in particular, and the fellow that was in charge of Minor Ball was quite frustrated because Minor Ball wasn't getting things done that they thought needed to be done, such as putting grass on the ball fields. I guess because I was always kind of outspoken and busy in the community, he asked me if I would please run for council. And I guess with a little persuasion, he did all my signs and did all the rest of it, and that's what got me there. But let's face it: I had a larger interest than just ball, even then.
Twenty-five years I've been elected to office. In 1990 I lost by six votes, but it was good. I got my ear back on the ground; after seven years on council it's good to get back out there amongst the people again, and become grounded.
When I was first elected councillor, I did initiate to this day something that I'm always proud of when I drove by, and that's that turnout at the Chief. At the time there was climbing going on and cars parked all along Highway 99, with people standing on the road looking up at them.
CHIEF: What would you say were the two or three most significant achievements of your nine years as mayor?
LONSDALE: That's very difficult to answer. I want to make very clear from the beginning that things that may have [seemed to have] been my initiatives might not even have been my initiatives, but something that I had to work very hard for, but that none of it can happen by myself, by one person. It takes council as a whole to accomplish anything. Anything that I mention I certainly did have a huge role in, but I couldn't have done it without support.
One thing I feel very good about was getting a grant in lieu of taxes from B.C. Rail. At that point in time it was stated that they were getting away with $1 million a year in non-payment of taxes. We got a grant in lieu of only $400,000, but we wouldn't have gotten it had I not fought hard for it.
And that's probably why I got branded somewhere down the line [as pro-industry]; shortly after I was elected as mayor the mill [Interfor] mill shut down, putting 200-plus men out of work. It was already probably shut down when I got elected. I got involved at that point in time lobbying to get the mill started up. A committee was struck. Ron Sander, whose campaign I'm helping with in this election, he was the mill manager, an IWA representative and I formed a committee and went to Victoria and that started my relationship with the Ministry of Forests. The mill came up to the office of the Job Protection Commissioner but the mill came back to life. It took a couple years to get it back on its ground; we forgave $200,000 in taxes one year, but $200,000 one year is certainly a drop in the bucket when you think of the contribution to the community of 250 people working over there.
The West Coast Railway Park: When I was a councillor, a couple people from the West Coast Railway Museum from Vancouver said they were looking for a place to stage a rolling-stock exhibition. That's all they said. That's when the property was designated and the park got underway. During the time I was mayor, we assisted with all of that. There was a time when they wanted to build the station building. Council at that time guaranteed a loan to enable them to build that. We had as collateral two of the rail cars. If they didn't pay us, we would have gotten -I don't remember which ones they were, but two of the rail cars. I don't know what we would have done with them if we had, but they retired their debt just as they said they would. But I'm pretty excited about having played a part in bringing that park about. It was pretty important.
The other thing, of course, is Quest University. I read in the paper not long ago that Ian Sutherland and the next council were given credit for landing that university. But the university was landed two years before that. It was in 2000 and 2001, because I was still mayor when it was [granted] accreditation. I went to Victoria with Dr. Strangway when they received that. We worked very hard on that, and this community bent over backward to land that university. Certainly I won't take it away from the next council; they, too, had to do things to facilitate it actually being constructed when it was. But the land was zoned, all concessions were made. The bridge was an outstanding issue when the new council took office, but it would have happened.
CHIEF: You also had your critics, most of whom felt you were too closely tied with the logging industry and were not progressive enough for the "new" Squamish. How do you react to that sort of criticism?
LONSDALE: That's true. I really was branded. As I mentioned earlier, one of my big initiatives was to get the mill that we needed to work to re-open. It was important to this community. I wish it was still there today, actually. We really need to bring jobs to town.
At the same time, just after the mill opened up, we started what they called The War in the Woods. In the Upper Squamish, the tree farm was under siege, if you like, because the environmental movement -and I've got to be careful, because I'm an environmentalist myself - but they had come in and attached themselves to the trees. They were preventing the men from going to work. So a camp was set up out there by Interfor, and I did stay out there, and so did a whole bunch of people from the community, to enable the men to keep being able to go to work. So I think that's how I got my reputation. With those two things, I was very much in the news and out there.
But who enabled The Spit and the windsurfing? Our council. The Chief, becoming a provincial park? Another one of the initiatives we led. The Railway Park? So I have always felt very, very strongly that a strong community is a well-diversified community and that's what I was looking for there. I wanted us to be as diverse as we can. I never, ever felt that we should lose anything we had; I always wanted us to build and add more. So tourism was always meant as a bit of a transition; at this time we're in transition, and that, in my opinion, is a little bit unfortunate. I'm hoping that we can diversify
CHIEF: What would you say have been the most rewarding and the most frustrating aspects of being in public life?
LONSDALE: The most rewarding thing is being able to effect change that's positive and the community feels good about. Examples? When I was first elected, there was one building in the business park, and it was nearly filled up during the time I was mayor - and not because I was mayor, but it was because of the economic times. We've gone into economic slumps more than once and we have a slump right now, but things will go again, like they did when we had a slump nine, 10 years ago.
Frustrations? There was to be a chip plant to serve Howe Sound Pulp and Paper. I'm trying to remember who owned it at the time. It was Canadian Forest Products, I believe. Anyway, it was a terribly divisive issue.
But it wasn't the most difficult issue. The most difficult issue, I think, was the airport It was difficult because in the interest of the community at large, council felt very strongly that the airport needed to be expanded to better service the community but the neighbourhood was totally opposed and I would say 99 per cent of them was totally opposed - Brackendale. Probably there was never a "Republic of Brackendale" until that time. I think that probably was the most frustrating of all. It was interesting because, going into that election (1996), Terrill Patterson was my opponent and I beat him handily, there's no question about that, but he got a lot more votes than I would have expected, and I had a look at the books and I think it was 90 per cent of the eligible voters in Brackendale voted. What's interesting, and I've said it to other candidates in elections ever since, is that one neighbourhood in this community can determine the outcome of an election if the other neighbourhoods are complacent
Sometimes it's frustrating when you know that you need to do something that's in the best interests of the community at large but those that are in the area that's most affected are opposed because they perceive that there's a negative impact on them. That's hard because I don't think any elected official ever, ever wants to make a decision that has a negative impact on anyone.
[In the case of the airport], there was an individual that tried to start up a commuter service between here, Vancouver and Seattle. Admittedly, it was more about servicing Whistler than this area, but it would have meant expanding the apron of the runway at the airport and not necessarily, but maybe, expanding the runway to the south and people were really up in arms. That was the first time that I'd every really been exposed to the First Nations people getting out in the community, and I always remember how calm and cool they were. One of the council members from North Vancouver was up and I'll never forget it, when she spoke she had the feather and it really seemed to it was a power thing. That really stuck out in my mind. I'll never forget that.
Next week: Lonsdale talks about her past three terms on council and the challenges facing Squamish over the next few years.
