Women make up more than 50 per cent of Canada's population, but only 24 per cent of its elected officials.
The Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) is trying to change that by hosting a series of workshops across the country to help women overcome the barriers to running for office and Squamish - who has a solid 20-year track record of electing women - was selected as a venue for such a workshop in September.
"FCM's program will make a meaningful contribution to help us reach the United Nations (UN) target of having a minimum of 30 per cent female participation in municipal government," said Pam McConnell, a Toronto city councilor who leads FCM's standing committee on increasing female participation in government.
"The UN says that you have a gender voice when you have at least 30 per cent at the table."
McConnell said the goal is to increase the number of councillors as well as the number of mayors who are women.
"When we first started in 2006 we were at 21 per cent across the country, and at that time we would have needed over 2,000 women to be elected to reach 30 per cent," she said.
"We are now at 24 per cent but you'll see a difference between councillors and mayors - 25 per cent of councillors are female but only 16 per cent of the mayors are female."
The number of women in municipal politics has increased by 700 in five years and Canada currently ranks 46th out of 189 countries for female participation in government.
"We have a democratic deficit and we need to address the number of women on municipal councils," McConnell said. "That's why we've looked at specific projects to work on those numbers."
Campaign workshops are one of those projects, funded by Status of Women, a federal government organization that promotes the full participation of women in the economic, social and democratic life of Canada.
"We're running 20 workshops right across the country in places and in time for local elections in hopes we'll inspire more women to run," she said.
The workshops provide instruction, networking and mentorship from women already involved in the political process.
"These workshops really give women a local network to work with, and for, and also the tools that they need to be able to run a winning campaign," McConnell said.
"All of us who have won for so many years have contributed our ideas to that campaign school so that when's it's run, it really is the collective knowledge of women from coast to coast to coast."
The hands-on workshop will teach women how to make brochures, what to put on signs, how to design signs, how to put together a campaign budget, how to figure out what the main messages are and how to embed them in election brochures. It also outlines how to assemble a campaign team that will help the candidate get to every door and talk to every person.
The second day of the workshop will focus on media training so women are able to speak to the media and get their key messages across.
"The first day is a very practical 101 of running a campaign to win and the second day is media training to get your message across and to be able to communicate your ideas to your voters," said the Toronto city councillor.
Currently women occupy two of the seven seats on the District of Squamish council -second-term councillor Patricia Heintzman and longtime councillor and former mayor Corinne Lonsdale.
To Squamish's credit, this meets the 30 per cent UN target, so long as Squamish elects at least two women again in the municipal elections this November.
Heintzman said she's not surprised Squamish was selected because historically there are several female community builders, and there are a number of potential female council members in the community.
"Holding this conference here is a step forward for women in politics," she said. "If you look back in Squamish's history, you've got female community builders that have driven the town at a lot of different levels, but they're usually in a volunteer capacity or behind the scenes."
She said although women devote hundreds if not thousands of hours to community organizations, running for public office is a big step.
"To make that move and become an overt leader is a big step for a lot of women," she said. "But there's so much capacity and talent out there that we're really excited that FCM is coming here.
"I think there's a large demographic out there that's looking for an opportunity to take this next step in becoming a community builder but they don't necessarily know how to do it."
Heintzman, who has been on council for almost six years, said this workshop is an opportunity for women to learn how to run for council, or just acquire skills for other management positions.
"Even if these women don't decide to run this time, maybe they'll run in three years or maybe they take up other leadership roles in town," she said.
Heintzman said her decision to run for council didn't come as a surprise. As a former community reporter, she was well aware of the issues in town and although she didn't have a specific penchant for running, she wanted to see several issues addressed.
"I've always been one of those people who believe a situation can be improved," she said. "I've always had a bit of a 'I want to make things better' attitude."
But Heintzman said often it's one major issue that frustrates women and therefore convinces them to run for council. However, it's important to remember that council deals with much more than one issue.
"All of a sudden you have to be interested in way more than the one thing that may have inspired you to run," she said. "Whether it be safe routes to school, carriage houses, economic development or sewage treatment."
Lonsdale's long political career began that way in 1983, when her frustration at the delay in completing the Babe Ruth baseball field prompted her to run.
"I had been really involved with various organizations in the community, one of them being minor ball and at the time we were developing the Babe Ruth field," she said. "There were over 400 kids in those days playing baseball but that field hadn't been turfed, there was no grass, it was just sitting half finished.
"The fellow that was in charge of ball started to pressure me a little bit about running for council and giving baseball a place on council and that's basically how it started."
Lonsdale said since she's been on council the number of women alongside her has been fairly stable, and at one point women even held the majority.
"My last term as mayor there were four of us - 1999 to 2002 - and we made the majority and that's the very first time there were four women on council in Squamish," she said.
Lonsdale hopes the November election could result in another majority and believes Squamish voters know what they're doing.
"Maybe we're a very wise community and we recognize that women make good leaders," she said, chuckling.
The campaign school will be held Sept. 24 and 25 and the cost is $50 to attend. For more information, contact Heintzman at [email protected].
