More than half are against “corporate votes”, non-resident electors and allowing residents aged 16 and 17 to cast ballots.
Vancouver, BC [December 23, 2021] – More than three-in-five residents of Metro Vancouver believe it is time to end the regulation that allows people who do not reside in a municipality to vote in local elections if they own property there, a new Research Co. poll has found.
In the online survey of a representative sample of Metro Vancouverites, 63% of residents agree with eliminating non-residency property electors and only letting residents of a city vote in municipal elections.
Majorities of Metro Vancouverites disagree with the notion of allowing “corporate voting” by giving businesses the ability to vote in municipal elections (56%) and with letting Canadians aged 16 and 17 cast ballots in municipal elections (51%).
The idea of allowing adult Permanent Residents of Canada to vote in municipal elections is endorsed by more than seven-in-ten Metro Vancouverites (71%), while only 22% disagree and 7% are undecided.
Three-in-ten Metro Vancouverites (31%) identify housing as the most important issue facing their municipality right now, followed by COVID-19 (24%), property taxes (10%), climate change (7%), drug overdoses (6%) and crime (5%).
“While concerns about housing are particularly high in Burnaby (45%), this is also the main preoccupation for residents of Vancouver (31%) and Surrey (24%),” says Mario Canseco, President of Research Co. “Drug overdoses are a salient issue in Vancouver (9%) while crime is a significant worry in Surrey (12%).”
The approval rating for Vancouver Mayor Kennedy Stewart stands at 57%, up six points since a similar Research Co. survey conducted in January 2020. The numbers are stable for Burnaby Mayor Mike Hurley (51%, =), while Surrey Mayor Doug McCallum has seen his rating drop from 50% at the start of 2020 to 30% in the last month of 2021.
Across Metro Vancouver, 42% of residents believe their current mayor deserves re-election, while 37% disagree and 20% are undecided.
Almost half of residents of Burnaby (48%) and Vancouver (47%) are currently willing to re-elect Hurley and Stewart respectively. In Surrey, only 28% think McCallum deserves a new term in office while 59% disagree.
Methodology: Results are based on an online study conducted from December 17 to December 19, 2021, among 1,200 adults in Metro Vancouver. The data has been statistically weighted according to Canadian census figures for age, gender and region. The margin of error—which measures sample variability—is +/- 2.8 percentage points, nineteen times out of twenty.
Find our data tables here and download the press release here.
For more information on this poll, please contact:
Mario Canseco, President, Research Co.
778.929.0490