Neighbours Before Partisans
When politics becomes about winning, communities can lose.
The local Facebook page in rural communities is generally where all the best tea is spilt. From late night solar light theft, to sharing random acts of kindness, you can keep your finger on the pulse just with a few simple scrolls.
It’s not unusual for the conversations to turn political at some points, mostly questions about garbage pick ups, snow removal, or (at least in Cranbrook) comments on the endless amount of pot holes. More recently however the discussion has shifted. There has been a growing conversation about bringing organized provincial party politics into municipal elections.
I would say that for the most part the comments are pretty firmly against the idea. While a few people see this as a positive step. Others see it as a cause for concern.
During this conversation I’ve heard from locals, former Mayors, current Mayorial candidates, our local MLA, and the party driving the movement. While I have had a lot of feelings, I’ve found myself thinking less about political parties and more about the purpose of municipal government itself.
Because before we decide how we should govern our communities, we should probably ask what local government is actually for.
Last year, I had the privilege of serving on Cranbrook’s Mayor’s Task Force on Homelessness and Community Safety and Wellbeing. Around that table sat people from different professions, different experiences and, I’m sure, different political beliefs.
To be honest, I couldn’t tell you who voted for which party.
It never seemed to matter.
What mattered was whether we could make Cranbrook better.
Every conversation came back to practical questions.
How do we improve community safety?
How do we respond to addiction and homelessness?
How do we strengthen our local economy?
How do we build a healthier community for everyone?
No one asked whether an idea belonged to the political left or the political right.
We asked whether it might help.
Don’t get me wrong. There were a lot of disagreements in that room. While we were all asking the same questions, we all had different ideas on how to answer them. In the end however we were all able to focus on the end goal and everyone had to make compromises to make it happen.
That experience reinforced something I’ve come to believe:
Municipal government is fundamentally different from provincial or federal politics.
Federal and Provincial legislatures are designed around political competition. Governments and oppositions challenge one another. Parties develop platforms, organize around shared ideologies and compete for power. That adversarial structure serves an important purpose in our democracy.
Municipal government serves a different one.
Its purpose isn’t to win ideological debates.
Its purpose is to steward a place.
Stewardship is different from victory.
A steward asks,
“What will leave this community stronger than I found it?”
That question doesn’t belong to the left or the right.
It belongs to anyone who has ever loved a place enough to leave it better than they found it.
Roads still need repairing.
Water systems still need maintaining.
Local businesses still need support.
Families still need housing.
Parks still need caring for.
Emergency services still need to respond.
These are not partisan problems.
They are shared responsibilities.
And they are solved most effectively when people with different perspectives are willing to work together in service of the same community.
Over the past few years, much of my professional work has focused on recovery systems and the conditions that allow people to flourish. The more I study them, the more convinced I become that the same principles extend far beyond healthcare.
Healthy communities, like healthy recovery systems, aren’t built because everyone thinks the same way.
They’re built because relationships become strong enough to carry disagreement without breaking.
Flourishing is not the absence of disagreement.
It is the presence of trust.
I suspect this is especially true in rural communities.
In places like Cranbrook, our lives overlap in ways that are difficult to appreciate unless you’ve lived them.
The person sitting beside you at the council table may also be the parent beside you at the hockey rink.
They may own the business you visit every week.
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They may volunteer with Search and Rescue.
They may coach your child’s soccer team.
They may be the person who shows up when your family needs help.
In rural communities, disagreement doesn’t end relationships.
It can’t.
We’re too interconnected.
Our communities function because we depend on one another.
That interdependence is one of our greatest strengths.
It’s also why I’m cautious about importing structures designed primarily around political competition into institutions that depend upon long-term collaboration.
The danger isn’t that people bring different ideas to council.
I hope they do.
Different experiences lead to better questions.
Different philosophies challenge assumptions.
Different perspectives often produce better decisions.
The danger comes when the incentive quietly changes.
Instead of asking,
“How do we solve Cranbrook’s problem?”
we begin asking,
“How does my team win?”
Those are not always the same question.
And when they aren’t, I hope community wins.
To be clear, this isn’t an argument against political conviction.
Communities need people with principles.
They need people willing to challenge one another.
They need robust debate.
What they don’t need is for our first loyalty to be somewhere else.
The first responsibility of a municipal leader isn’t to defend an ideology.
It is to care for a place.
To listen.
To build trust.
To make difficult decisions.
To leave the community healthier than they found it.
That is stewardship.
Perhaps that’s why municipal government has always felt different.
Not because politics disappears.
But because relationships matter more.
After the council meeting ends, we are still neighbours.
We’ll still see one another at the grocery store.
We’ll still volunteer together.
We’ll still cheer for the same kids.
We’ll still respond to the same wildfire.
We’ll still grieve the same losses.
We’ll still celebrate the same victories.
Our future is shared whether we agree politically or not.
That is the quiet wisdom of local government.
It reminds us that the strength of a community is measured less by how well it competes with itself and more by how well it cares for itself.
In a time when so much of public life rewards division, perhaps municipal government should remain one of the few places that rewards stewardship instead.
Because local government should be the place where we practice being neighbours before we practice being partisans.
Jaime Jenkins explores a simple question: What conditions help people and communities bring forth the best of what they are capable of? Her writing examines recovery, leadership, stewardship, and human flourishing through that lens.
