Councillor Bob Day has been re-elected for a second term as vice chairman of the Cowichan Valley Regional District.
The representative from Lake Cowichan, who is halfway through his third term as a town councillor, was re-elected at the CVRD’s regular monthly board meeting on Dec. 14.
Day was pleased to continue his work in that role, which involves filling in for chairman of the board, Jon Lefebure, at appearances and speaking engagements. The vice chair also typically chairs a “higher profile” committee of the board. This year, Day chaired all of the budget committee meetings.
“I love local government. I see lots of changes that need to be made and as vice chair that gets you a little more respect when you suggest policy changes and stuff like that,” said Day.
“Every year since I’ve been in politics, I think I’ve become a better person, more professional, more accepting everybody’s opinions. It’s always a challenge to find how to get a board of 15 people, it’s difficult to get everybody to agree to the decision sometimes.”
Looking ahead at 2017, Day said the board will once again be focusing on climate change and the flow of the Cowichan River, which are priorities for the CVRD.
“And dedicating some more time and energy into the First Nation relationships,” he said. “We have nine First Nations that border our CVRD and even the chair has identified this as a priority — and so has the board actually. We haven’t had the time to spend on that part of our strategic plan but we plan on moving forward on that.”
Day said an issue he would personally like to move to a higher profile is solid waste management.
