One council candidate in this year’s municipal election is starting a campaign to send back unwanted election material delivered to her house.
Since launching the Return to Sender campaign last week on Facebook, Pam Alexis has reached more than 2,400 people with her idea.
The movement takes aim at a newsletter sent out by Citizens for Responsible Municipal Government (CRMG) to nearly every address in Mission through Canada Post.
“I’ve talked to a lot of people who don’t want this in their house,” said Alexis. “I don’t want it in my house.”
Alexis explained she wanted to do something about it without turning her election campaign into a negative one.
“This is probably the most dignified way to protest this,” said Alexis, who started the campaign by purchasing a “Return to Sender” photo and sharing it on Facebook.
“Please join me in a campaign to return the Mission Messenger to Ted Adlem care of City Hall,” wrote Alexis, who also encouraged others to share the image.
“I have looked at (Mission Messenger) and feel there is a tremendous amount of mistruths, and perhaps some exaggerations,” Alexis explained.
Alexis criticized some material in the newsletter, which she believes “slams” every municipal council in Mission for the past 20 years and has shown “tremendous disrespect” to district staff.
“People need to have something they can do (about the newsletter). I didn’t ask for this; it was mailed to me.”
“As a corporation mandated to deliver Canada’s mail, items that are deemed mailable must be accepted for delivery,” said Carley Smith, manager of medial relations for Canada Post.
Smith also noted Canada Post offers a Consumer Choice program for residents who don’t want flyers like the Messenger.
“… but it should be noted that joining this program also removes you from all unaddressed admail, including municipal mailings and notices, community flyers and newsletters,” said Smith.
To stop receiving unaddressed advertisements, residents can leave a note in their mailbox stating they don’t want to receive unaddressed mail. According to the Canada Post website, the only unaddressed mail that will continue to be delivered to these homes will be community newspapers, as well as mailings from the House of Commons, provincial chief electoral officers, municipal electoral offices and Elections Canada.
The newsletters are a part of CRMG’s election campaign, explained Mayor Ted Adlem, who has no plans to change his slate’s strategy.
People who are serious about getting elected, should be campaigning, not complaining, said Adlem, who is not confirming how many more newsletters CRMG will be mailed out.
“We budgeted for six,” he said.
Anyone who doesn’t want to receive the bulk mail out should contact Canada Post, Adlem suggested.
