Unlike other British Columbia municipalities, senior staff with the City of Nelson say outside consultants are not needed to run the upcoming municipal election.
The idea was floated Tuesday night by Coun. Nicole Charlwood, who incidentally was elected to council through a by-election in March 2021 to replace Brittny Anderson.
Charlwood says the staff appointed to be elections officers are experienced but wondered if it would “behoove us” to hire consultants given the municipal staff already have a lot on their plate.
Corporate services manager Sarah Winton says they would have to do “quite a lot of the work” anyway and they were able to handle the by-election last year. The difference between the by-election and a general election is just more names, she said.
Winton added that the municipality also hires election staff and the deputy corporate officer will handle day to day office work heading up to Election Day.
Council appointed Winton as the chief election officer and Sonya Martineau as deputy chief election officer.
The municipal election is Saturday, Oct. 15, 2022.
