Saint John East byelection has no local candidates

Voters in Monday's Saint John East byelection looking to support a candidate who lives in the riding are facing a problem — there aren't any.

Five candidates are on the ballot to fill the seat left open by Liberal Gary Keating, who resigned three weeks after winning it in September's general election, but none live among the riding's 11,000 eligible voters.

Still, that hasn't stopped candidates from criticizing each other's absentee status.

"This byelection is so odd," said University of New Brunswick political scientist J.P. Lewis, who helped moderate an all candidates meeting on Wednesday.

"It does give voters some ammunition when candidates come to the door saying, 'How will you speak to my local concerns?"'

It is not unusual for a candidate to live in one riding and run for office in another. Former Progressive Conservative leader David Alward, for one, did it successfully in September. But it is unusual for all of the candidates to be from elsewhere.

In Saint John East, the Liberals are running Saint John Deputy Mayor Shelley Rinehart who lives on the other side of the city, in the riding of Saint John Lancaster.

People's Alliance candidate Arthur Watson lives one riding over, in Saint John Harbour.

The NDP is running Leader Dominc Cardy, who is from Fredericton, while Green Party candidate Sharon Murphy lives in Rothesay.

People want a member who knows their community, who is part of their community.- Glen Savoie, Tory candidate

The Progressive Conservative Party's Glen Savoie did represent part of Saint John East in the last legislature, but actually lives in the next door riding of Hampton. Still, Savoie claims he is the most local of the group and despite his own residency problem has been painting opponents as interlopers.

"People want a member who knows their community, who is part of their community," said Savoie.  "I was born in east Saint John and I work in east Saint John, I go to church in east Saint John, I teach kids karate in east Saint John."

But the Green Party's Murphy says she's the real insider among outsiders because she has worked hardest on air quality problems in the heavy industrial area of the riding and also works daily in the community at her family-owned business.

"There are shades of grey," Murphy says of who is connected to the riding and who isn't. "For some people who are parachuted in from far away, they have no idea what's going on here and it's a bit self-serving really."

That's a shot at the NDP's Cardy, who has come the furthest distance to run in the byelection after losing his bid for a seat in Fredericton in September. Cardy's response is he's the only one in the group willing to live among the locals if he wins.

"To represent a riding, an MLA should live in it," said Cardy in a none-too-subtle criticism of everyone else's home address. "My wife Margot and I will move to Saint John East before the end of November."

The NDP and Liberals have been using the same campaign slogan — promising their candidate will be "a strong voice for Saint John East," with the Liberal effort emphasizing Shelley Rinehart grew up in the riding and her parents still live there.

"Shelley's roots are in Saint John East," her official party biography states.

Elections NB says although none of the candidates live in the riding, provincial election law allows all five, their spouses and any adult children living at home, to vote in the byelection.