Storm chaser thunders back into council race

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This article was published 06/09/2022 (1226 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

One of Brandon’s latest city council candidates says his top priority isn’t just to have affordable housing built in the city, but affordable housing that residents can afford to buy instead of renting.

Last Friday, the city’s latest list of council candidates showed Jeff Plas registered to run in Assiniboine Ward, which is being renamed Ward 1 for the election.

After no candidates had registered for the ward before last week, the addition of Plas and Kevin Chambers — formerly a Ward 10 candidate — has turned the race to replace outgoing Coun. Jeff Fawcett, now a mayoral candidate, into a contested one.

If Plas’s name seems familiar, that’s because he came in second to Fawcett in the ward in the 2018 municipal election, receiving 118 votes to Fawcett’s 751.

He’s also known through Westman Storm Chasers, a Facebook account dedicated to documenting notable weather events in the region that he runs with wife, Mandi Grayston. His day job is at Best Buy Homes, where he’s a home sales specialist.

In a phone interview Monday, Plas said that a year ago, he and his wife set out to buy a new home and found that nothing was available for below $250,000 that isn’t a “rat trap.”

“Right now, if you’re to rent a new unit, the rents are hundreds of dollars more than an average mortgage,” he said. “I was taking a look online this morning and the average rent is $1,500 or more, which is awful because how is a blue-collar family supposed to save money for a down payment and still pay their bills?”

If elected, he said he would push the city to build affordable housing that people will be able to purchase outright, that people feel safe and comfortable in. He said he thinks the city has done decent work to help build rental housing and is glad the city has hired a co-ordinator for those efforts, but more needs to be done.

He also wants to bring items to his ward that he said have failed to materialize.

“There’s so much stuff that was promised to us that hasn’t been developed over the last four years that we need someone to push for,” Plas said. “I think the North Hill’s getting forgotten.”

Those forgotten items, he said, include a water park in Winston Churchill Park, more frequent patrols from the Brandon Police Service and planned roundabouts for the intersections of Braecrest Drive and 18th Street as well as the intersection of Braecrest Drive and Knowlton Drive.

According to Plas, safety in the ward is such a concern for him that he’s scared to send his sons to their high school on the bus or walking to the Corral Centre. He also expressed concern that school zone speed limits in the ward are not being enforced, which could endanger pedestrians.

“They need to start enforcing safe school zones,” he said. “So many times … if you were to stop by a school zone when kids are around, how many people go blatantly through there?”

Plas said he thinks the Brandon Police Service requesting funding to help handle calls that lie more on the social services side of things than policing is a good idea, but is concerned that higher levels of government are likely getting overwhelmed with similar requests. He believes there’s room for volunteer-driven grassroots efforts to assist in achieving the same goal.

When Plas was interviewed about his candidacy in 2018, he told the Sun of concerns about climate change and environmental impact. Since then, he said he believes the issue has “escalated severely.”

He said he’s not sure what can be done to prepare for extreme weather that can affect some areas with drought and others with an overabundance of water, but he thinks as a city the problem can be tackled through collaboration.

One advantage Plas said he has in the race is that unlike Chambers, he lives in the ward. Chambers told the Sun last week that he was switching his candidacy from Ward 10 (being renamed from Green Acres) to Ward 1 out of concern for the absence of candidates in Ward 1.

“I have the pulse on what’s happening in the neighbourhood. I talk to my neighbours,” he said. “I know 24 hours a day what’s happening there.”

Via text message, Chambers wrote that he applauded Plas for stepping up and throwing his hat in the ring.

“I don’t see not living in the ward as a disadvantage,” he wrote. “Many of the issues facing Brandon are city-wide. having grown up in Brandon, having raised a family and having an extensive career as an educator in our city, I know the issues that effect all of us. I have the skill set, experience in many of our community organizations and energy to be a very effective councillor for Ward 1/Assiniboine.”

Chambers also pointed out that there are current city councillors who don’t live in their wards.

As for the prospect of succeeding a three-term councillor in Fawcett, Plas said he has big shoes to fill, but there are a lot of projects left to accomplish. He said people in the ward have told him they feel neglected by the city because they’re north of the Assiniboine River.

Election day is Oct. 26.

» cslark@brandonsun.com

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