Former NDP candidate takes on Berry for Ward 7

A former provincial and federal NDP candidate is running for city council in Brandon.

Quentin Robinson is registered to run in Ward 7 in the Oct. 28 election against longtime councillor Shawn Berry.

“I am working for the health and well-being of the very place that I live. I have skin in the game,” Robinson said.

Ward 7 encompasses the city’s southwest corner, west of 26th Street and south of the CN rail line.

Robinson, who lives in the ward, represented the provincial NDP in Brandon West in 2023, losing to Progressive Conservative candidate Wayne Balcaen by 89 votes. Robinson also ran for the New Democrats federally in Brandon-Souris last year, finishing third in a three-person race behind winning Conservative candidate Grant Jackson and Ghazanfar Ali Tarar, who came in second for the Liberals.

Robinson is a member of the non-profit Sustainable Brandon, which advocates for a sustainable future and encourages leaders and Brandonites to address climate change.

While Berry has represented the ward since 2010, Robinson pointed out the city is going through a time of transition, with recent higher tax increases and water and sewer rates.

“Doing more of the same may not be the best thing now,” he said. “It may be a good thing now to have someone who has a new vision and will ask new questions and spark new conversations about what we really need to do to find our way through these changing times.”

Affordability and the environment are among his biggest concerns.

The city should move toward more electric vehicles as a way to save money, he said. Earlier this year, the city bought its first four electric vehicles at a cost of $234,080, according to city documents online. A city official in May said staff plan to “maximize” use of the vehicles in order to save fuel and, in turn, taxpayer money.

“There are a growing number of people in Brandon who are saying, ‘Hey, how can I get my hands on an electric vehicle?’” Robinson said. “I think the city should be saying that. And I will take that voice to table.

“I’ll say, ‘This is not an expense. This is an opportunity that we can be saving fuel costs, we can be saving maintenance costs. And that translates then to helping to keep the costs of running the city lower, which means the cost of tax increases lower.’”

Smarter development of homes in the city is another priority. While there has been a push for single-family homes in the city’s southwest, where Ward 7 is located, a lot of people simply need a place to live.

“If we address that need, and if we address that caringly and carefully with a proper kind of infill housing, that housing can be provided more affordably for people,” he said.

Robinson suggested those homes could be built along city transit bus routes, which makes life more affordable for people.

“It could be a big, big benefit for everybody,” he said.

His previous political experience is also handy, he said, as he has been door-knocking in previous campaigns and has heard many concerns from residents.

He said the responses he got from residents in the past sparked his interest in running at the municipal level.

» alambert@brandonsun.com