Candidates

Born and raised in Nanaimo, Jeff Annesley attended Wellington Secondary and Vancouver Island University, where he earned a BA in Creative Writing. He spent nearly a decade as a warehouse manager, is a published author who runs a small online publishing business, and has coached youth soccer for more than five years. He says he has regularly attended council and committee meetings for the past four years.

We have not found a primary-source published bio on this candidate.

Sandy Bartlett is a lawyer with more than 35 years of experience in courtroom, corporate, commercial, real estate and family law, and has been an employer in Nanaimo since 1990. He has lived in Nanaimo for 54 years. He was part of the successful effort to defeat the City's Alternative Approval Process (AAP) for the operations centre.

Ken Bennett has lived in Nanaimo for more than 29 years and is retired. He worked as a care aide in a Nanaimo group home for more than 16 years, and before that for nine years in a group home for youth in care. While working in the group home, he was elected to the Hospital Employees' Union Provincial Executive as a Provincial Trustee.

Marnie Boers was born and raised in Nanaimo and works as a registered nurse in the Emergency Department at Nanaimo Regional General Hospital. She has worked with local organizations that provide shelter and support services, and is a master's student in counselling and a mother of two.

Jackie Bolen moved to Nanaimo from the Lower Mainland a couple of years ago. A former teacher, she now works as an author, digital creator and consultant, and has held leadership roles in environmental organizations, community gardens, stratas and sports groups. She says attending the Cable Bay hearings motivated her to run.

Born in Germany, Brunie Brunie came to Canada as a refugee in 1948 and has worked as a ballroom dance teacher, a fashion designer and a real estate agent. Brunie has run as an independent for MP, MLA, city council and mayor, and describes playing a big role in saving the Parksville Flats estuary in 1992.

Mark Chandler was born in London, Ontario, and moved to the Nanaimo area in 2006. He has worked for more than 40 years in the food, hospitality, sales and distribution business, including founding Five Star Food Group. He served on Parksville City Council from 2018 to 2022 and has volunteered with RCMP community policing, Parksville Fire Rescue and Tour de Rock.

Paul Chapman has made delegations to City Council and campaigned to save Hamilton Marsh, including fundraising for its acquisition.

Malcolm Cooke has lived in Nanaimo for four years. He studied journalism at the University of Regina and was selected for The Democracy Fund Student Journalism Fellowship in 2022.

Andréa Coutu grew up in Nanaimo and attended VIU before finishing her degree at SFU; her family has lived in Nanaimo since the 1870s. She built a career in the tech sector, started her own business, completed an Executive MBA and has taught at SFU and UBC. During COVID she launched an entrepreneurial resiliency program for business owners.

We haven’t found a published platform yet.

Ryan Djakovic describes himself as a technologist, licensed realtor, developer and community advocate, with work spanning real estate, addictions and mental health advocacy, and civil planning. He is a father of four raising his family in Nanaimo.

A Nanaimo resident since 1984, Anne Marie Dryden worked for more than 35 years as a self-employed, independent financial advisor and holds CLU and CFP designations. She raised two children in Nanaimo as a single parent. She gave up her financial licence at the end of 2025 to run for mayor.

Hilary Eastmure moved to Nanaimo in 2013 to work as a radio reporter with 91.7 Coast FM, where she regularly covered City Council. She later worked as a caseworker in the local Member of Parliament's constituency office and as bookstore manager for Literacy Central Vancouver Island. Elected to council in 2022, she has chaired the Advisory Committee on Accessibility and Inclusiveness and co-chaired the Public Safety Committee.

Joe Figel holds a Bachelor of Management from the University of Lethbridge and a Financial Management Diploma from SAIT, and has more than a decade of corporate management experience. He works in two family businesses, in real estate and marketing, and is a director of the Brechin Hill Community Association. He took part in opposing the City's use of an Alternative Approval Process to borrow money.

Meg Fyfe Watkins grew up on Vancouver Island and has lived in Nanaimo for 12 years. In 2022 she founded Kind Society Yoga Collective, which became Nanaimo’s only non-profit community-focused yoga studio, after managing yoga studios in Toronto and Nanaimo and working in student life at the University of Toronto and UBC. She holds a general science degree from UBC and is a mother of two children in Nanaimo public schools.

Ben Geselbracht grew up in Nanaimo and was first elected to council in 2018. He studied biology and ecology, is a registered clinical counsellor with a master's degree, and in 2013 started a tree service company that became a worker-owned cooperative in 2022. This term he served as president of the Association of Vancouver Island and Coastal Communities.

Bryan Gordon is a retired RCMP Staff Sergeant who served in communities across B.C. for more than three and a half decades, finishing as Commander of West Coast Marine Services. He retired from the RCMP in 2009 and has lived in Nanaimo since 2001.

We haven’t found a published platform yet.

Patrick Gunville was raised on Vancouver Island and is a commercial real estate advisor with CBRE in Nanaimo, after starting his career in downtown Vancouver. He holds a Diploma in Legal Studies and a Bachelor of Arts in Criminology. He is immediate past president of the Nanaimo Executives Association and sits on the Regional District of Nanaimo’s Board of Variance and its liquid and solid waste plan monitoring committees.

Derek Hanna has lived in Nanaimo for more than 34 years. He holds a Bachelor of Applied Science in Mechanical Engineering and spent 16 years at the Harmac Pacific pulp mill, leading equipment and infrastructure projects.

Richard Harlow was born in Nanaimo and lost most of his sight in his early twenties, then built a life in the city as a painter and small business owner. He has served for six years on the City's accessibility and inclusion advisory committee and has been a CNIB ambassador since 2017.

Erin Hemmens moved from Halifax to Nanaimo in 2011, after a career start in women's health research. In Nanaimo she worked with local physicians on health access projects, including CanScreen, B.C.'s first virtual cancer-screening clinic. She was first elected to council in 2018 and also works as a coroner with the BC Coroners Service.

Steven Johns has lived in Nanaimo for 13 years and has run Red Shelf Decor, a downtown retail store, for seven years; before that he ran a financial planning practice in Nanaimo for six years. He is vice-chair of the Downtown Nanaimo Business Association and a board member of Nanaimo Crime Stoppers and the Nanaimo Arts Council. He holds a master's degree in international communications from Royal Roads University.

Leonard Krog was born in Nanaimo and raised in Coombs. He was first elected to the B.C. Legislature in 1991, served as the Official Opposition's justice spokesperson and as B.C. Government Caucus Chair, and resigned as MLA for Nanaimo when he was elected mayor in 2018. He has chaired the United Way for Nanaimo and was a director and president of the Mid-Island Consumer Services Co-operative.

Cameron Leckenby grew up in Nanaimo and graduated as valedictorian from John Barsby Community School before earning a bachelor's degree after attending VIU and UVic. He worked in unionized positions at BC Ferries and the Regional District of Nanaimo, and has worked in the constituency offices of two federal MPs and a B.C. MLA and cabinet minister.

Sarah Lovegrove is a registered nurse with emergency department experience and has been a university professor of nursing since 2022. She has chaired the Nanaimo Community Action Team on the toxic drug crisis and is vice-president of the Harm Reduction Nurses Association. She moved to Nanaimo in 2017.

Max MacKay was born and raised in Nanaimo and is a Status First Nations resident. He has worked in Nanaimo's hospitality industry for the past seven years and is a member of the Nanaimo Golf Club.

Paul Manly was born and raised on Vancouver Island and is the third generation of his family in the Nanaimo area. He previously served as the Member of Parliament for Nanaimo-Ladysmith and has worked as a filmmaker, local business owner and non-profit executive director. He returned to Nanaimo 25 years ago to raise his family.

We haven’t found a published platform yet.

Bill McKay has lived in Nanaimo for more than 20 years. Before entering politics he worked as a tugboat captain, then as manager of operations and personnel for the Ministry of Transportation and for Nanaimo Harbour Link Corp., and later managed SignAge, a local display business. He was first elected to council in 2011 and served as mayor from 2014 to 2018. He is vice-president of the Nanaimo Disability Resource Centre board and has held leadership roles with Royal Canadian Legion Branch 256.

Andrew Merilees's family has lived in Departure Bay since 1978. He served four terms on municipal council, including as mayor of Masset from 2011 to 2018, and spent eight years on the Vancouver Island Regional Library board. He has also run a small business.

Matthew Miller is a frontline healthcare professional based at Nanaimo Regional General Hospital. He is a director of the Health Sciences Association of BC, representing about 2,300 healthcare and social service workers on Vancouver Island.

Zaki Mohammed was born in Saudi Arabia, schooled in India and earned a B.A. in Hotel & Hospitality Management in Switzerland before coming to Canada for a dual MBA/MSc program through Vancouver Island University and the University of Hertfordshire. He has lived in Nanaimo for more than 10 years and is financial controller for the Tony Harris Group and a director of the Tom Harris Community Foundation. He is also a board director of the Central Vancouver Island Multicultural Society.

We have not found a primary-source published bio on this candidate.

Janice Perrino was President and CEO of the Nanaimo & District Hospital Foundation from 2016 until retiring in 2022, after leading hospital and cancer foundations in the Okanagan. She served two terms as a councillor and two terms as mayor of Summerland, B.C., before being elected to Nanaimo council in 2022.

We haven’t found a published platform yet.

Frank Pluta has lived and worked in Nanaimo for more than 20 years, with a career in business and working with the public. He previously served as a municipal councillor, a regional district director and a hospital board member in Northern B.C. He holds Bachelor of Science degrees in Accounting and Computer Science.

Austin Seng grew up in Harewood and has lived in Nanaimo for 35 years, the child of immigrant parents. After more than a decade in business development and management, Seng now owns and runs A. Seng & Co., a vintage general store and photography studio in downtown Nanaimo, and is involved in downtown revitalization efforts.

We haven’t found a published platform yet.

Ian Thorpe moved to Nanaimo in 1974 after graduating from the University of Victoria, and retired in 2010 after a 35-year career as a teacher and school administrator in Nanaimo. He has written "The Thorpe Report" sports column in the Nanaimo News Bulletin for more than 45 years. He is the longest-serving current councillor.

Paul Van Ryssel has lived in Nanaimo for much of his adult life. For decades he has worked with students, families, athletes and educators as a teacher, coach, mentor and advisor.

Angela Hope Waldick is originally from Lloydminster, Alberta, and raised two children in Nanaimo while working, going to school, building businesses and volunteering. She has served on committees and advisory groups and regularly attended Council meetings and open houses. She says her run grows out of twenty years of following how Nanaimo works, from reading reports to asking questions at public meetings.