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The Electors' Action Movement
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The Electors' Action Movement
The Electors' Action Movement (TEAM) was a centrist political party from 1968 to the mid-1980s at the municipal level in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. It fielded candidates for the office of mayor as well as for positions on the City Council, School Board, and Park Board. It was most successful in the 1970s when it held the majority of council seats from 1972 to 1976.
Retrospective accounts of TEAM have painted it as distinctly shifting civic governance in Vancouver when it gained power. Rod Mickleburgh of The Globe and Mail wrote in 2013 that TEAM's Art Phillips' four years as mayor "were pivotal in changing the face of Canada's third largest city, just when it seemed to be headed for pell-mell, American-style development that was ruining so many cities south of the border". May Brown, one of the original TEAM members who represented the party on council for ten years, told Pat Johnson of the Vancouver Courier in 1999 that "TEAM radically altered the face of city government".
The catalyst for the creation of TEAM was a proposal to build a freeway through historic Chinatown. At the time, power at City Hall was not in the hands of the elected mayor and aldermen, but in those of two appointed city commissioners. In 1959, one of the commissioners, chief planner Gerald Sutton-Brown, generated a city plan that former TEAM alderman and transportation engineer Setty Pendakur described as "completely automobile and freeway oriented".
While such freeways were being built in major cities throughout North America at that time, in Vancouver, opposition grew as the plans progressed. By the fourth quarter of 1967, a public hearing on how the route was chosen turned into one of the "wildest, most stormy meetings ever seen at city hall", wrote The Province's Bud Elsie. The nearly 500 people who attended, most of whom were opposed to freeways, turned it into a networking opportunity, "and, with their vest pocket diaries in hand, eagerly arranged to meet again for further discussion". Those further discussions led to the formation of a political movement that in just nine months would develop policies and attract candidates to run for every position in the next civic election.
TEAM came into being at a public meeting held at Vancouver's Grandview Community Centre on March 12, 1968. The founding president was Phillips, the head of a successful Vancouver investment firm; first and second vice-presidents were broadcasting executive Bill Bellman and labour leader Ed Lawson. Also on the founding executive committee were hotelier Frank Bernard; UBC history of medicine professor W. C. Gibson; Citizens' Housing Council president Alice Moore; head of UBC's department of community and regional planning; Peter Oberlander; UBC geography professor Walter Hardwick; businessman Charles Jordan-Knox; lawyer Haig Farris; and West Vancouver councillor Donald Lanskail.
In less than five years' time, TEAM would be in a position to shift the power balance at City Hall and implement the policies for which the electors had voted.
TEAM sought to be a moderate reform group committed to democratic principles, appealing to people of all political leanings. Its candidates would be tied to policies determined by the general membership. In contrast, the ruling Non-Partisan Association endorsed individuals, but not policies. Oberlander described TEAM as the first civic party to run on a platform and with a caucus on council, school board and park board that could coordinate coherent policy.
Within a month of the founding meeting, about 150 people met at the Waldorf Hotel to set up committees dealing with all aspects of civic life. There were four subcommittees and a special research committee, operating under an over-all policy committee headed by Oberlander and Farris. Oberlander stated, "We want to involve the maximum number of people in the evolution of our policies."
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The Electors' Action Movement
The Electors' Action Movement (TEAM) was a centrist political party from 1968 to the mid-1980s at the municipal level in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. It fielded candidates for the office of mayor as well as for positions on the City Council, School Board, and Park Board. It was most successful in the 1970s when it held the majority of council seats from 1972 to 1976.
Retrospective accounts of TEAM have painted it as distinctly shifting civic governance in Vancouver when it gained power. Rod Mickleburgh of The Globe and Mail wrote in 2013 that TEAM's Art Phillips' four years as mayor "were pivotal in changing the face of Canada's third largest city, just when it seemed to be headed for pell-mell, American-style development that was ruining so many cities south of the border". May Brown, one of the original TEAM members who represented the party on council for ten years, told Pat Johnson of the Vancouver Courier in 1999 that "TEAM radically altered the face of city government".
The catalyst for the creation of TEAM was a proposal to build a freeway through historic Chinatown. At the time, power at City Hall was not in the hands of the elected mayor and aldermen, but in those of two appointed city commissioners. In 1959, one of the commissioners, chief planner Gerald Sutton-Brown, generated a city plan that former TEAM alderman and transportation engineer Setty Pendakur described as "completely automobile and freeway oriented".
While such freeways were being built in major cities throughout North America at that time, in Vancouver, opposition grew as the plans progressed. By the fourth quarter of 1967, a public hearing on how the route was chosen turned into one of the "wildest, most stormy meetings ever seen at city hall", wrote The Province's Bud Elsie. The nearly 500 people who attended, most of whom were opposed to freeways, turned it into a networking opportunity, "and, with their vest pocket diaries in hand, eagerly arranged to meet again for further discussion". Those further discussions led to the formation of a political movement that in just nine months would develop policies and attract candidates to run for every position in the next civic election.
TEAM came into being at a public meeting held at Vancouver's Grandview Community Centre on March 12, 1968. The founding president was Phillips, the head of a successful Vancouver investment firm; first and second vice-presidents were broadcasting executive Bill Bellman and labour leader Ed Lawson. Also on the founding executive committee were hotelier Frank Bernard; UBC history of medicine professor W. C. Gibson; Citizens' Housing Council president Alice Moore; head of UBC's department of community and regional planning; Peter Oberlander; UBC geography professor Walter Hardwick; businessman Charles Jordan-Knox; lawyer Haig Farris; and West Vancouver councillor Donald Lanskail.
In less than five years' time, TEAM would be in a position to shift the power balance at City Hall and implement the policies for which the electors had voted.
TEAM sought to be a moderate reform group committed to democratic principles, appealing to people of all political leanings. Its candidates would be tied to policies determined by the general membership. In contrast, the ruling Non-Partisan Association endorsed individuals, but not policies. Oberlander described TEAM as the first civic party to run on a platform and with a caucus on council, school board and park board that could coordinate coherent policy.
Within a month of the founding meeting, about 150 people met at the Waldorf Hotel to set up committees dealing with all aspects of civic life. There were four subcommittees and a special research committee, operating under an over-all policy committee headed by Oberlander and Farris. Oberlander stated, "We want to involve the maximum number of people in the evolution of our policies."