I am going to write about my father. My dad was a coach and manager of soccer, baseball, and softball teams, a founder of the Alberni Valley Juvenile Soccer Association, and was appointed as a three-term parks and recreation commissioner in Port Alberni. He fervently believed that all children and youth who wanted to play should have that opportunity.

If a family couldn’t afford soccer boots, he went out and found good used ones or a donation from a sporting goods store. He made sure everyone had a ride to the playing field. When a First Nations team that played in the league folded because they didn’t have enough players, he invited the remaining players to join his team. Once when we were playing scrub in our large front yard, a girl from the next block who had a reputation as a “toughie” asked if she could join in. My Dad said “Sure”. A week later when I was swimming at the nearby outdoor pool, she came up to me and asked if she could goof around in the pool with me. I learned that sometimes a cocky attitude can mask someone who just wants to be friends!

One of my father’s favourite movies was The Bad News Bears. In the final weeks of his life, it was one of two movies that he watched over and over again. His favourite line came near the end of the film, when the coach, along with a talented pitcher who is his girlfriend’s daughter, have managed to take their once-hapless team to the playoffs. Partway through the game, when his team looks like it might win, he starts putting in his substitutes. The second-stringers play their hearts out, but they lose by a couple of runs. When one of the parents yells at the coach for not keeping his best players in the game, he yells back, “On my team, everybody plays!”

And that line really does sum up what I learned from my father. Not just an interest in parks and recreation, but the principles of inclusiveness, fair play, and giving back to the community. That is why I am running again to be a parks commissioner in Vancouver.

When promises to replace an outdoor pool, or build a new community centre, or add a new park to a densifying neighbourhood, are broken, that is not fair play. When people who come to the park board or city council to express their concerns about changes to their neighbourhoods, or a lack of community amenities, are accused of being “NIMBYs” or “squeaky wheels”, that is not inclusiveness. When a top-down attempt to impose an inequitable one-size-fits-all joint operating agreement on community centre associations results in stagnating meetings and lawsuits, that is taking away from communities.

If I am elected as a parks commissioner, I will never forget that I am there not only to represent the people of Vancouver, but to be accountable to them, and to serve them. In my Vancouver, everybody plays!