Vancouver’s governing civic party has revealed how it plans to select candidates for this October’s election for council, park board, and mayor.

Nominations open today (April 4), a media release states.

“Nominations will close in June, when [party] members will vote to select the candidates who will run as the Vision Vancouver team going into the fall campaign,” it reads. “The number of candidates Vision will run for council, park board and school board has yet to be determined.

“At this time, Vision is not formally opening a nomination process for the mayoral race,” the release adds.

In a twist, the release states that whoever Vision Vancouver decides to support for mayor does not necessarily need to be a member of the party.

“There has been a lot of talk about the need for Vancouver’s progressive parties to work together to keep the NPA out of office,” said Vision Vancouver co-chair Sheena Sargeant quoted in the media release. “With this in mind, we’re creating an opportunity to collaborate with other parties for an independent or partisan mayoral candidate to seek the support of our members.”

The release serves as a call out for prospective candidates.

“As a first step, Vision has invited all expressions of interest in the mayoral race by April 16,” it reads. “Anyone interested in seeking the Vision Vancouver endorsement should contact the party for a nomination packages.”

Mayor Gregor Robertson announced he was leaving civic politics last January. He was elected to run the city in 2008.

Today Vision Vancouver holds five seats on city council plus the mayor’s chair. But only two of those six politicians have said they intend to run for re-election this year. That’s Raymond Louie and Heather Deal.

The departures follow Vision making a weak showing in an October 2017 by-election that was held to fill a council seat after Vision’s Geoff Meggs left civic politics for a job in the B.C. premier’s office. Vision’s first-time candidate, Diego Cardona, came in fifth place.

Vancouver’s 2018 civic election is scheduled for October.