BC municipal elections (Oct 15 - today!)

[Hatman 🍁]

BC heads to the polls today to elect mayors, councils, park boards, school trustees and regional district directors.

The races in Vancouver and Surrey look to be the ones to watch.

In Vancouver, former NDP MP and current mayor Kennedy Stewart is in a tight race against businessman Ken Sim, who leads the centre-right ABC Vancouver party, a splinter from Vancouver's traditional centre-right party, the NPA. The other main candidates are: former NPA councillor Colleen Hardwick who leads TEAM for a livable Vancouver, another centre-right party that has gone hardcore NIMBY. They also have some support from NIMBY New Democrats like Bill Tieleman; Liberal Party strategist Mark Marissen (former husband of Christy Clark) of Progress Vancouver, a centrist YIMBY party that has got the endorsement of former PM Paul Martin; and the NPA's standard bearer Fred Harding, who ran in 2018 for the right wing Vancouver 1st party.

Polls are suggesting a tight race between Stewart and Sim, with Hardwick in a distant third.

Vancouver has a ridiculous plurality at-large voting system, so the council race will be anyone's guess. Last election the NPA won 5 of the council's 11 seats, while the remaining seats went to the Greens (3), the left wing COPE (1), the centre-left One City (1) and of course Kennedy Stewart, who was elected as an Independent. Since then, the NPA has collapsed, and only has one councillor left, with 3 joining Sim's ABC Vancouver party, and Hardwick who started TEAM.  Stewart has started his own party Forward Together.  All of those parties are running candidates for council, as is the moribund Vision Vancouver, a centre-left party that collapsed in 2018 due to the unpopularity of outgoing mayor Gregor Robertson. I'm guessing because there are more centre-left parties contesting that centre-right, they will split the vote, and there will be a right wing majority on council.

And in Surrey, BC's second largest city, there are five main candidates for mayor: Liberal MP Sukh Dhaliwal, former Liberal MP & MLA Gordie Hogg, former Liberal MLA and city councillor Brenda Locke, incumbent mayor Doug McCallum, and NDP MLA and former MP Jinny Sims. All 5 represent different political parties in the city. Brenda Locke is leading the polls right now, and is helped by McCallum's general unpopularity. McCallum leads the Safe Surrey Coallition, which holds 5 of the 9 council seats (but won 8/9 in 2018). Brenda Locke leads Surrey Connect, which holds 2 seats, and was elected as a member of McCallum's party. The other party on council is Surrey First, whose mayoral candidate is Gordie Hogg.

[CascadianIndy]

Mayoral prediction:
Sim (ABC) 34%
Stewart (Forward)32%
Hardwick (TEAM) 17%
Marissen (Progress)9%
Harding (NPA) 8%

Council:

1. Adrianne Carr (Green)
2. Christine Boyle (OneCity)
3. Sarah Kirby-Yung (ABC)
4. Jean Swanson (COPE)
5. Rebecca Bligh (ABC)
6. Lisa Dominato (ABC)
7. Peter Meiszner (ABC)
8. Ian Cromwell (OneCity)
9. Bill Tieleman (TEAM)
10. Dulcy Anderson (Forward)

[Hatman 🍁]

Polls are now closed.

[Hatman 🍁]

Brenda Locke has been narrowly elected as mayor of Surrey, defeating Doug McCallum.

[Hatman 🍁]

Ken Sim has been elected as mayor of Vancouver, defeating Kennedy Stewart.

[Oryxslayer]

This popped up in my timeline, is there a story?

https://twitter.com/j_mcelroy/status/1581507556614496256?s=20&t=lijCxCuwgslK...

[Hatman 🍁]

Apparently Young has been mayor since Langford became a city in 1992. The city is growing like gangbusters, so maybe the residents want things to slow down.

I'm reminded of the longstanding mayor of Milton, ON, another fast growing municipality who has been mayor since 1980. He might be facing a serious challenge this year too.

And then there's Hazel McCallion who was mayor of Mississauga for 36 years and never really faced much of a challenge for most of those years.

[Hatman 🍁]

Final result in Surrey:

Brenda Locke, Surrey Connect 28.1% (5 seats)
Doug McCallum, Safe Surrey Coalition: 27.3% (2 seats)
Gordie Hogg, Surrey First: 21.% (2 seats)

[Benjamin Frank]

While both Jinny Sims, Sukh Dhaliwal and Gordie Hogg all lost for Surrey Mayor, a number of former MLAs and MPs were elected including Brenda Locke for mayor in Surrey who was a B.C Liberal MLA from 2001-2005.

Jasbir Sandhu who was an NDP M.P from 2011-2015 ran on Suhk Dhaliwal's slate for council and was trounced even worse than Dhaliwal was.

Former Vancouver area Liberal MLA Kash Heed was elected to the Richmond City Council, and former Liberal M.P Dan Ruimy was elected Maple Ridge mayor. Interestingly, the defeated mayor of Maple Ridge was elected in 2018 on a hardline anti crime platform. So, as always, politics is never a destination it's always a incomplete journey.

Former MLA and Deputy Premier Rich Coleman badly lost in an attempt to become mayor of Langley Township. Despite the name, Langley Township has a much larger population than the city of Langley with a population of over 100,000. Eric Woodward, a city councilor and prominent businessperson who was briefly the NDP candidate in the riding for the 2020 provincial election before stepping down handily won the mayoralty.

Also in Langley Township, Kim Richter who previously ran for the NDP but has since run a couple times for the Federal Liberals was reelected and Steve Ferguson who was first elected in 1988 and ran for the provincial Liberals in 1986 was reelected.

Sadie Hunter who was the NDP provincial candidate in the 2020 election and, I believe, narrowly lost to Liberal incumbent Peter Milobar lost running for mayor in Kamloops to some, apparently populist newcomer, but former NDP provincial candidate Nancy Bepple got back on city council in Kamloops.

The NDP apparently now has the trifecta of 'big' city mayoralties on Vancouver Island, though I don't know if they're all officially New Democrats, with Victoria Green mayor Lisa Helps not running for reelection, the Saanich mayor going down to defeat, and Len Krog being easily reelected in Nanaimo.

However, former Nanaimo Green M.P Paul Manley topped the polls for council. Also, for Victoria city council, NDP MLA from 1996-2001, Steve Orcherton, lost the last spot for city council by 67 votes.

In Chilliwack anti gay bigot Barry Neufeld lost his seat on the Chilliwack school board, which isn't necessarily a surprise, but amazingly also in Chilliwack Teri Westerby is apparently the first transgender male to ever be elected to a school board in Canada.

Finally on the Vancouver Park Board, the Green-COPE majority coalition that tried to essentially turn Stanley Park into a park just for locals and bike riders by giving one of the two traffic lanes in the park over to bikers was trounced. One Green Park Commissioner was reelected due to ABC (or as I call them NPA 2.0) not running a full slate. The one Green Park Commissioner though ended up about 14,000 votes behind the 6th place ABC Park Commissioner. (47,000 votes to 33,000.)

As I said on another board, it's simply not true that Green Parties don't have special interest groups.

[Benjamin Frank]

Here on the Richmond B.C City Council, once again no incumbent was defeated, however there are two newcomers as a result of long time City Councilor, former MLA and basically a B.C legend Harold Steves retiring along with a center right city councilor Linda McPhail.

The two newcomers came in 7th and 8th (no wards) with, as I mentioned above Kash Heed getting elected in 8th place, and Laura Gillanders of the RITE slate coming in 7th. RITE is something of a provincial Conservative/Green coalition (some provincial Conservatives favor conservation) with Gillanders having run for the federal Green Party in 2021. Two other RITE city councilors were reelected, former B.C Conservative Carol Day and Green Michael Wolfe (who Harold Steves designated as his successor.)

The one RITE council candidate to not be elected was Jerome Dickey who received over 2,000 votes less than Gillanders (around 9,000 to 11,000) which is not a surprise since Dickey has expressed support for the 'extinction rebellion' protests. The Richmond Citizens Association, the local NDP affiliated party was reduced from two to zero with the retirement of Harold Steves and Kelly Greene leaving the council after getting elected as an MLA in 2020.  The biggest disappointment for me was that 2021 NDP federal nominee Jack Trovato ended up with 1,000 less votes than Jerome Dickey.  In 2014, 2018 and now 2022 RITE and the RCA have run in an informal coalition with both parties running four council candidates for the 8 person council.

The election of Kash Heed means that the Richmond city council, a majority minority city, now has three racialized city councilors.

For the first time RITE ran a candidate for mayor, but he lost to 21 year incumbent Malcolm Brodie by about 40% (66-26%)

2017 provincial NDP nominee Chak Au topped the polls for city council, but he's been all over the map politically.

[Benjamin Frank]

Two term Quesnel mayor (in the Cariboo) and former NDP (and independent) MLA Bob Simpson lost reelection.  Apparently it was Carole James removing Bob Simpson from caucus that led to the caucus revolt that ultimately had her step down as leader.

Two time Cariboo NDP provincial nominee, Scott Elliott, though topped the polls in Quesnel.

Former Liberal MLA and, Social Credit candidate, Donna Barnett topped the polls in 100 Mile House in the Cariboo.

2020 NDP provincial nominee Joan Atkinson was reelected mayor of Mackenzie.

2021 Federal Liberal nominee Garth Frizzell was reelected to Prince George city Council.

Current B.C Conservative Party leader Trevor Bolin was reelected to Fort St. John city council topping the polls.

2019 and 2021 Skeena-Bulkley Valley Conservative nominee, Claire Rattee, was defeated for reelection to Kitimat City Council (or was defeated in 2018 and lost again.)

2019 and 2021 South Okanagan-West Kootenay federal Conservative nominee Helena Konanz was reelected to Penticton City Council.

2021 North Okanagan-Shuswap federal NDP nominee came in a distant third for Vernon mayor.

Retired Conservative M.P Ron Cannon was elected to Kelowna city council, topping the polls.

2020 provincial NDP nominee in Penticton and former Summerland Mayor, Toni Boot, was badly defeated trying to get on Summerland city council.

2020 Columbia River-Revelstoke NDP nominee, Nicole Cherlet was badly defeated for mayor of Revelstoke.

2017 and 2020 Shuswap NDP nominee Sylvia Lindgren was reelected to Salmon Arm city council.

This is the result for the Castlegar mayoralty:
Maria McFaddin 920
Lawrence Chernoff 915

which proves that every 5 votes count.

However, this is the mayoral result in Canal Flats
Mark Doherty 158
Doug McCutcheon 158

Former NDP provincial nominee Norma Blissett was reelected to Cranbrook city council while former Cranbroook mayor and Kootenay-Columbia NDP M.P, Wayne Stetski was elected to Cranbrook city council.

Kind of crazy 2017 Columbia River-Revelstoke NDP nominee and former Invermere mayor Gerry Taft was reelected to Invermere city council by acclamation.

Former B.C Liberal MLA for Abbotsford-Mission, Simon Gibson, who was defeated in 2020 was elected to Abbotsford city council.

Former B.C Liberal MLA Richard T Lee was elected to Burnaby city council. Former NDP MLA Pietro Calendino was reelected to Burnaby city council as was former Green Party nominee and well known punk musician Joe Keithley.

2021 Federal Liberal nominee and Port Moody city councilor Zoe Royer lost election to Coquitlam city council.

2021 Pitt Meadows-Maple Ridge Federal Liberal nominee, Ahmed Yousef, was reelected to Maple Ridge city council.

Former NDP MLA and incumbent New Westminster city councilor, Chuck Puchmayr, lost for New Westminster mayor in an independent bid against official civic New Democrat mayoral nominee Patrick Johnstone.

Former NDP nominee and prominent lawyer Jim Hanson was reelected to North Vancouver District council.

Former federal Liberal M.P and former North Vancouver District mayor, Don Bell, was reelected to City of North Vancouver (Lonsdale) council.

2019 Federal NDP nominee in Nanaimo Zeni Maartman lost reelection to Nanaimo city council.

2020 Saanich North and the Islands nominee Zeb King was reelected to Central Saanich city council.

2019 and 2021 Federal Liberal nominee in Esquimalt-Saanich-Sooke was elected mayor of Colwood.

2020 B.C Liberal nominee in Oak Bay-Gordon Head, Roxanne Helme, lost election to Oak Bay city council.

Former B.C Liberal MLA Susan Brice was reelected to Saanich city council.

[The Right Honourable Martin Brian Mulroney PC CC GOQ]

I expected Sim to win, but this is a huge landslide for a non-incumbent in a multi-candidate race, let alone for a centre-right candidate in a city that overwhelmingly votes for the left. Although as we all know, municipal politics in Canada doesn't operate on the same political spectrum as federal or provincial, hence why Edmonton's mayor is a former Liberal cabinet minister and Toronto's mayor is a former PCPO leader. Still, this is a massive vote-of-no-confidence for Kennedy Stewart's approach to crime and public safety.

[Benjamin Frank]

Kennedy Stewart losing in Vancouver and Doug McCallum losing in Surrey were not unique. These are the incumbent mayors who went down to defeat:

1.Bob Simpson, Quesnel
2.Walter Cobb, Williams Lake
3.Gary Foster, Northern Rockies
4.Lorraine Michetti, Pouce Coupe
5.Olsen Kris, Daajing Glids
6.Bob Motion, Fort St. James
7.Greg McCune, Enderby
8.Colin Basran, Kelowna
9.Cindy Fortin, Peachland
10.John Vassilaki, Penticton
11.Santo Talarico, Cache Creek
12.Susan Swan, Clinton
13.Terry Rysz, Sicamous
14.Linda Brown, Merritt
15.Barry Noll, Greenwood
16.Martin Fromme, Midway
17.John Dooley, Nelson
18.Lisa Pasin, Trail
19.Lee Pratt, Cranbrook
20.Ange Qualizza, Fernie
21.Val van den Broek, Langley (City)
22.Ron Mclaughlin, Lions Bay
23.Mike Morden, Maple Ridge
24.Doug McCallum, Surrey
25.Kennedy Stewart, Vancouver
26.Mary-Ann Booth, West Vancouver
27.Darryl Walker, White Rock
28.Leslie Baird, Cumberland
29.Brad Unger, Gold River
30.Ed Mayne, Parksville
31.Gaby Wickstrom, Port McNeil
32.Brian Wiese, Qualicum Beach
33.Darnelda Siegers, Sechelt
34.Rob Martin, Colwood
35.Bob Day, Lake Cowichan
36.Stewart Young, Langford
37.Fred Haynes, Saanich
38.David Screech, View Royal

by my count, 108 mayors ran for reelection, so over 1/3 were defeated.

Of the 30 largest cities in British Columbia (population 30,000+) the mayors of Kelowna, Penticton, Langley (city), Maple Ridge, Surrey, Vancouver, Saanich and Langford all lost reelection.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Is it unusual for this many mayors to be defeated?

[Benjamin Frank]

I expected Sim to win, but this is a huge landslide for a non-incumbent in a multi-candidate race, let alone for a centre-right candidate in a city that overwhelmingly votes for the left. Although as we all know, municipal politics in Canada doesn't operate on the same political spectrum as federal or provincial, hence why Edmonton's mayor is a former Liberal cabinet minister and Toronto's mayor is a former PCPO leader. Still, this is a massive vote-of-no-confidence for Kennedy Stewart's approach to crime and public safety.

That's actually debatable as the reason.
1.As I just posted 38 of 108 mayors lost reelection.  This includes the 'tough on crime' mayor of Maple Ridge.
2.The polls, as kind of inaccurate as they were, had crime and public safety low on the list of concerns despite the police and the media sensationalising it.

[Benjamin Frank]

Is it unusual for this many mayors to be defeated?

I believe so.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Is it unusual for this many mayors to be defeated?

I believe so.

I guess there must be higher than normal voter dissatisfaction then. Not entirely sure what caused it though...What was registered in the polls?

[Benjamin Frank]

Is it unusual for this many mayors to be defeated?

I believe so.

I guess there must be higher than normal voter dissatisfaction then. Not entirely sure what caused it though...What was registered in the polls?

The usual things here and elsewhere probably, I think crime was a factor though not as big as the media makes it out to be, along with the high cost of living and housing. I think housing costs and lack of housing was the main factor, and not just in metro Vancouver, but also in the bigger cities in the Interior (Kelowna) and Vancouver Island (Langford and Saanich.)  Either along with that or conversly, the belief that growth/development has been too fast was a factor in Kelowna and Langford.

[Benjamin Frank]

I haven't looked at the school boards or regional district results with one exception. On a more personal matter, a person I went to grade school with and a prominent organic farmer here in B.C, Arzeena Hamir, lost reelection after two terms on the Comox Valley regional district for the Lazo North electoral area by 766-743.  If Comox NDP MLA Ronna Rae Leonard doesn't run for reelection I hope Arzeena Hamir considers going for the NDP nomination, though she isn't all that much of a partisan and also has connections to the Green Party.

And, my college english instructor Pamela Swanigan lost election to the Delta city council as the centre right 'Achieving for Delta' slate swept all the council seats.

I've known 2 other instructors who ran for or held office. One was from way back when I first went to college in the 1990s. He was a history instructor and a fairly prominent environmentalist and I can't remember where he lived. The other was my first year macro economics instructor, Nancy Clegg, who ran twice for the NDP federally in Surrey.

My first year micro economics instructor, Nils Veldhuis (who was my favorite instructor) never ran for political office, but has held senior positions with the Fraser Institute and is currently its President. Even in class, he'd joke about being part of the 'Dark Side' in economics and some called him Darth Vader.

[jaichind]

It seems to me that the scale of Ken Sim's victory in  Vancouver is much larger than expected.  Is that right?  If so is that not a harbinger for the next BC general election and federal election?

[Benjamin Frank]

It seems to me that the scale of Ken Sim's victory in  Vancouver is much larger than expected.  Is that right?  If so is that not a harbinger for the next BC general election and federal election?

Hard to say provincially, I think clearly not federally. Looking at the polls, I think what happened is that especially Colleen Hardwick ended up with a lot less votes than the polls showed she would get and her support in the polls ended up entirely going to Ken Sim. Kennedy Stewart's 29% was roughly where the polling had him.

I don't know if Sim ran as a social liberal, but he started off his victory speech with a 'woke' noting of how he was the first non-white mayor of Vancouver, and then listed all the previous East Asian Vancouver elected office holders. So, if anything, Ken Sim and many of his supporters are probably happily Federal Liberals.

Vancouver itself has a rather interesting history in municipal politics, as it hasn't been until much more recently (until now) some left wing city like Seattle, Portland or San Francisco supposedly are.

The media mentioned how Kennedy Stewart was the first incumbent Vancouver mayor to be defeated in an election in 42 years. That's true, but the wording is very precise.

First though, in 1980, then city councilor Mike Harcourt, who went on to become Premier, defeated incumbent mayor Jack Volrich. Volrich and Harcourt were elected for the same slate initially (TEAM - The Electors Action Movement) in the 1970s, as a reformist movement that ousted hard right wing mayor Tom Campbell (AKA Tom Terrific.)

As an example of Campbell's right wing politics. When Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau imposed the War Measures Act all across Canada in 1970 to deal with the FLQ crisis in Quebec, Campbell used the provisions in the act to crack down on hippies in Vancouver, who were annoying to some people, but harmless.

However, Jack Volrich steadily drifted to the right, and Harcourt defeated him running as an independent. He served as mayor for 6 years and then left to run provincially, replaced by centre right NPA mayoral candidate Gordon Campbell (who also went on to become Premier) who was mayor from 1986-1993, when he left after winning the B.C Liberal leadership. He was replaced by NPA mayoral candidate Phillip Owen who was mayor from 1993-2002.

For those entire 16 years, the center right NPA had a majority on council. I think in hindsight part of this was because the center left was dominated by the left wing party COPE, which was more a collection of activists than a potential governing coalition.

The NDP in this time twice ran a Vancouver Civic NDP, but it seems that concerns that this party would take its orders from the provincial party turned many people away from voting for it.

Even the name COPE is an indication of its problems. Vision Vancouver, for instance, wanted a vision for Vancouver, TEAM wanted to be the team for Vancouver. COPE hoped that Vancouverites could cope.  Beyond that, COPE stood for at that time, The Committee of Progressive Electors, which has eerie similarities to Soviet block era communism. (The Party has since rebranded itself as the Coalition of Progressive Electors.)

Anyway, in 2002, mayor Phillip Owen pulled together an impressive coaltion of Vancouver citizens, from the police to drug users, over the four pillar strategy to drug 'harm reduction' and for his thanks, lost renomination to NPA city councilor Jennifer Clark in which only party executives chose the candidate - and Clark had taken over the party executive.

Annoyed by Owen's loss, Vancouver coroner Larry Campbell announced his own run for mayor in league with COPE though he ran as an independent, and for the first (and last) time, COPE won a majority on council.

However, as happens with the left, the COPE majority fell apart due to splits between the moderates and the 'progressives' and the party split into Vision Vancouver and COPE for the 2005 election (from 1990 to 2014 council terms were three years, before that they were two years, since 2014, they've been four years.)  The NPA took back a 6-5 majority including city councilor Sam Sullivan elected as mayor. I believe 4 of the five non NPA were Vision Vancouver with one COPE member who later joined Vision Vancouver.

In 2008, Sam Sullivan lost renomination after a single term to "Business in Vancouver" newspaper publisher Peter Ladner in an open nomination meeting in which about 2,000 people voted. Meanwhile Vision Vancouver nominated NDP MLA Gregor Robertson to run for mayor. So, this non affiliated Vision Vancouver basically became the municipal NDP with COPE relegated  to the sidelines.

Roberson and Vision remained in the majority, though with decreasing majorities in 2011 and 2014.

So, you could argue that the NPA was in power municipally when the NDP was in power provincially from 1991-2001 (though the NPA came back into power in 1986) and you could argue the left/center left took power in Vancouver when the center right B.C Liberals were in government from 2001-2017, or you could say that it was due more to the municipal politics I outlined above.

Finally, although Ken Sim and the majority belong to a party called ABC, what happened was the NPA executive was taken over after the 2018 municipal elections by some hard right wing group that (allegedly) has similarities to QAnon types. So, rather than try to take back the NPA, Ken Sim and most of the civic elected NPA members chose to start this new party ABC. That's why I refer to ABC as NPA 2.0.

And, keep in mind that Vancouver only has about 13% of British Columbia's population. As I've mentioned twice now, in Maple Ridge (a city of over 90,000 people), the hard line anti crime mayor lost to former Federal Liberal M.P Dan Ruimy.

So, while the clear trend was anti incumbent, the reasons, if any, seem to be all over the map based on the left/right spectrum. Of course, as has been the case for not too long now, the center/left parties across B.C mostly ran as 'pro developer' (though 'the right kind of development') and the center right/right wing parties mostly ran as anti development NIMBYs.

[The Right Honourable Martin Brian Mulroney PC CC GOQ]

It seems to me that the scale of Ken Sim's victory in  Vancouver is much larger than expected.  Is that right?  If so is that not a harbinger for the next BC general election and federal election?

As a general rule of thumb, municipal elections in Canada aren't indicative of federal and provincial trends. It may still be good news for the BC Liberals and federal Conservatives if they can capitalize on the "anti-establishment" mood of Vancouverites, but that has less to do with ideology and more to do with a general feeling of malaise.

But yes, Ken Sim's victory is larger than expected. Polls were tight (the last one literally had Sim and Kennedy tied), and from my reading, the media agreed with the consensus that it would be a close one (although the media has a clear incentive to push the narrative of a close race, so that's not always the best indicator)

[Benjamin Frank]

It seems to me that the scale of Ken Sim's victory in  Vancouver is much larger than expected.  Is that right?  If so is that not a harbinger for the next BC general election and federal election?

As a general rule of thumb, municipal elections in Canada aren't indicative of federal and provincial trends. It may still be good news for the BC Liberals and federal Conservatives if they can capitalize on the "anti-establishment" mood of Vancouverites, but that has less to do with ideology and more to do with a general feeling of malaise.

But yes, Ken Sim's victory is larger than expected. Polls were tight (the last one literally had Sim and Kennedy tied), and from my reading, the media agreed with the consensus that it would be a close one (although the media has a clear incentive to push the narrative of a close race, so that's not always the best indicator)

Only the Researchco poll. The Mainstreet poll had Sim up 34-28 over Stewart with Hardwick at 18% and the Leger poll had Sim with 50% to 21% for Stewart and 21% for Hardwick. I believe all 3 polls showed somewhere around 40% undecided.  I think clearly what happened is the Hardwick supporters largely ended up voting for Ken Sim.

Of course, that's to do with the accuracy of the polls as the indicator of Ken Sim's win being larger than expected. It's very rare for a one term mayor of a big city in Canada to lose reelection, yet alone in a landslide. Even Denis Coderre in Montreal had a narrow loss after his single term (as did Rob Ford/Doug Ford.)

[Oryxslayer]

Is it unusual for this many mayors to be defeated?

I believe so.

I guess there must be higher than normal voter dissatisfaction then. Not entirely sure what caused it though...What was registered in the polls?

The usual things here and elsewhere probably, I think crime was a factor though not as big as the media makes it out to be, along with the high cost of living and housing. I think housing costs and lack of housing was the main factor, and not just in metro Vancouver, but also in the bigger cities in the Interior (Kelowna) and Vancouver Island (Langford and Saanich.)  Either along with that or conversly, the belief that growth/development has been too fast was a factor in Kelowna and Langford.

Full disclosure I know next to nothing about this type of local politics in a foreign province, so what I say next could be full BS.

Basically, the theory that I have seen going around is that there was an anti-incumbent mood cause nobody was perceived to be taking on the big problems of the time. its very likely that the local administrations do not have the tools to solve every one these big issues whatsoever, but they got the blame. If you take a step back, the politics of most Canadian and US cities right now can be distilled down to four issue 'categories.' These are: unequal poverty among minority groups who desire the dignity of integration, crime, housing or the lack of it (NIMBY vs YIMBY), and the occasional extremely local issue of a park or road or persons (LA...). All four are often linked in some fashion.

Basically, because the incumbents had a perception of not doing enough on every one of the four when it mattered, voters got angry with the whole local system and tried their best to throw out the bums whenever viable. Some causes of the issues, like inflation hurting lower-income groups more including minorities cannot be solved locally. Others, like housing, can be solved locally but not very fast so even movement on this front is unlikely to be rewarded quickly. In Vancouver, all four issue
 blocks were working in tandem in Sim's favor, and so he got elected by a large margin and got his allies elected with him.

[Hatman 🍁]

Final Vancouver results:

Ken Sim, ABC Vancouver: 51.0% (8 seats)
Kennedy Steward, Forward Together: 29.5% (0 seats)
Colleen Hardwick, TEAM: 10.0% (0 seats)

Parties that didn't run for mayor:
Green: 2 seats
OneCity: 1 seat

Park board:
ABC: 6 seats
Green: 1 seat

School trustee:
ABC: 5 seats
Green: 2 seats
OneCity: 1 seat
COPE: 1 seat