Mike Harper

Wellington Ward Three

What do you do when you want to run for local council in a tight-knit community that is known for two things: not liking change and not changing their vote? You buy a great pair of walking shoes and you get to pounding the pavement. Real, actual face time goes a long way in this community, and Mike Harper hopes that the legwork he’s putting in will make a difference come October.

Harper is three weeks into his door-to-door campaign and figures he has knocked on about two-thirds of the residents’ doors in his ward. There are a few streets he has left to do, but he hopes to get the whole ward covered before the end of this month.

Harper graduated with a master’s degree in program and policy evaluation and went to work in the public sector. For a time, he wrote policies for research companies before working for the Attorney General evaluating policies, with native justice being one of his bigger files. After that, Harper went to work for a public opinion polling company and then got into focus groups. From there he spent close to 10 years in advertising as an account planner for global companies.

“My job would be to understand an opportunity that a company has and then to use research to develop the insight to find a way to connect with the consumer and either persuade them to do something, think something or feel something. That’s all advertising really is. I’ve spent most of my life in the persuasion business,”says Harper.

After that, Harper went out on his own as a focus group moderator, where the job is to get an understanding of the issues, get the insight, and help develop, test and refine strategies and advertising campaigns. Getting the to root of the issue is something that Harper has extensive training in, and something that could be considered very valuable around the horseshoe come fall.

Harper says he started thinking about running due to some surprising decisions made by current and past councils. Some of it related to infrastructure, some to compliance with secondary demands and heritage preservation. He was worried that not enough public consultation and strategic thinking were going into the decision-making process, and feels that those are areas he can be of help in. In fact, he’s built his career around it.

Harper and his wife, Heather Ford, have been residents of the County for 15 years. In that time, Harper has been busy volunteering in the community. He’s the treasurer of the Wellington Recreation Committee and has been involved with 99.3 County FM since its first day on the air. Harper has also worked on projects with the WDBA and hosted a classic car show in the village this past summer. The top three concerns that Harper has had expressed to him during his door-to-door campaign are affordable housing, the impact of tourism and especially the Airbnb on the community, and water pressure.

“If you were to pin me down to one issue it would be water. People are worried about water on three levels. Water rates across the board, water pressure and infrastructure. Issues like affordable housing can’t be addressed because we don’t have the water pressure to support new developments,” says Harper.

Harper adds that without the affordable housing, we won’t be able to attract or retain working families, which will weaken our community and go against everything that we are fighting for. It’s a complicated series of problems that are intertwined with one another.

For opportunities, Harper sees the new affordable housing net work as having great potential to addressing a Countywide problem. The water issue in Wellington needs some serious focus and Harper is hoping to form a highly qualified committee to tackle the issue. The tourism boom is also something that is mostly positive, but Harper feels it’s been oversold and problems have arisen, and arguably, the Airbnb issue has affected the liveability of Ward Three more than any other ward in the County. Regulations on short-term rentals, traffic calming measures and the management of Rotary Beach would be priorities for Harper if he is elected.