Ahead of the Oct. 19 provincial election, Black Press conducted phone interviews with each of the four Kootenay Central candidates. Each interview included questions about the same general topics, which were not disclosed in advance. The candidates were also given the opportunity to speak on a bonus topic of their choice.
This interview is with independent candidate Corinne Mori.
Housing
Mori was asked about encampments and generally about housing supply.
Asked how the government should approach encampments of unhoused people, Mori said the camps exist because of provincial government harm reduction programs that she referred to as "provincial government drug trafficking."
The solution for encampments, she said, is to create "cheap little pods with a bed and a table and chair that can be locked up. And then there can be a central bathroom and kitchen area."
These would be used as shelters, she said, and when their residents show that they can "manage and participate in their own decisions, then we start moving them into housing."
Mori said too much regulation in the housing industry drives up costs and makes property owners less likely to want to develop their land. She cited over-regulated rural septic and water systems as examples.
Crown land should be made available for housing, she said, and the province should look into rent-to-own options and co-operatives.
Climate change
Mori was asked about wildfire control and about climate change in general.
Mori said governments need to reduce the amount of dry fuel in the forests while ensuring the health of the lumber sector, "which actually are the people that are producing the income to pay for all the things like health care and education."
She said governments need to create greater financial incentives for forest cleanup. She said there should be more selective logging and she recommended an ecological approach to fire mitigation and forest management.
"I've talked to ecologists, fire service, forest service, lumber sector," Mori added. "Every single one of these have decades of experience in this region, and they all say that they're not allowed at the table for the decision making. So that's the first priority."
It is generally accepted among forest professionals that the increase in the number and intensity of wildfires is due to human-caused climate change. Mori is not so sure.
"Climate change is a natural phenomenon that occurs as a part of the Earth's cyclical processes, influenced by both human activities and uncontrollable natural factors," she wrote in an email.
"Human interaction with nature not only involves stewardship and responsibility, but also necessitates that the allocation of public resources and interventions actually produce measurable results."
Health care
Mori was asked about nursing jobs and the opioid crisis.
Mori lost her nursing job during the COVID-19 pandemic after refusing to be vaccinated.
"I lost my job because I refused to co-operate with the government in violating our rights ... I was never anti-vax. I don't care if people want to take the vaccination, if people want to take birth control, if people want to do MAID, that is their choice."
She said the government took away her right to decide what happens to her own body. One of the reasons for her run for office, Mori said, is "to make sure that the government doesn't do that again."
Mori said the health care system is mismanaged to the point where large amounts of tax payer money are going to management and administration rather than patient care.
Prior to the pandemic, she said, B.C. had 2,000 unfilled nursing jobs, and now it has almost 6,000.
"We have the government and the BC Nurses Union going on about how they're going to enforce nurse-patient ratios, but they never talk about where they're actually getting the personnel."
She also criticized the financial arrangement between the province and the private sector owner of the still-under construction Nelson Health Campus, saying that large amounts of public money are funding the owner's infrastructure.
"At the same time, both hospitals were asking for money for new CT scans and they were having to transport patients back and forth to get CT scans."
Asked about the opioid crisis, from which about 2,500 people died province-wide in 2023, Mori said she supports a March report by the B.C. Auditor General that outlines significant flaws in the government's administration of safe supply and supervised consumption programs.
She said she would discontinue those programs and divert the funding to recovery and rehabilitation initiatives.
Bonus: Running as an independent
In this provincial election, Mori is one of 39 independent candidates.
"When you have an MLA that is tied to a party," she said, "their primary loyalty is to the party, to how the party tells them to vote."
Belonging to a party would be a compromise, Mori said.
"If the Conservatives are coming up with a policy that's fiscally responsible, I can side with them. If the Greens are coming up with a policy that wants to provide more drugs to our community, and our community says no, then I can side with [community]."
