Oral history: Blizzard, COVID made Saskatoon election unforgettable

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Anyone who was around for the 2020 Saskatoon civic election knew it was going to be historic. But few could have imagined that a once-in-a-century global pandemic wasn’t the only thing that particular election day would be remembered for.

A storm hammered the city with freezing rain, strong winds and snow on Sunday, Nov. 8. It didn’t stop until 4 a.m. the next day, which coincided with civic election day. Already having to hold voting day under COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, the City of Saskatoon wound up initiating another historic first: delaying one of its civic elections.

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“It ranks up there as one of the strangest days of my entire life,” said Zach Jeffries, a Ward 10 city council candidate that year.

Let’s walk it back with an oral history of the wild week that was the 2020 election day in Saskatoon. (All quotes obtained first-hand unless noted. Some are edited or condensed for clarity. Titles are their position at the time.) …

‘COVID RESTRICTIONS MADE SOME THINGS TRICKY’

As was the case across most of the world, COVID-19 restrictions were in place in Saskatchewan, putting strict rules on face-to-face interactions, mask usage, gathering sizes, business operations and more.

Hilary Gough, Ward 2 city council candidate/incumbent: “The COVID-19 pandemic and associated restrictions definitely made the election feel strange.”

Bev Dubois, Ward 9 city council candidate/incumbent: “It made it feel quite strange and surreal.”

Rob Norris, mayoral candidate (Saskatoon StarPhoenix; Nov. 9, 2020): “You can remember that opening day at The Cave as I fretted about the number of people we had around.”

Sarina Gersher, Ward 8 city council candidate/incumbent: “It was a challenging election due to some folks not feeling comfortable physically voting during the early days of COVID-19 or to connect on the doorstep while door knocking.”

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Charlie Clark, mayoral candidate/incumbent: “The combination of the COVID-19 restrictions and the snowstorm made it all very surreal.”

Zach Jeffries, Ward 10 city council candidate/incumbent: “It already felt odd and different because of COVID. It wasn’t that weird on the voter contact side. We were going door to door and having conversations. We stayed outside, made sure we were doing the distancing, the things that were recommended at that time. The thing that felt strange was not being able to have an event, a gathering, town hall meeting, debate.”

Hilary Gough: “It was hard to know what people would be comfortable with, and also what precautions above the restrictions to take. It got more comfortable as we went on.”

Mairin Loewen, Ward 7 city council candidate/incumbent: “The COVID restrictions made some things tricky — normal campaign features like events, in-person debates, and visiting retirement homes were off the table — but in most ways it felt surprisingly normal because we could still door knock, flyer, and phone.”

David Kirton, Ward 3 city council candidate: “At first, knocking on doors was awkward. We were wearing masks. But after just a few days we realized that wasn’t necessary since we backed away a fair distance after knocking.”

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Sarina Gersher: “Furthermore, with the provincial election in close proximity to the municipal, it was extra challenging to share information and capture people’s attention.”

Alex MacPherson, StarPhoenix city hall beat reporter: “We’d had some experience covering the provincial election a couple of weeks earlier, so we knew it would be different, but not impossible to cover. The big difference was that instead of a room packed with volunteers and supporters, the press conference would be a handful of people standing 10 feet apart from each other in a field somewhere. Less exciting visually, maybe.”

Hilary Gough: “Giving people rides to the polling station was also quite different. Some of my volunteers partitioned off their vehicle with plastic to create a separation between the front seats and back passenger seats. We provided masks and hand sanitizer as well.”

‘NO SNOW DAYS FOR ELECTIONS’

David Kirton: “The day before, we were delivering the final get-out-the-vote pamphlets. In the morning it was OK. Windy in the afternoon. By 5 p.m., heavy snow and wind. We couldn’t see the steps and it became too slippery to walk.”

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Zach Jeffries: “We knew the night before and day before that the snow was coming and falling. That this is going to be a challenge.”

Alex MacPherson: “Everyone knew there was a big storm coming, but what I remember most is waking up that morning and just marvelling at how much snow came down.”

Approximately 35 to 40 centimetres, or roughly a foot, of snow fell on Saskatoon by the time voters woke up that Monday morning. Wind gusts created unfathomable drifts. Most roads and sidewalks were impassable. Still, the thought of anything other than status quo when it came to voting was not originally considered.

Jeff O’Brien, City of Saskatoon archivist (Saskatoon StarPhoenix; Nov. 9, 2020): “I did some poking around, on the assumption that the only thing that would delay (an election) would be a major blizzard, and there were election-day blizzards in 1947, 1948 and 1951 … In any case, the elections were held as planned in those years.”

Saskatoon StarPhoenix; Dec. 8, 1948: “The weatherman — no respecter of democracy — saved up a particularly icy blizzard to hurl into the faces of citizens trudging their way to the polls this morning.” (Approximately 9,000 people, or 26 per cent of eligible voters, cast ballots that day, the lowest turnout for a municipal election to that point.)

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Jeff Jorgenson, City of Saskatoon manager (early-morning, Nov. 9, 2020): “There’s no snow days for elections. The election must continue.”

Mairin Loewen: “Shovelling was delegated to my spouse that day.”

Sarina Gersher: “Oh gosh, I think my husband was shovelling for an hour or two and then our neighbour came with a snow blower to help us. They ended up snow blowing lots of neighbours’ homes. I was out on foot in my neighbourhood reminding folks to vote during that time.”

Zach Jeffries: “It felt like a good neighbourhood moment. Sunny morning. Bunch of us out there with snowblowers and shovels, out there for hours.”

David Kirton: “On the original election day, I spent five hours in the morning snow-blowing around the neighbourhood. I’ve got a pretty good-sized snow blower, but at one house the snow was covering the top of the door along a long driveway.”

Bev Dubois: “We all stuck together to make the best of a situation we could not control.”

Charlie Clark: “I borrowed a four-wheel drive SUV from a neighbour to get around and help voters get to the polls. It was a good distraction from the stress to be rally driving through that deep snow, and occasionally pushing others out along the way. I didn’t get stuck, which I felt pretty proud of, too.”

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Jeff Jorgenson (Saskatoon StarPhoenix, Nov. 9, 2020): “The city was littered, I would say, with small cars — with cars of any size — and small SUVs who thought that they could navigate blizzard conditions (Sunday) evening and through the night.”

Deputy police Chief Randy Huisman said the Saskatoon Police Service received 311 calls between 8 a.m. on Nov. 8 and noon on election day, the majority of which were about stranded motorists. Police responded with SUVs, 4x4s, UTV side-by-sides and snow machines.

A Facebook post shared Sunday night asked for “anyone with a snowmobile” to help hospital staff to and from Royal University, St. Paul’s and City hospitals. The RUH main switchboard was the phone number posted. Hours later, a grateful but urgent post read: “Switchboard is overwhelmed with calls of people trying to help-PLEASE STOP calling.”

Saskatoon fire Chief Morgan Hackl (CBC, Nov. 9, 2020): “A number of people were evacuated from vehicles, taken to their homes. Others were helped to be able to get their vehicle moving.”

Bev Dubois: “We have a large driveway and not enough room to put all the snow. I remember doing a live video for my socials while I was shovelling, to connect with folks. It was also very cold. Talking for the video, my lips felt like they were frozen, so I was talking funny.”

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Mairin Loewen: “As soon as we knew there was a big storm coming, we tried as much as possible to accelerate our (get out the vote) plans and get things out the day before, but by the time the sun went down we were already having trouble getting around, and we knew that next day was going to be a serious challenge.”

‘I RECALL A LOT OF UNCERTAINTY’

A large number of polling stations did not open as scheduled at 8 a.m. By noon, 64 out of 65 stations were operating — but chaos had already ensued. Many residents were telling the city, media and candidates that the snow made it impossible for them to get out and vote.

Provincial Government Relations Minister Lori Carr, late that morning, signed an order declaring civic returning officers would be permitted to postpone their elections to any date on or before Nov. 25. Voters and candidates in Saskatoon waited … and waited … and waited to hear from the civic decision makers.

Hilary Gough: “I recall a lot of uncertainty about what was going to be happening with voting. Would polling hours be extended for stations that couldn’t open on time? Would people be able to vote on another day?”

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Pat Lorje, long-time city councillor (Saskatoon StarPhoenix; Nov. 10, 2020): “This snowstorm, this blizzard, was not unforeseen.”

Zach Jeffries: “Can we extend voting hours? Can we have another election day? How is this going to work? We were on the edge of our seats. We didn’t know if we could extend hours. There were all of these unknowns.”

Bev Dubois: “My most vivid memory is the unknown and thinking this cannot be real. This is election day. We need to get this election done.”

Sarina Gersher: “The uncertainty of whether the election would be postponed or not is one of my most vivid memories. I also remember looping arms with folks to help them walk through the snow since many still made the trek to their polling station.”

Zach Jeffries: “This is unprecedented. It doesn’t make sense to just say, ‘It’s 8 p.m. and the polling stations are closed.’ ”

Hilary Gough: “We didn’t learn the plan until quite a few hours into the day, since the elections office needed guidance from the provincial ministry. There was a lot of uncertainty.”

Finally, around 4:50 p.m. on Monday, Nov. 9, 2020, the city announced that voting would be halted at 6:30 p.m., rather than continuing until 8 p.m. as originally planned. It would resume from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 13 at Shaw Centre, Lakewood Civic Centre, Lawson Civic Centre, Cosmo Civic Centre, and city hall.

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Scott Bastian, City of Saskatoon returning officer (Saskatoon StarPhoenix; Nov. 10, 2020): “Obviously an election in the city of Saskatoon is quite complex and requires a lot of moving parts, so we just wanted to make sure all of our pieces were in compliance with that order and logistics were organized.”

University of Saskatchewan political scientist Greg Poelzer, calling the delay in announcing the rescheduling “perplexing,” as it kept voters out on dangerous streets and forced campaigns to expend “precious” resources (Saskatoon StarPhoenix; Nov. 10, 2020): “That just is beyond comprehension.”

Mairin Loewen: “In the morning of that first election day, a volunteer and I were trying to deliver voting reminders and pull my supporters to go and vote. All of a sudden we saw someone cross-country skiing towards us, going right down the middle of the street. She recognized me, and said, ‘Oh, I’m just going to the polls to go vote for you!’ It felt incredibly surreal.”

Charlie Clark: “When the election was called off at 5 p.m., my wife Sarah was so demoralized and discouraged it wasn’t going to finally be over, and she was wet after tromping through deep snow to remind people to vote. I was out driving people to the polls and went and picked her up and found her on Idylwyld Drive in the dark. It was a rough moment.”

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Alex MacPherson: “My plan was to work from home for most of the afternoon and then go down to Charlie Clark’s campaign office downtown once the results started to come in … ultimately the postponement meant I didn’t have to go out that night. I felt for my colleagues who spent the day slogging around the city to write about the storm’s effects.”

With the help of every private contractor the city could hire on short notice, cleanup took eight days. Removing windrows and snow piles took weeks. According to a 2021 report for the city’s transportation committee, the blizzard cost the city $14 million. Over the winter of 2020-21, more than 90,000 truckloads of snow were hauled to snow management facilities; the previous record was around 35,000 truckloads in 2012.

Hilary Gough: “My most vivid memory is of talking on FaceTime to one of my brothers-in-law after he had trudged through waist-high snow on foot to the Westmount polling station — a neighbourhood over. He was very wet and very tired. He found it closed. If I recall correctly, that station was inaccessible for most of the day, and didn’t open until very late.”

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Mairin Loewen: “I was out trying to pull vote most of the day with volunteers, until we got word that voting was being suspended and then extended. Shout out to my Subaru Outback because we didn’t get stuck once.”

‘A PRETTY UNPLEASANT PURGATORY’

On the one hand, the delay gave all candidates a few extra days to reach out to voters, share campaign messaging and make one last push. On the other hand, it extended what is always a stressful experience for the candidates and those around them.

Charlie Clark: “Those last few days were, frankly, hell. It’s like running a full marathon and then finding out at the finish line you have to run another five miles.”

Hilary Gough: “Absolutely. And it was also exhausting since we had to regroup and repeat our efforts to get people out to vote on election day twice.”

Bev Dubois: “When you are in election/campaign mode, there is an end date with election day. Having to wait another four days was stressful but everyone was in the same boat, so to speak.”

Mairin Loewen: “It was a pretty unpleasant purgatory to be in, and of course as a council member, we had a lot of work to do to try to address the conditions around the city and manage the operational issues that the snow had created.”

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Zach Jeffries: “Of course it added nerves. I wasn’t sure how people were going to perceive our response, not only as a city but as a community, to the snow. Maybe everyone’s going to be really, really angry. Gets folks into a ‘throw-the-bums-out’ attitude. I was certainly on edge about that. We came to realize that people were understanding.”

David Kirton: “The rescheduled election day? It was my birthday. Nov. 13, just like this year.”

Mairin Loewen: “In a campaign, all your efforts and energies are driving towards that specific day, and you and your team and your family are looking forward to the relief of getting to that day and to the results, whatever they may be.”

Goran Saric, City of Saskatoon director of roadways and fleet support, on the city aiming to have roads cleared within 72 hours of a snow event (Saskatoon StarPhoenix, Nov. 10, 2020): “In an average winter storm, we will be pretty confident to say we would meet those timelines. With a storm like this one that resulted in 35-plus centimetres of snow with some drifts that are four feet high, that timeline might be extended.”

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Mairin Loewen: “So even though I knew it was the reasonable choice to allow an additional chance to vote, it was very hard to reenergize and refocus for those additional days until the second election day. Especially because of the conditions around the city, which made door knocking nearly impossible, there was really no playbook about what campaign work we should be doing.”

‘ANTICLIMACTIC BY COMPARISON’

A week that started with so much intensity and so many unknowns ended close to midnight on a quiet Friday’s eve. Between the aftermath of the snow and pandemic restrictions that would remain in place for months, campaign headquarters and city streets were largely empty. Perhaps to little surprise, voter turnout was 27.4 per cent, or 58,734 ballots cast. It was the lowest since the 2000 election, when 26.4 per cent of eligible voters cast a ballot.

Bev Dubois: “Family, friends, colleagues on city council, city administration — we all did the best we could for each other and the city.”

Sarina Gersher: “I was very grateful for our civic crews who worked very quickly to try and get people moving safely.”

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Mairin Loewen: “My team had so many amazing volunteers that managed to get people to the polls under truly wild conditions. It was an incredible team effort.”

Charlie Clark: “I am so grateful for my campaign manager Michelle Beveridge, and an amazing campaign team and volunteers for building a campaign that there was no instruction manual for — as well as a two-phased election day strategy.”

Alex MacPherson: “The rescheduled election day was anticlimactic by comparison. I remember interviewing Charlie Clark in the hall outside his campaign office after the results came in, and then filing my part of the story. It felt quite subdued compared to 2016. The pandemic made big celebrations difficult if not impossible, but I think everyone was utterly exhausted by that point and just wanted to go home.”

David Kirton: “The day after the election, my partner Erin and I were already out collecting signs because in that weather they would get lost fast. While in our truck, I got a call from Mayor Clark, congratulating me and welcoming me to council. And I could almost hear his smile as he told me: ‘You know this snow is your responsibility now.’”

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Zach Jeffries: “It was quiet and muted. But there was a sense of relief, that all the weird things — campaigning in a pandemic, voting in a blizzard — was going to be done. Life was going to go on and the sun was going to come up the next day.”

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