Meet Your Candidate: Leslie Nolin

21 hours ago

8 min read

Village Resident seeks Council seat

Editor's Note: The Watershed has contacted all the current candidates running in the upcoming Municipal Election to give them the opportunity to answer a few questions. All the candidates were offered the same questions (apart from those which differ to reflect the experience of candidates who have not held office before). Responses have been edited for brevity, style and clarity.

Council Candidate Leslie Nolin. Submitted photo.

Can you tell our readers a little bit about yourself? How long have you lived in the Village? What's your favourite part of living here?

I'm a Registered Nurse with a speciality in critical care.

We moved here as a young family in 1997. It was remote, comparatively inexpensive, private and away from the hustle. We compared it to other cities in the Lower Mainland and there wasn’t another municipality with the same value as Lions Bay. Safe, tight-knit, a dynamic population of residents — and it was within nature. It is a place that required self-reliance and responsibility. It wasn’t Kits, it was wilder and we were hooked.

You have never held the position of Councillor before. What made you step forward to take the job on now?

I have participated in Lions Bay Council meetings when I felt strongly about a policy, concern or to add my voice to a group of concerned residents. I am particularly concerned about the lack of long-term planning previous Councils have made – think 90’s and 2000’s – we are in this financial conundrum because 15-20 years ago past councils did not have the courage and foresight to save for future expenditures. These past four years just gutted us and it cost us. So over the past four years, I have invested hundreds of hours of personal time into learning about our Village governance, and took it upon myself to dip my toe into municipal grant writing. Nai Jaffer, our former Works Manager and municipal grant-writer mentored me.

I stepped forward because I care deeply about our Village, nature and our combined sustainability. We have to find a balance between spending and planning for inevitable Village costs. That does not mean I am for development – because I am not. I am for meticulous financial responsibility, ending wasted spending, transparent communications around Village realities and ending the scare tactics currently being floated. I would like to be part of a genuine Lions Bay turn-around story – but it is going to take some financially astute individuals who have the capacity, backbones and plans to get this done.

How many Council meetings have you attended in person or online?

Zoom conferencing has made it much easier to attend meetings, participate and learn the facts around the current issues. Reddit and Facebook get a lot wrong. I wanted to learn first-hand what the facts are. Since 2020 I have probably attended more than most and less than some (somewhere over 50 but less and 100).

It's important to at least have been to a mountain, when you tell folks you want to mountain climb. Understanding the landscape of the four-year project you are about to embark on speaks a great deal.

Have you volunteered for a Village committee or event? What other volunteer experience do you have?

I volunteer just about every day — picking up garbage in our community on my walks, trimming over-grown blackberry bushes on our streets. Volunteerism is what this village is built on. Where would we be without the hard work of those silent volunteers? Not the braggers, the quiet ones. Those are the worker bees in our Village.

Formally, from 2010-2015 I was the Human Resources board member for a large performing arts festival in Vancouver and there I worked to put in place performance reviews for leadership, all with measurable outcomes.

In 2020, I whipped up a baking-for-trade during the first six months of Covid to bring a little sweetness to a time of great uncertainty. From 2022-2023 I was the co-director with Mary Brown for Emergency Social Services. In 2024 and 2025 we co-wrote and were awarded two Provincial grants for Lions Bay Emergency Support Services. Funding was needed to equip our community with updated emergency support services equipment, as well to hire a consultant to research and write Lions Bay’s 2026 Evacuation Plan – both now completed.

This is my third year as Board Treasurer of the Lions Bay Arts Council. My portfolio has been Adult Program chair (as well as operations manager, membership and website design and tech administrator). I have worked as a strong volunteer to effectively and efficiently increase membership, exposure and arts program offerings. Most recently (spring and summer) our society spearheaded the Public Art Call for the art that now adorns our beach park washroom. I also worked to facilitate our newest community offering, Lions Bay Village Choir: SING! Now in full swing here in our community – Tuesday evening at the Village Hall. It has been wonderful to contribute to their Board and to work to elevate their profile following the Covid shutdown.

Should you win your seat, what is the most important challenge facing the Village in the upcoming term?

Having an effective collaborative Council that is action-oriented, solution-focused and has a complement of skills, experience and a proven track record of financial management. I realize I don’t get to choose the team, and I do commit to working with those elected. It never escapes me that every decision made is about spending someone else’s hard earned money.

For effective management of our revenue and assets, our water security, financial stability and ageing infrastructure, taxes, deficit management — we need honest conversations, not sweet, fluffy ones that promise everything it fine. Profits and loss, balancing budgets, allocating funds for future expenditures etc.…. All the scary conversations are priority. We just need a team that is big on financial literacy. This whole Village does.

The most recent term of Council was divided to the point of dysfunction. Do you have any thoughts for a positive change?

Rebuilding trust is where I believe Council needs to start. Council is here to ensure the needs of our community are met. And it is up to Council to direct staff. Losing 76 years of municipal experience in four months simply gutted our community operationally. Most of our employees were hired at 2010-2015 salaries – think about that. So understanding the cause and effect of actions will be top of mind. Building trust and working to get us “unstuck” – if you will. I’d like to see Lions Bay be a B.C. turnaround story so we need seasoned experience, action-oriented critical thinkers who have been around long enough to understand the implications of decisions.

In the last term, Financial Officer Joe Chirkoff noted that the Village faces at least $10 million in pending infrastructure upgrades not covered by grant money. How would you prioritize these projects?

There are some life experiences that prepare one for unexpected future roles and I would have to say my experience with emergency triage might come in handy here. 'Need-to-haves' over 'want-to-haves' and a plan.

These recent numbers feel like scare tactics especially when pressed for specific reports and backup — these are delay tactics. I am watching Council meetings closely as certain Councillors are demanding facts and reports — with more excuses and delays. That is troublesome and telling.

I would also like to see actual cost reports on the Beach Park. Yes, its beautiful, but the cost of this mismanaged project is not lost on those of us looking at the cost instead of the art (funds donated by a citizen, and managed by Lions Bay Arts, with a five and half month turn-around before completion). Assessing the needs without hype will be a priority.

What strengths do you bring to the Council table?

I am an action-oriented individual who thrives on working strategically, planning for measurable outcomes and navigating the anticipated challenges. I am hard-wired to respond urgently to situations that are not actually urgent. (Emergency room PTSD perhaps). I was raised by educated proactive and independent parents and flanked by brothers. So, I am tough and I have thick skin. I have an entrepreneurial mind that simply cannot accept that “things can’t be done” I am frugal and have a dry sense of humour. I would prefer to laugh off stress than carry it or share it.

I am a curious individual — rarely afraid to ask questions and understand the “why" of situations.

The recent clear-cutting of a private property on Oceanview Road has prompted a petition and a public outcry. Would you support the creation of bylaws addressing tree-cutting, protection of riparian boundaries and steep slopes?

My response to this circumstance is to address the bylaw that allows for all trees cut down on a steep forested property with numerous residents below, and on another albeit small, water way. There is plenty of data out there on evolving best practises for managing land in steep terrain. The recent landslide that claimed the lives of two long-time residents is still visible and haunting as one drives north on the Sea to Sky. One can only ask – when is the next time? I’m not bashful about my position on safety. I am for addressing tree cutting – and let me be specific – I am all for limbing, dangerous tree removal, but I am not for clear-cutting anywhere. There is huge middle-ground there, and our bylaw needs to be specific and enforced.

Many residents along Mountain, Sunset and Bayview have expressed frustration with the vast increase in hiker vehicle parking and traffic. Suggestions have been made to offer alternate parking in the gravel pit or elsewhere on Crown land. How would you respond to resident concerns?

Since Covid, these upper streets are dealing with this 12 months of the year, as hiking has no season. I would like to champion that challenge as there is a solution to this problem. Lions Bay Avenue is resident-only and it has a parking lot for visitors — why are these two streets not the same? I would also like to return to an increase in parking fees and an increase in parking fines, especially on resident streets. Yes, we will be thrown some shade on Reddit, however Deep Cove had the courage to address their residents' concerns and they fixed their summer tourism parking problem there. We can do this too.

We just need fiscally-responsible problem solvers on Council to get this done.

The recent trial of public porta-potties positioned near the Village centre has produced calls of concern regarding smell and garbage from nearby homeowners. This is balanced against evidence that visitors are relieving themselves on our local streets. Do you have any thoughts to share?

My understanding from the Council meeting in July was that this was a temporary solution. Personally, I felt it met a need, however not well thought out. As a municipality we need to offer washrooms to the public but there were other places this should have been placed. Something as simple as a large sign that directs people to the brand new expensive beach washroom, or placing porta-potties near the Village Hall might been appropriate — lots of parking during the week and on weekends there.

What else would you like to share with residents today? Where can they reach you? Do you have a website where voters can read your platform online?

We need four years of a group of fiscally-prudent, fact-based doers and communicators to get us back on track. A Council that understands responsible spending. That’s the job. Cull the legal spending, demand facts, enforce bylaws. Managing your tax dollars and make them stretch. Preserve Lions Bay’s quaintness, safety and hospitality while ensuring all generations and all inhabitants of this mountain are a priority.

My website is LeslieNolin.ca and I can be reached at VoteLeslieNolin@gmail.com.