Two more longtime New Westminster school trustees won’t be seeking re-election in the upcoming election.
Trustees Casey Cook and James Janzen are the latest incumbents to announce they will be retiring from their positions on the school board effective Oct. 20, joining incumbent trustee Michael Ewen, who announced last week he was retiring after 39 years.
Both Cook and Janzen said they are ready to step aside and are excited about the new candidates who’ve stepped forward in the race this year.
“25 years is a long time, and I’m not getting any younger,” joked Janzen, who was first elected in 1990.
“It’s time to move on to other things, and we’ve got some great people running on the team so it seemed like a good time to pull the plug.”
Cook agreed.
“We have a certain shelf life, and there are other people stepping forward that I think are very capable. I’ve done 10 years and it’s time to move on,” Cook said.
Cook, who also served as a four-term city councillor, was elected to the school board in 2008. Since then he has seen the school district move from several years of financial uncertainty to a place of stability.
“The main thing that has happened, particularly in the last five years, I think that a lot of decision making has been taking place that I think has restored confidence from the community back into the school board,” Cook told the Record.
This new-found confidence is in part the result of the school board moving away from day-to-day operation of the district to focusing more on policies that directly benefit children, he added.
Initiatives like the district’s SOGI 123 and Sanctuary Schools policies are just two examples of important work the school board has undertaken over the past few years, according to Cook.
“New Westminster has been a leader in diversity and inclusion, and I think that that’s a real strength of the district,” he added.
One of Janzen’s proudest moments as a trustee was the night the school board passed its first LGBTQ inclusion policy, which began as an anti-homophobia policy in 2011.
“And the surprising thing is how little resistance or how little upset there was over that in New Westminster, which I think speaks well for our city,” he said.
While Janzen and Cook may not have always agreed at the board table, in reflection they both agree that the most important thing any trustee can do is listen and “be ready to compromise and accept other people’s point of view,” according to Cook.
And Janzen agreed.
“I’ll miss the give and take and the discussion at the board table, and actually realizing sometimes that other people had a good plan and maybe I should be listening,” Janzen said.
So what’s next for Cook and Janzen?
Cook’s plan is to focus on his roles in the senior-care sector. He is currently serving as president of the board at the George Derby Care Centre and as chair of Kiwanis Care Centre New Westminster.
Janzen, meanwhile, has plans to retire from his job with the Burnaby Public Library sometime in the next year. After that, he said he’ll be spending more time working in his yard, travelling with his wife, work on his cooking skills and maybe even take up piano.
