A hike with Green Party Leader Andrew Weaver sowed the seeds of Sonia Furstenau鈥檚 successful foray into provincial politics.
She says she had approached him about joining Shawnigan residents in their opposition to an old quarry in the area becoming a site for dumping contaminated soil, and that led to a hike to see the facility.
鈥淗e was standing there on the hike staring at this sloping quarry,鈥� Furstenau says. 鈥淗e said: 鈥楾his is crazy,鈥� and he just started to help, taking his water samples, writing his blog reports.鈥�
Not long after, Weaver suggested that Furstenau would be a good fit with the Green Party.
鈥淗e said: 鈥業鈥檓 going to be knocking on your door,鈥� and I said, 鈥楢ndrew, I鈥檓 busy, I鈥檝e got a little job to do here.鈥櫬犫��
But Furstenau eventually agreed. She became the Green candidate for the Cowichan Valley riding in September 2016.
Cobble Hill Holdings Ltd.鈥檚 permit for the soil site was cancelled five months later, touching off celebration by many residents.
Furstenau says she had only one choice in affiliating herself with a provincial party.
鈥淭he Greens are the only party I could have run for because of their principled stand on spending big money, on calling for a moratorium on fracking, on pipelines 鈥� the things that really matter to me,鈥� she says. 鈥淢y values are completely aligned with where the Greens stand on those things.鈥�
Furstenau, 46, is married to Blaise Salmon and is the mother of three children and two stepchildren, ranging in age from nine to 22. Family time is hugely important to her, she says.
鈥淚 love spending time with my family, my kids,鈥� she says.
鈥淭he campaign has been pretty intense, so it鈥檚 really a priority to me to ensure that I聽protect that family time now.鈥�
Furstenau also enjoys cycling, reading and knitting. 鈥淚 used to spin wool, but I haven鈥檛 had time for that in a long time.鈥�
Politics had not been on her radar before she began working against the soil site, Furstenau says.
鈥淚t wasn鈥檛 like I had my mind set on a political career, I never did. The circumstances that I found myself in inspired me to step up.鈥�
In 2014, she was elected as the local director with the Cowichan Valley Regional District.
Before serving with the CVRD, Furstenau was a teacher. She taught at Colquitz Middle School and Spectrum Community School, and was the social-justice chair for the Greater Victoria Teachers鈥� Association.
Furstenau, who has a master鈥檚 degree in history, went on to teach at Dwight School sa国际传媒 in Shawnigan, but decided to leave聽teaching to devote time to her CVRD duties.
She says it has been busy, with a typical work week at the CVRD about 60 hours.
Furstenau says her concern for environmental issues around Shawnigan stems from her upbringing on an acreage about an hour west of Edmonton.
鈥淚 grew up in nature, canoeing on the lake or hiking around.鈥�
Every summer from the time she was eight, she visited the Saanich Peninsula鈥檚 Ravenhill Herb Farm, which was owned by her aunt and uncle.
She moved to Victoria in 1990 and got involved with trail-building in the Walbran Valley.
鈥淔or the first time in my life, I went into an old-growth forest and that was it for me.鈥�
Furstenau says her run for provincial office had to be done a certain way, with an emphasis on a grassroots, people-oriented approach.
鈥淏eginning back in November, we started having what we called kitchen-table meetings,鈥� she says.
鈥淲e had dozens of those over the course of the campaign, where we actually sat down with people and listened to them.
鈥淐ertainly, my campaign, we didn鈥檛 participate in any negative campaigning at all.鈥�
One of Furstenau鈥檚 biggest admirers is Calvin Cook, president of the Shawnigan Residents Association and a close ally in the effort to fight the soil facility.
鈥淎 key thing about Sonia is her ability to bring people together,鈥� he says. 鈥淪he may not have had a lot of experience, particularly when she was getting into the CVRD in terms of the political realm, but she was able to attract people to her.鈥�
Furstenau emerged as a spokesperson for the soil-site battle and was always able to get her message across, Cook says.
鈥淓xcellent communicator and also very empathetic, and sometimes that can beat you up a little bit in politics,鈥� he says. 鈥淏ut I聽think she鈥檒l be a great representative for the Cowichan area.鈥�
Cook says he and Furstenau kept in close contact along the way and were able to accomplish a lot together.
鈥淭hat was one of our goals, just to present a very united community,鈥� he says. 鈥淚 think we were able to do that.鈥�
Furstenau says working co-operatively was the 鈥渟ecret sauce鈥� to getting things done in Shawnigan, and says she won鈥檛 be changing her approach at all as an MLA.
鈥淭he spirit that infused how I worked in Shawnigan, which was to bring everybody together across party lines and across jurisdictions, is exactly the spirit that I鈥檓 going to continue working in.鈥�
