Pie Palace

David Chernushenko has resigned as Senior Deputy to the Leader, and as candidate for Ottawa-Centre. For those of you who don’t know, David Chernushenko has run in this riding twice, providing steady improvements in our portion of the popular vote. He was on board when the Green Party went from kooky fringe party to a quasi-accepted member of the political mainstream.

After losing the Green Party leadership race last summer, the new party leader, Elizabeth May invited him to stand as “senior deputy to the leader,” a paid position that would allow him to continue to make the Green Party an attractive option for Canadian voters. We’re eight months on, and David has stepped down.

I’m choosing my words very carefully at this point. David has done great things for the Green Party. I don’t know what precipitated his decision to resign. I’m fairly certain that he would have stuck around as long as he felt that he was able to help the Party.

In the interests of Party unity, I’m going to leave my assessment of David’s resignation at that.

But the most important question is this: what does this mean for Greens in Ottawa?

• Ottawa-Centre needs a new candidate.
• Ottawa-Centre, and other ridings need to start grooming star candidates. These folks have to be able to speak to citizens and media, in a manner that is both compelling, interesting, and attractive (Richard Warman, are you available?)
• Greens in Ottawa have to get off our butts to start attracting new voters, volunteers, members, and donors without having a star candidate around.

That’s the joy of grassroots activism: when it comes to picking up the slack, it’s up to the volunteers. We’re sorry to see you go David, and we hope you come back. But don’t expect us to wait up – the Party’s only going to grow while you’re gone.