Editor's note: Today is municipal election day across Ontario. In Ottawa, you can enter your address in this polling station finder to find out where you vote; the polls are open from 10 a.m until 8 p.m. You'll need to bring a piece of ID with you that has your street address on it; the list of acceptable ID types is here. From 8.00 until 9.00 this morning, Spacing Ottawa columnist Vicky Smallman will be teaming with Walter Robinson and host Alistair Steele to provide election day commentary on CBC Radio,  91.5 on your FM dial. Vicky and Walter will also be appearing on CBC TV from 9 to 10 in the evening, hosted by Lucy Van Oldenbarneveld. It's all over but the voting. It's all over but the voting. As I write this piece, I'm watching a documentary on the urban planning success that is Portland. Now there is a city with some vision - about the links between urban planning, sustainable growth, quality of life, and smart transportation. I think we need to give our councillors, our city staff, our mayor – whoever they are – permission to bring a little Portland thinking to Ottawa. They don't do it because they think we won't buy it. I've heard it time and time again when raising ideas: Hub and spoke? “People don't like to transfer”. Crosswalks with pedestrian signals? “People won't stop”. Segregated bike lanes? “Business won't go for it”. And so on. Meanwhile, we get mediocre development, a haphazard transit plan, a disregarded official plan, aging infrastructure, inadequate parks and recreation, overstretched social services, a divided council and an overworked city staff.

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600" caption="Calling frenzy - phone bots, circa 1914"][/caption] Today -- October 14 -- is the last advance poll before election. The pace is hopping! Debates, fundraisers, doorknocking, phone calls, coffee parties, community events – campaigns are working hard to generate momentum, solidify support and shift the undecided. They'll be encouraging volunteers and firm supporters to vote early, then starting to gear up for election day. As I write this, half of my twitter feed seems to have received an automated survey call from Larry O'Brien. Last night I got a similar call – not a survey but a plug for his latest campaign video. Ah, the campaign video. No one actually seems to be spending the cash to put them on TV these days, but you can get a lot of mileage by spreading links to video on social media. Or, in Larry's case, by getting lots of coverage in traditional media for blasting your opponent with an attack ad.

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500" caption="Meanwhile, has Larry O'Brien stumbled onto a key demographic?"][/caption] Someone asked me today when I was going to stop being so polite during my weekly municipal pundit gig on CBC's Ottawa Morning. I guess I have been pretty reserved in my election commentary so far. Although I believe I did refer to one campaign tactic as “lame” last week (that would be this, which sparked this equally odd response from O'Brien). I don't know. I guess it's just hard to find the ideas behind all the sniping. And it's gotta be rough for Doucet, Haydon and other Mayoral candidates to get their words in edgewise if the coverage focuses on bizarre barbs traded by the front-runners. It was all feeling so... underwhelming.

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500" caption="O'Brien and Doucet get the message. But what about Cleo?"][/caption] September is approaching and campaigns are picking up the pace. Candidates are starting to roll out their platforms. Pressure groups are lining up debates and releasing platforms of their own. Before we know it, election signs will start popping up... although perhaps not as many we might expect. Larry O'Brien's campaign says that lawn signs are "old school and expensive". He's opting for billboards instead. Clive Doucet's campaign is eschewing the tradition for environmental reasons. It's unclear whether this includes signs on public property (which were much more effective a campaign tool for O'Brien in the last campaign, as his lawn sign count was minimal). But Alex Cullen's website still has a link to order a lawn sign, and Jim Watson keeps announcing his daily sign request count on Twitter, so they won't be jumping on the no-sign bandwagon.

Apparently there are a record number of candidates running for municipal council this year. For those looking for some alternatives to the status quo, this is good news. Only one candidate is running unopposed, and several incumbents are retiring – so no matter what, we'll see new faces on council this year. And it's good for our local democracy to have a lot of people show their interest in serving their community. In the coming months, we'll have a chance to look at the ward races in detail. Folks are still launching campaigns, so the field is shifting. I'm reluctant to step in and start analyzing each race at this point. But as someone who has a keen interest in seeing more women in elected office, I couldn't resist doing a little calculation. According to the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, women make up 13.9 per cent of mayors and 23 per cent of councilors – pretty much on par with other levels of government, and contributing to Canada's dismal international rating for women's participation in politics. FCM wants to raise Canada's average to 30%, and have been running campaign schools and workshops across the country for a few years now. Local councilors Marianne Wilkinson and Jan Harder held a campaign school for women here, which from all reports was well attended.

What a difference a few weeks make. It seems we have a mayoral race. It wasn't much of a surprise when Mayor Larry O'Brien announced his intention to seek re-election. With the passage of Lansdowne Live, he likely concluded he had accomplished enough to run on his record. Sure enough, that was the focus of his re-election announcement (as awkward as it was). O'Brien declared that he wants the election to be about leadership, which he says is about “getting things done”. “We've finally gotten over the constipation of amalgamation”, he said. It's an odd statement to make for a mayor who leads a fractured council that often split along urban/suburban/rural lines, that has flip-flopped on multiple decisions, that cost taxpayers millions by canceling the former light rail contract, and that unnecessarily prolonged a bus strike. Yet when it came to budget time, the council seemed to be able to get things done in spite of the Mayor. But is it a more functional body than when Larry O'Brien took office? Hardly. And as others have pointed out,  O'Brien is quick to claim the credit for projects that were started well before his time or which have been spearheaded by someone else. And as for those voters who have been paying closer attention, he is counting on a certain number of them overlooking the flaws, and focusing instead on the promises he has kept.

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="600" caption="Knowing the ropes: do voters give it too much weight?"][/caption] Much has been written about the need for fresh faces on Ottawa's city council. From community coalition Our Ottawa to the high profile residents behind Fair Chance, from columnists like Randall Denley to bloggers like Blake Batson, the call for change at City Hall has been loud and clear. There's no question that Ottawa's pattern of re-electing incumbents is not exactly healthy for our local democracy. But is a clean sweep what we need? What are the pros and cons of supporting incumbents versus voting in new faces and new voices? Incumbents: On the pro side, incumbents have no learning curve. They know the ropes, they know the rules of order, they have relationships with staff and know how to answer constituents' issues and resolve problems. There's no waiting while they set up an office and hire staff – they're ready to go as soon as they take office. They also know what to expect – they understand the pace of a councilor's lifestyle, so there's no adjustment period while they get used to the evening meetings, the event-after-event weekends, the reduced family time and the lack of privacy. But incumbents get tired. They might get lazy, or take voters for granted. They may resist new ideas, or ignore some communities in favour of the constituents that voted them in. Some are quite parochial in their approach, focusing on the narrow interests of their ward instead of the city as a whole. Some get defensive when challenged by residents (Gord Hunter, for example, is notorious for his quick email trigger).

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="480" caption="In lieu of fresh thinking, will candidates rely on the old stand-by?"][/caption] It's true that elections are no time to debate policy – between the hot button-pressing and the sound bite speaking, no one seems to want to do any actual big-T Thinking. But municipal elections are slightly different than their provincial or federal counterparts. Candidates can register as early as ten months before election day, so they can start spending money and get their message out to prospective voters. With six months to go, it's still early, so it's not too surprising we haven't seen much from the front-running mayoral candidates about their vision for Ottawa. But perhaps it's time they started throwing out some ideas. Six months is long enough to get people talking. By the time September rolls around, schedules become packed, the media starts paying more attention, and candidates have less control over the debate. So why not get ahead of the game and set the agenda while you still can?