A much publicized run-in with anti-SOGI audience members at an all-candidates meeting didn’t appear to hurt longtime Burnaby Citizens Association trustee Larry Hayes at the ballot box.
Hayes garnered the second most votes Saturday, even after a video of him barreling through a woman holding a baby was widely circulated on social media and in news stories during the campaign.
The altercation happened at Byrne Creek Community School on Oct. 3 after an all-candidates meeting ended in loud chanting from anti-SOGI audience members and yelling matches between candidates and audience members with opposing views on the province’s sexual-orientation and gender identity curriculum.
The woman told news media Hayes had pushed her while she was trying to ask him a question.
Hayes said the woman had blocked the door as he was trying to leave, and he accused anti-SOGI audience members at the meeting of using “ambush tactics.”
“Unfortunately I got caught up into it,” he said. “Emotions were running high. Do I regret that it happened? Of course I do, but I certainly got a lot of feedback from people that saw it for what it was, especially people who know me.”
RCMP were called, and officers took statements from witnesses, but no charges have been laid.
After capturing 23,780 votes, Hayes will now serve a sixth term on the board.
Anti-SOGI candidates Laura-Lynn Tyler Thompson and Jimmy Zhao, meanwhile, were denied a spot at the table, landing 15, 622 votes and 9,556 votes respectively.
