With 85 days left until the November 19 B.C. municipal elections, community newspapers are busy framing the fall campaigns for their readers.

This week, it was Revelstoke’s turn, as Times Review editor Aaron Orlando called for a new kind of municipal candidate. Fed up with the usual divide between pro-business and pro-union choices, Orlando is looking for candidates right down the Canadian Taxpayers Federation’s alley:

"Listen to the commercial ratepayer revolt, check your tax bill, look at city borrowing for infrastructure basics like sewage lagoon cleaning, or peruse the latest city finance report… Revelstoke has little appetite for more taxes. Voters may support big ideas, but it’s hard to see them supporting any big price tags. We’ve got serious money woes that will need to be addressed in the coming years.

"And voters beware. Cutting the budget is a lot trickier than it might seem. Candidates need to express not that they would be prudent with your money, but exactly how they would do so."

Revelstoke is a harbinger of many, many, many communities across B.C. Taxpayers need to take extra care this municipal election cycle, and look at candidates who both talk the talk of fiscal restraint—and can walk the walk of making it actually happen.