So, yes, Gregor Robertson is still your mayor.
Hopefully, you caught our comprehensive coverage online Saturday and came away informed about what transpired on a very interesting day and night.
Where do I start?
Lots to consider but wanted to get to the chief complaint for many parties battling Vision Vancouver during the campaign: A broken public consultation system.
That was certainly voiced loudly and clearly by many residents and activists in Grandview-Woodland, who were riled up over a proposed community plan that called for a forest of new highrises in the neighbourhood.
Robertson acknowledged last Thursday the plan "infuriated" residents. He promised to do a better job in his third term and "find better ways to hear from people and to make decisions, accordingly."
So how did Vision do at the polls in Grandview-Woodland?
At Britannia Community Centre, Robertson won 1,406 votes to 397 for COPE's Meena Wong. The NPA's Kirk LaPointe finished third at 264 votes.
The same polling station showed support for seven of Vision's eight council candidates (Tony Tang finished in 12th spot) and the Green's Adriane Carr, Pete Fry and Cleta Brown.
The exact same results for council and mayor were recorded at Queen Victoria School Annex. And almost the same mix of candidates were the choice of voters at Grandview elementary, where the only change was COPE's Lisa Barrett taking the 10th council spot by six votes over Brown.
But while Vision may have won those polls, my colleague Jeff Lee over at The Vancouver Sun wrote a story Monday that showed the ruling party lost 10.6 per cent of its vote in Grandview-Woodland from 2011 and a further 12.4 per cent in Strathcona.
Interesting, no?
In fact, many voters across the city voted for a party other than Vision, with the NPA increasing its presence on council, school board and park board from seven seats in 2011 to 11 this time around. The Greens, led by Adriane Carr topping the council polls, won two seats on park board and one on school board.
Despite it being his first run at politics, LaPointe had an impressive showing, pulling in 73,443 votes. Not bad at all for a rookie who used to manage typists in newsrooms.
In his concession speech Saturday at the Fairmont Hotel Vancouver, LaPointe wished Robertson well and called Vision's three-peat at council a significant accomplishment.
Earlier in the day, some of us reporters caught up with LaPointe and asked what it was like for a former managing editor of the Sun to be the centre of media attention.
"I wish I asked tougher questions when I was on your side because I feel that I left a few off the table," he said after dropping off lunch for NPA scrutineers outside Templeton secondary school.
LaPointe said he "learned a lot about media in all of this" and knew reporters wouldn't be "soft" on him because he used to be on the other side of the camera/notebook/microphone. And he obviously paid attention to what we scribes were writing about him.
"A couple of things that journalists have written, I thought they could have done a better job. But, you know, overall I've been treated quite fairly. For a newcomer, I've been given every opportunity to make my point."
One other note on the election: Voter turnout, at 44 per cent, climbed 10 percentage points over the 2011 contest, which is good news. The bad news is more than half of eligible voters don't seem to care about city government. Shame, shame.
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