Poll showing Hepner in the lead in Surrey mayoral race being questioned

imagesTHERE is much skepticism about a poll by a research company that was hired by Surrey First whose mayoral candidate is Linda Hepner that shows Hepner has 40 per cent support among decided voters.

What makes it worse is that the pollsters introduced Surrey Mayor Dianne Watts’ performance that obviously gives the poll a slant no matter what arguments they may come up with!

Well, if you still want to believe the poll, former mayor Doug McCallum is at 33 and councilor Rasode is at 22 per cent support.

However, one-third of voters are undecided.

The telephone poll, for whatever it’s worth, took place October 6-12 and shows that reducing crime was the most important issue at 36 per cent, followed by keeping property taxes low at 16 per cent. The survey noted that about one-third of Surrey voters are undecided.

 

THE poll that seems to have more credibility is the online one carried out by Insights West poll that placed McCallum first with 40% among decided voters, followed by Linda Hepner with 32%, Rasode with 21%, John Edwards with 7% and Vikram Bajwa with 1%.

When asked which one of the three main mayoral candidates would be the best person to handle specific matters, McCallum held a slight edge on six issues: city finances and taxation (18%), economic development (18%), transportation (18%), crime (17%), development (17%) and housing (16%).

On the race for City Council, 38% of Surrey residents said they are likely to give at least one of their votes to Surrey First, while 36% would give at least one vote to the Safe Surrey Coalition. Three-in-ten residents (31%) are likely to support independent candidates.

Practically half of Surrey residents (48%) were undecided.