Wow, has it really been 3.5 months since the end of the federal election and the Pair Vote campaign? Much has happened since then to keep the vote reform issue alive, most notably the coalition crisis, something that would have never occurred under a PR system.

Sadly, I haven’t found my legs to get back at working on voting reform. The desire is strong, just finding it tough to give the time necessary on top of the needs of a busy young family and other commitments. After the election, I needed to make up time lost on a variety of things. Ok that’s enough wimpering from me! It’s clear to me, though that I want to devote time to the issue again. The questions for me are where to add value to what other groups are doing, and will other people join in the effort?

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First stop on my road to recovery is this weekend’s ChangeCamp , which will bring together a diverse crowd motivated to create connections, knowledge, tools and policies that drive transparency, civic engagement and democratic empowerment. In other words, bring some of the Obama’s open engagement style to Canada. Hopefully this event will the seed of a national movement of many more ChangeCamps. I’ve proposed a session on voting reform which will hopefully draw some interest.

My primary short term objective is to ensure a win for STV in BC this May. I hope to get in touch with organizers soon.

I also envision getting some tech people together to produce a better vote swapping system, in time for the May elections. A few of you expressed interest in working on that, hopefully that is still the case. Ping me to get going on this, or maybe you want to lead where I have not. :)

One last thing – I spend a lot of time on Twitter these days, it’s an amazing place to connect, share, and learn. If you are on there, please say hi to @gerrykirk . :)

We are in exciting times. I’ve got plenty of hope and optimism for 2009. Let’s make this the year cynicism in governments and voting turns to citizen engagement in building a vibrant, healthy democracy.