Yellowknife City Councillor Rommel Silverio has announced he’s running to become the member of the Legislative Assembly for the riding of Kam Lake.
Silverio is a two-term city councillor having been re-elected last year.
He says obviously he could not hold down both jobs if he wins but says that he could be most effective helping Yellowknifers and all residents of the Northwest Territories as an MLA.
Silverio came to Canada in 1998 from the Philippines and agrees Canada has been very good to him and his family.
He has been at patient care co-ordinator at Stanton Territorial Hospital since 2012 and says his main priority is to end what he calls a crisis at the hospital and across the territory when it comes to health care.
“Lately I start to worry. There is a crisis at the hospital. A lot of health care providers including doctors and nurses are leaving Yellowknife and the North,” says Silverio. “We have to address that as well as all health care in the Northwest Territories.”
Silverio says mental health care, particularly for young people, can also be improved.
He says he’s gotten to know many of Kam Lake’s business people through his work as a city councillor.
Silverio adds that his mother owns a business and he can relate to other hard-working people trying to run a business in Yellowknife.
He says that the funding gap between what communities expect and what they actually are provided by the Government of the NWT is also one of his priorities – one that he knows all too well from his time on City Council.
Silverio is also president of the NWT Nurses Association and says that has allowed him to meet with other health care providers from across Canada.
Silverio will be up against incumbent Kieron Testart, former Yellowknife Centre MLA Robert Hawkins, Caitlin Cleveland and Cherish Winsor in the Kam Lake riding.
The election is on October 1.