WATCH: Which famous face is running for city council?

• Public safety and state of roads are on his agenda
• He doesn't want 'to be beholden' to anybody

He was in our homes for decades and now a former Global Okanagan TV news anchor is hoping to get the ear of the voting public as he runs for a seat on city council.

Rick Webber will be one of the more high-profile figures running come the October municipal election, and certainly has the name recognition, but concedes he’s trying politics for the first time.

“I’m certainly not taking anything for granted,” Webber, who has been retired since 2019, told Kelowna10 before heading out for a ride on his beloved motorbike. “Last election, only one new person got on out of a lot of candidates. Also, I don’t want a lot of [campaign] donations, I don’t want to be beholden to anybody.”

Webber, a resident of Kelowna for 32 years, said his job as a reporter and broadcaster for forty years gives him a thorough understanding of how each level of government works and what city councillors can and can’t get done.

“I know a lot of the [current] city councillors and I feel I could fit into that team. I don’t want to go in all adversarial and everybody has to go; that’s not me.”

Webber added he has no axe to grind, is not involved with any developers and, as a retired person on a fixed income, figures he’d be a good representative for the average resident.

'Accosted twice on the street'

Public safety is one area he feels has suddenly become a priority.

"I’ve lived here for thirty years, and I wouldn’t have put it near the top [of priorities] before, but in the past year I’ve been accosted twice by people on the street,” he explained. “You can see there’s this lack of respect for law enforcement right now.”

Responding to a recent survey showing many residents say they’ve been a victim of crime in the past year, Webber said, if elected, he would be part of efforts to increase the size of the RCMP locally and to lobby senior governments to increase sentences for repeat offenders.

What about the driving public?

As for some other hot button issues, he’s all for reducing red tape so developers can get on with building more affordable housing, and he’s critical of the current political administration for forgetting about the ordinary driving public. He referenced a recent study showing 80 per cent of the Kelowna residents call themselves ‘vehicle drivers only.’

“They [city council] like to imagine a world where everyone is taking the bus, or the bike, or walking, and we’re not there yet, and we won’t be there for a long time. I don’t think we’ve spent very much money in recent years on actually improving driving conditions.”

Ultimately, Webber, who has volunteered for many local events and fundraisers, does not see himself as a politician but figures his decades in the TV new business makes him a good choice for the council table.

“I’m good at interviewing and I’ll be asking everybody their opinion. Anybody that knows more about it than I do, or has a different view, that’s what I want to hear.”