Rest in peace, my friend.

I am personally saddened and shocked to hear about the passing of Art Cowie, “a landscape architect, land planner, politician, PNE director, developer, commentator and writer,” over the weekend.

I had the pleasure of managing Art’s campaign for City Council in 2002 when he co-founded and subsequently ran for the one-election wonder party, vcaTEAM.

Often enamoured with his place in this city’s political landscape, but but always better informed than 90 per cent of the city representatives that I have met over the years, Art was truly an elder statesman in Vancouver.

I remember sitting down with Art on a rainy Sunday afternoon for our first face-to-face meeting so he could size me up as a potential candidate to manage his campaign.  I was a young, 24 year-old political upstart who at first was very intimidated by Art’s knowledge about density, row housing, building heights and sight corridors, and mixed-use development.  But I guess he saw something he liked and hired me on.

Over the ensuing months, I realized the depth of Art’s knowledge about planning and design and discovered some of his fantastic visions for the city, many of which can be retrieved on his website where he regularly published many of these concepts for public consumption.

Art was a member of the Park Board, City Council and the BC Legislature. He was elected on 1971 as the sole TEAM member on the Vancouver Park Board. Since then he has been Chair of the Park Board several times and served on City Council. Art was elected to the BC Legislature in 1991 as a Liberal, representing Vancouver-Quilchena. In the Fall of 1993, he voluntarily gave up his seat for Gordon Campbell, allowing the current Premier to get into the legislature seamlessly.

He was always opinionated, regularly full of energy and ready to tackle whatever task was in front of us, and most importantly, committed to the concept of public service.

Thank you for your contributions, Art.  They will not soon be forgotten.

For anyone who knows the details of Art’s funeral arrangements, please send along a note.