B.C. municipal election 2018: Creston

Candidates

To be announced.

Boundary

Creston is a town in the Kootenays located a short distance from the U.S. border, and about 100 kilometres from Cranbrook.

Population (2016)

5,351

History

The Ktunaxa were first to the region that now houses Creston, and fishing and the hunting helped sustain them.

When European settlers came upon the area in 1883, they found a region flooded by a freshet that required people to travel using boats such as canoes and, eventually, sternwheelers.

Settler William Adolf Baillie-Grohman drained the Creston Flats to create farmland.

His scheme involved diverting water from the Kootenay River into the Columbia, exploding the Kootenay River’s bed east of Nelson and building dykes to contain it in Creston.

Grohman’s ideas didn’t quite work out as he had planned – but dykes were built, and they protected many thousands of hectares of farmland.

Farms in the Creston area have since produced fruits, dairy and vineyards.

Median total income of couple economic families with children (2015)/B.C. median

$102,144/$111,736

Crime Severity Index (2016)

RCMP — municipal/B.C.

66.79 (-11.58)/93.63 (-0.71)

RCMP — rural/B.C.

52.24 (-38.56)/93.63 (-0.71)

Violent Crime Severity Index (2016)

RCMP — municipal/B.C.

70.64 (+71.92)/74.86 (-9.81)

RCMP — rural/B.C.

42 (-68.78)/74.86 (-9.81)

Political representation

Federal

Wayne Stetski (NDP)

Provincial

Michelle Mungall (BC NDP)