Three of Saskatoon’s mayoral candidates would like to see more equal footing so it isn’t all about how much money you can raise in your campaign. Zubair Sheikh, Cary Tarasoff, and Mark Zielke held a joint news conference Wednesday and presented recommendations which include lowering the maximum mayoral marketing budgets to $76,000 from the current $229,000 and lowering the donation threshold to $100.

Zielke pointed to Regina, which has an expense budget of just under $69,000 for mayoral candidates. The three suggest having such a high limit means candidates can’t equitably convey messaging.

The candidates also pointed to two recent mayoral debates on media outlets with talk formats; CBC and CKOM. Sheikh says they had phone interviews but weren’t featured or invited to the debates.

Their joint recommendations for future elections:

1. Lower campaign maximum mayoral marketing budgets from $229,000 to $76,000 and lower individual donations to a threshold of $100 to discourage the influence of corporations, unions and political parties in a civic election.

2. Positive discrimination – multicultural diversity should allow equal participation in our democracy.

3. Citizen engagement – provide training workshops for citizens to learn about municipal governance and how they can be engaged.

4. Voters list – voters lists are required for provincial and federal elections and should be extended to civic elections.

5. Media standards list – gather media together including community-based media to come up with a set of standards for fair coverage, debate formats and transparency on any polls conducted.