SURREY, B.C. - When voters in Surrey-Cloverdale head to the polls on October 24, the Conservative Party’s choice is a candidate whose career has been about building things people care about: Nicholas Cartmell, a brand strategist and community sport builder who has run everything from a provincial museum to a national event rental business.
Cartmell is the CEO of the BC Sports Hall of Fame and Museum, a non-profit accountable to a 23-member board. In that role he expanded a youth education program that reaches classrooms across British Columbia and raised the funding for the Hall’s Indigenous Sport Gallery, bringing the stories of 40 First Nations and Métis athletes, coaches and builders to audiences across the province. He also chaired business and community engagement for the 102nd Grey Cup Festival in Vancouver, and from 2016 to 2018 served on Capilano University’s Board of Governors, where he chaired the Investment Committee.
His business background runs deep. Cartmell spent 14 years at TELUS, most recently as Senior Director of Strategic Initiatives, Partnerships and Government Relations, where he led national teams and budgets and negotiated $51 million in partnerships and investments. He went on to run the Western Canadian division of Canada’s largest event rental company, employing more than 100 British Columbians through peak seasons.
Community work has been the constant through it all. Today Cartmell is Vice President of the Surrey 2027 55+ BC Games Host Society, preparing to welcome thousands of participants and visitors to Surrey. The Conservatives pitch him as the kind of leader who can get things done – a message the party is running across its Surrey slate: make life affordable again, restore safety to Surrey’s streets, fix healthcare, and give Surrey strong leadership.
The reason Cartmell’s race matters is the riding’s history of close finishes. In 2024, Conservative Elenore Sturko won Surrey-Cloverdale with 10,268 votes, or 48.31 per cent, against NDP incumbent Mike Starchuk’s 9,682, or 45.56 per cent – a margin of 506 votes. This time, neither of them is on the ballot in the riding: Sturko is running for CentreBC in Surrey South, and Starchuk is not running at all. The NDP banner is now carried by Stephen Dooley, and Green candidate Pat McCutcheon – who took 1,150 votes, or 5.41 per cent, in 2024 – is running again.
Cartmell and his wife, Leslie, have made Surrey home since 2012. They are raising a young son who plays competitive minor hockey, and their two adult sons are now building careers in engineering and the Canadian Armed Forces Reserves.
Advance voting in Surrey-Cloverdale runs October 16 to 21, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., at Hillcrest Elementary School, the KPU Cloverdale Campus, and Katzie Elementary School. General voting day is Saturday, October 24.
Photo: Conservative Party of BC (conservativebc.ca)
Sources: conservativebc.ca; Elections BC; BC Ballot; Wikipedia
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