Wildrose candidate John Bos and how he became involved with politics

By Susan Hofforth

When he was younger, like many of us, John Bos wasn’t very interested in politics. His interest grew as he got older, and he started to see the things that mattered. And, as he started to see, he became more involved.

He served on the Rich Valley parent council for five years, with three of those as president. During that time, he was invited to sit in on regional planning with the Northern Gateway School Division, and was instrumental in putting some extra funding into busing so that the buses could go to the individual schools directly, shortening the travel time for the children. “Some of those kids were on the buses for an hour or more,” he said. “That’s not right, especially when you’re only six years old.”

For a time he was a member of the PC Party, serving as Director at Large. At the time, he was satisfied with the party, and it’s direction. But one issue made him see things differently.

His dissatisfaction began when the off-road trail systems were being planned through the county in 2010. This project was meant to be a way to stimulate the economy, and would increase tourism and bring people into the area. “I had nothing against skidoo trails,” said Bos. “But, this was a costly and very poorly laid out plan.” The trails were being attached to every road allowance, dissecting farmland and going past acreage developments where people had recently built expensive homes. Bos himself would have had three trails through his property. A bigger problem was that there was no way of policing the snowmobiles and no plan to prevent them from transporting potential diseases and weeds from farm to farm. The landowners got together and Bos was asked to be spokesperson. He discussed the problem with George VanderBurg who did not seem to be concerned with landowner rights. VanderBurg told him that this was important to the region, and it would fill the hotels in Whitecourt.

Bos became disillusioned over the lack of respect for property rights.

Shortly afterward, in 2010, the Wildrose party came into existence. Bos agreed with their politics and he joined, sat on the board, and became the Chief Financial Officer. He considered the candidacy, but MaryAnn Chichak became the candidate and Bos was happy to support her. The timing for him was not right as he was needed at home to take care of his ailing mother. But, when Chichak was elected mayor of Whitecourt, a new candidate was needed. Bos was asked if he would let his name stand as a Wildrose candidate.

His political experience so far has taught him that there is a better way of running government programs. “My goal as candidate is to run a more efficient government. My father taught me early that there would be good years and bad years in agriculture and you have to plan for that to be sustainable. I’ve seen the ups and downs in agriculture and, really, government and oil are the same.”

Bos believes there is no need for taxes to go up. “We have what we need in the coffers,” he said, “but we need to spend it properly and have a plan for the future. Government should be run just like any private business.