CHMA is continuing its series of short candidate interviews ahead of Tantramar’s municipal election on May 11.
This time, Mike Robar sat down with incumbent candidate Josh Goguen, one of eight candidates running for one of four Ward 3 council seats. Goguen spoke about his desire to see the fire department issues through to the end and to give the community a voice, especially underserved populations that may not be able to speak for themselves.
Listen to the audio below:
This interview has been edited for clarity.
Can you tell me a little about yourself?
 Thanks for the opportunity to interview me this morning. So I’ve been in Sackville for about 20 years. I’m married to my lovely wife Sarah, who works at Jean Coutu. Many of you guys know her there. I’ve been at Monaris for 19 years in the IT department there. And during my free time, I am the group commissioner for the Scouts chapter here in Sackville. I also run two groups—the Cub Group, which is eight to 11, and then new this year is the Chipmunks group, which is 4- to 5-year-old kids. So I do enjoy doing that, and going out doing walks. I’ve got a border collie that’s very active, so we try to go out and have walks.
Why are you running in the municipal election this year?
 With amalgamation, there was a lot of just getting everything tidied up, and I didn’t really get a chance to do much. And obviously with the fire department file that has come up, one of my main priorities is to see that to an end to make sure we get a resolution on it. It’s been around for quite a while and unfortunately, due to some issues, it hasn’t been resolved. So I’d like to see that get resolved.
And I definitely want to keep on being a voice to the community. People reach out to me all the time and I make a conscious effort to email them back because if they’ve taken the time to email me, then obviously it’s something that’s concerning to them. So I want to make sure that they know that I’ve heard them or heard their issue and reply back to them. And, just continue advocating on everything that we need within the community, like a multi-use building for the farmer’s market.
I’ll go back to my scouting hat. When COVID hit, we got kicked out of the schools and we haven’t been able to find a permanent spot to get back in. And we have a spot right now that we can go but it’s on private property. Once that arrangement goes, then we don’t have a space; so definitely there’s a lot of things that can be done in the next four years. And I hope to continue on working on that.
What would you like to accomplish if you are reelected?
 I’ve already talked a lot about what I want to get accomplished, so I think just having a voice for the community. There’s a lot of tension going on in the municipality and a lot of people are divided, and I want to make sure that everybody gets heard and has a voice at the table. You may have your beliefs, but you want to make sure that it aligns with what the community wants. If you’re going in there just with an agenda, then you’re not representing the community the way you should. Like I have a teenage child and they don’t have anywhere to go and the recreation report came out and said that the teens are the underserved of the community. Sure, you can go into hockey, you can do other activities, but everything is geared towards the small children or seniors or adults, and there’s nothing to fill that void. So I definitely would like to bring that up and have something that we could include the teenagers in.
Josh, thank you so much for coming in to sit down today. I wish you, as we have all of the previous candidates, the best of luck in the upcoming election.
