BC Green Party candidate for MLA in Courtenay-Comox. The party describes him as a veterinarian and public health researcher.
Jay Van Oostdam is the BC Green Party candidate in Courtenay-Comox, on Elections BC's list on 2026-10-03. The party's candidate page says he is a veterinarian and public health professional with a 25-year career at Health Canada and BC Environment, studying environmental contaminants. Brennan Day of the Conservative Party won the district in 2024 and is on the 2026 list again. voche.me found no policy statement in Van Oostdam's own words beyond one sentence on why he is running, so the commitments below are the party's.
Researched by voche.me · Not a campaign-authored page
BC Green Party2026
Jay Van OostdamBritish Columbia provincial election
Jay Van OostdamMLAv.
Candidate research / October 3, 2026
A researched record of Jay Van Oostdam's 2026 candidacy in Courtenay-Comox. Elections BC lists him with the affiliation BC Green Party. His career as described here comes from the party's candidate page, with CHEK News repeating it. The commitments below are the BC Green Party's platform, because voche.me found no commitment in his own words.
On dates without a confirmed appearance the public schedule is unknown; the candidate may still have activities that day. This static page changes only when its research is updated.
01 / Introduction
About Jay Van Oostdam
Elections BC lists Jay Van Oostdam as the BC Green Party candidate in Courtenay-Comox. The copy of the list read on 2026-10-03, stamped October 3, 2026 07:00:07 PM, shows four accepted nominations in the district: Will Cole-Hamilton of the BC NDP, Jason Cook of CentreBC, Brennan Day of the Conservative Party and Jay Van Oostdam. Nominations closed at 1 p.m. PT on October 3, 2026.
The BC Green Party's candidate page for him is dated October 2, 2026. It says he is a veterinarian and public health professional, with a Bachelor of Science in Biology from the University of Regina and a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine from the University of Saskatchewan. It says he began practising in Nanaimo and later worked in British Columbia and Saskatchewan. These are the party's statements. voche.me has not checked them with the universities or a veterinary registry.
The same page says he did postdoctoral work at the University of British Columbia's Pulmonary Research Laboratory and earned a Master of Public Health in Environmental Health and Epidemiology at the University of Minnesota. It says this led to a 25-year career with Health Canada and BC Environment studying contaminants such as lead, mercury, PCBs and DDT. It says he led the Human Health component of the federal Northern Contaminants Program and co-led the Human Health Assessment Group of the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program. voche.me has not checked these roles with Health Canada or either program.
The page says he has long been a member of both the federal and the provincial Green parties, and that he has taken part in direct actions to protect old-growth forests in Temagami, Ontario and at Fairy Creek, British Columbia. It quotes him: "I'm running to bring decades of experience in public health, environmental science and advocacy to the work of protecting our communities and our environment."
CHEK News listed him on October 3, 2026 in its roundup of Vancouver Island candidates. Its entry repeats the party's description of his career and the party's wording on why he is running.
In 2024 Brennan Day of the Conservative Party won Courtenay-Comox with 13,481 votes (38.83 percent). Ronna-Rae Leonard of the BC NDP received 13,388 (38.56 percent) and Arzeena Hamir of the BC Green Party received 7,202 (20.74 percent), according to Elections BC's statement of votes. voche.me searched that statement for the surname Van Oostdam and found no match.
Published positions and selected commitments, separated by election cycle. Status labels describe the evidence reviewed, not a numerical score or a complete audit of the platform. Council approval is different from delivery.
10 commitments shown · Checked Oct 3
2026 · HousingCampaign pledge
Party platform: 26,000 non-market homes a year
The BC Greens platform page says the party would build and protect 26,000 permanently affordable, non-market homes a year, and make it easier and quicker to build all forms of housing.
Evidence & next checks
Evidence reviewed
This is the party's platform page. It does not name Jay Van Oostdam, and voche.me found no statement in his own words that repeats it.
What still needs checking
Does he repeat this commitment in his own campaign?
Party platform: restart the $10-a-day child care pledge
The BC Greens platform page says the party would restart the stalled $10-a-day child care pledge and chart a path toward universal coverage, with fair pay for early childhood educators.
Evidence & next checks
Evidence reviewed
This is the party's platform page. It does not name Jay Van Oostdam, and voche.me found no statement in his own words that repeats it.
What still needs checking
Does he repeat this commitment in his own campaign?
The BC Greens platform page says the party's Fair Share Act would make the few hundred richest people in BC pay their fair share and bring in a windfall tax on mega-corporations. The page says this would raise more than $13 billion in revenue for Community Health Centres, free transit and universal child care. The $13 billion figure is the party's own.
Evidence & next checks
Evidence reviewed
This is the party's platform page. It does not name Jay Van Oostdam, and voche.me found no statement in his own words that repeats it.
What still needs checking
Does he repeat this commitment in his own campaign?
The BC Greens platform page says the party would stop new fossil fuel development and institute a climate plan that follows the science of climate change.
Evidence & next checks
Evidence reviewed
This is the party's platform page. It does not name Jay Van Oostdam, and voche.me found no statement in his own words that repeats it.
What still needs checking
Does he repeat this commitment in his own campaign?
The BC Greens platform page says the party would institute selective logging and value-added industries, and fully fund old-growth deferrals with fair compensation for First Nations and forestry communities.
Evidence & next checks
Evidence reviewed
This is the party's platform page. It does not name Jay Van Oostdam, and voche.me found no statement in his own words that repeats it.
What still needs checking
Does he repeat this commitment in his own campaign?
voche.me found no public office held by this candidate in the sources read on 2026-10-03, so no voting record was reviewed. His past roles come from the party's candidate page and have not been checked with the employers named.
No reviewed entries have been added to this section yet. This is a research gap, not a finding about the candidate.
Recent appearances / Read and watch
Talks, interviews & statements
Read original statements and reporting, or open the publisher’s video. A summary of a speech is labelled separately from a full recording.
Statement
Statement on the BC Green Party candidate page
The party's page quotes him: "I'm running to bring decades of experience in public health, environmental science and advocacy to the work of protecting our communities and our environment." The quote names no measure, number or date.
Records are labelled by type, including official findings, civil proceedings and political disputes where applicable. Each entry identifies the response found in the sources and the latest status verified for this page.
No reviewed entries have been added to this section yet. This is a research gap, not a finding about the candidate.
News coverage / Original publishers
Read the reporting
A dated reading list from independent publishers. The headings below are voche.me summaries; follow each link for the original article, context and any corrections.
Reporting
CHEK News
All Vancouver Island candidates for the 2026 B.C. election
A roundup of every Vancouver Island candidate after nominations closed. Its entry for him gives his career as a veterinarian and public health professional with 25 years at Health Canada and BC Environment, and repeats the party's wording on why he is running.
Sources checked October 3, 2026. Official records establish decisions; campaign material establishes stated positions; reporting adds investigation and context. None alone establishes every claim.
No campaign website of his own was found on 2026-10-03. Six addresses built from his name (oostdam.ca, jayvanoostdam.ca, jayvanoostdam.com, voteoostdam.ca, teamoostdam.ca and oostdam4courtenaycomox.ca) did not answer. The party's page links only to the party's Facebook, Instagram and X accounts. A search of Bluesky's public directory found no account under his name. Accounts under similar names on other platforms were not used, because no page read links them to him. Local news items from 2018 to 2022, in the Comox Valley Record and the Vancouver Island Free Daily, name a Jay Van Oostdam of the Comox Valley in connection with a talk on Arctic contaminants, old-growth forest protests and a letter on logging. Parts of that description resemble the party's biography, but none of those pages names him as the candidate, so voche.me does not use them and has not archived them. The party's biography is the only source for his degrees, his veterinary practice, his 25 years at Health Canada and BC Environment, his two program roles and his party membership; CHEK News repeats it without independent checking. Health Canada, the two programs, the universities and a veterinary registry were not asked or searched. The platform page does not name him, and a search of the party's site on 2026-10-03 found no news release that names him. No statement of his own beyond the one sentence on the party's page was found. No all-candidates meeting or other public event in Courtenay-Comox was found, and campaign finances and endorsements were not available on this date. CHEK News says Elections BC would publish the final candidate list on the morning of October 4, 2026, so the list may change. The questionnaire has not been sent.
Research status
What voche.me has checked
Evidence reviewed on 2026-10-03: the Elections BC candidate list, key dates page and 2024 statement of votes; the BC Green Party's candidate page for him, its candidates page and its Our Plan page; and CHEK News's roundup of Vancouver Island candidates. The name search was limited: the WebSearch tool had reached its usage limit, so voche.me used the party's own site search, Google News pages, the search pages of the Comox Valley Record and the Vancouver Island Free Daily, and Bluesky's public search directly. Bing returned no result that named him, Google returned an empty page and DuckDuckGo showed a verification test.
No campaign website and no public social media account of his own was found. The party's page links only to the party's own accounts. An empty section records what voche.me did not find on this date. The candidate may have published material that these searches did not reach.
03 / Background
Experience & community
Dates not given
Veterinarian
The party says he practised veterinary medicine, starting in Nanaimo and later elsewhere in British Columbia and in Saskatchewan. It gives no years and no clinic names.
Researcher on environmental contaminants, Health Canada and BC Environment
The party says he studied contaminants such as lead, mercury, PCBs and DDT and their effects on human and environmental health. CHEK News repeats the 25-year figure from the party's description. voche.me has not checked it with either employer.
Lead of the Human Health component, Northern Contaminants Program
The party says he led this part of the federal program, which assessed contaminant exposure in Arctic Canada, and contributed to guidance for First Nations and Inuit communities. voche.me has not checked this with Health Canada.
Co-lead, Human Health Assessment Group, Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program
The party says he co-led this group and that its work contributed evidence used in developing the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants. voche.me has not checked this with the program.
Proposed questions for a future interview. They have not been sent to the candidate, and no answers have been supplied.
Which provincial forestry rules would you change to protect old-growth forest, and by when?
No response has been submitted.
Which of your party's measures would you push first in the Legislature, and what does it cost?
No response has been submitted.
What would you do as MLA to improve access to health care in Courtenay-Comox?
No response has been submitted.
Have your own question?
Ask Jay Van Oostdam directly. We send it to the campaign, and publish the reply here if we get one.
05 / About this page
Questions about this page
Facts voche.me can state about Jay Van Oostdam's page itself, answered directly rather than left blank.
Is this an official page for Jay Van Oostdam?
No. This page is researched by voche.me from public sources, listed below, and is separate from Jay Van Oostdam's own campaign.
What party is Jay Van Oostdam running with?
Jay Van Oostdam is running for MLA with BC Green Party.
Does Jay Van Oostdam currently hold public office?
Not according to this profile. voche.me has not listed a current public office for Jay Van Oostdam.
How many sources does this Jay Van Oostdam profile cite?
This profile lists 5 sourced references, each with the date voche.me checked it, in the Sources section below.
Why do some questions on Jay Van Oostdam's page show no answer?
The "Questions & answers" section on this page lists questions voche.me would put to Jay Van Oostdam in a future interview. They have not been sent yet, so the page says plainly that no answer has been supplied instead of leaving the section blank.
When is the election Jay Van Oostdam is running in?
The 2026 British Columbia election, including the MLA race, is decided on October 24, 2026.
06 / Candidate contributions
Space for campaign updates
No campaign updates yet
Announcements, event details and messages can be added here, with their source and publication date. No campaign submission has been added.
