VANCOUVER -- As Metro Vancouver’s transit referendum nears, Yes voters are stomping off to the No side or holding their ground with noses pinched at the idea of giving more money to TransLink, a new poll shows.

The Insights West poll, conducted last week, showed 55 per cent of 1,604 Metro Vancouver residents planned to say No to the regional congestion tax for transportation improvements, while just 33 per cent remained in favour of it.

The word TransLink may not appear anywhere on the ballot, but it’s the word that’s on everyone’s mind going into the plebiscite, said Mario Canseco, a vice-president at Insights West.

“There hasn’t really been a very effective way to counter the arguments from the No side related to mismanagement,” said Canseco.

It appears that even Yes voters are having trouble focusing on the substance of the plan rather than the organization that will implement it. Just 11 per cent of Yes voters say they have confidence in the transit authority to do a good job, while 70 per cent say they’re dissatisfied with TransLink’s performance but support the tax anyway, the poll found.

“There’s still this lingering bad taste whenever you talk about TransLink,” said Canseco. The voters “are just holding their nose and saying, ‘OK, I think this is going to be better, but it’s not an endorsement of the way our transit operation should be working.’”

As the campaign goes on, probable Yes voters are steadily becoming probable No voters, and even transit riders, who arguably stand to gain the most direct benefits from the tax, are weakening their support for a Yes outcome. Less than 50 per cent of residents who use public transit on weekdays now support the tax, the poll shows.

“That is the one group where the support has to be pretty high,” said Canseco.

“Voters tend to look at their own experiences and their experiences over the past few months haven’t been that fantastic,” said Canseco, and because “they live it everyday,” transit users’ support can be susceptible to things like service outages.

What has been unwavering in the past few weeks is the definite No contingent of voters. They now amount to 37 per cent of the population, according to the poll, outweighing definite Yes voters by more than two-to-one, and all Yes voters — including those with soft Yes votes — by four points.

Drivers, residents over 55, people who don’t commute during the week, and residents south of the Fraser River are among the strongest supporters of a No vote.

“Drivers are definitely the main problem that they have,” Canseco said. Three in five drivers are opposed to the tax and two in five say they won’t change their minds on that.

“Drivers may look at the ballot and say there’s really nothing here for me. If I don’t take Pattullo Bridge, all I’m getting is road maintenance, which conceivably I could get anyway,” said Canseco.

The recent announcement that Jim Pattison would oversee transit funds collected in a Yes outcome could help swing some voters to the Yes side and Insights West re-polled some of the respondents over the weekend.

But the poll showed only three per cent of decided No voters thought having Pattison on board would make them more likely to vote Yes.

There is a high level of awareness of the plebiscite — about 80 per cent of those polled said they were at least somewhat familiar with it. But as familiarity has grown, so too has support for the No side.

“You have this really broad coalition of people from different political parties, business groups, institutions, universities, everybody seems to be saying yes, this is the right way to go, but it’s just not something that is resonating very well with the average voter,” he said.

The online poll was conducted between March 2 and 5 and the results are accurate within 2.5 per cent 19 times out of 20, according to Insights West.

mrobinson@vancouversun.com

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