In the BC Legislature today I rose to pay tribute to former Oak Bay Mayor and Councillor Nils Jensen who passed away on Sunday morning after a brief battle with cancer. Below I reproduce the text and video of this tribute.

Photo credit: Oak Bay News/Black Press.

Video of Tribute

Text of Tribute

A. Weaver: I rise today profoundly saddened by the news of the passing of Nils Jensen on Sunday, April 7, after a short battle with cancer. Nils left us far too young at the age of 69 years.

Nils made significant contributions to our community in so many ways. He served four terms on Oak Bay council, two of them as mayor. He was always driven by the best interests of his community and served us with dignity and commitment.

I was honoured to have the opportunity to get to know Nils well over these past few years. I’ve always held him in high esteem. I enjoyed his sense of humour and positive outlook on the world. I’ll sorely miss our annual lawn bowling challenge that he beat me at, year after year, as we opened Carnarvon Park’s Oak Bay Lawn Bowling Club. I’ll also miss handing out candy with him at the Oak Bay Tea Party, when every year we would run out, and we would have to borrow from him.

Nils loved Oak Bay and brought great energy to his political and community life. He also worked on critical infrastructure projects for the region during his tenure as the chair of the capital regional district and head of the regional water supply commission. Under his visionary leadership, the Sooke reservoir was raised. Nils understood that Victoria actually had a water availability crisis emerging and showed the leadership required to ensure fresh drinking water for the region was available for generations to come.

Nils was highly educated, with degrees in mechanical engineering and law degrees from Osgoode Hall in the London School of Economics. Nils had a long and distinguished career as a defence lawyer and Crown prosecutor for the province of British Columbia.

Nils leaves his wife, Jean, and two sons, Nicholas and Stewart. Our hearts go out to his family for the loss of their beloved husband and father. Our community has lost a great leader, one who has left us far too soon, and I have lost a close personal friend.

A memorial service will be held on Thursday, April 11, at 2:00 p.m. at the Oak Bay High School community theatre for Nils Jensen