PLP’s Mischa Fubler To Run In Bye-Election

[Updated] The PLP announced that Mischa Fubler will be their candidate for the bye-election in Smith’s South on October 5th.

Mr. Fubler will face the OBA’s Ben Smith in the bye-election, which was called due to the resignation of Cole Simons, who has held the seat for more than two decades.

The PLP said, “The Progressive Labour Party is pleased to announce Mr. Mischa Fubler as our candidate for the Constituency 8, Smith’s South bye-election.

“Born and raised in Bermuda, and a graduate of Bermuda’s public school system, Mischa journeyed overseas for his tertiary education. He obtained his Bachelor of Arts in Urban Studies from York University in Canada, followed by a Masters of Science in Information Systems from Brooklyn College, New York.

“He provides a wealth of knowledge and experience in a wide spectrum of areas, and we look forward to his contributions to the political discourse.

“The Progressive Labour Party is proud to offer Mischa Fubler to the constituents of Smith’s South as a viable option to the status quo OBA winner they have voted for the last 25 years.

“We believe he is the better option, and that once the community meets, interacts, and engages with him, they will confirm his value and show him support on October 5.”

Update: Mr Fubler’s bio, provided by the PLP

As a husband, father, and advocate for socio-economic justice, Mischa Fubler brings a diverse and complementary collection of educational and professional experiences and skill sets to Bermuda’s political discourse. Mischa is driven by a desire to increase equity amongst the wider population while driving digital transformation within the government and its services.

Born and raised in Bermuda, Mischa is an example of a highly successful graduate of the public education system and is an advocate for its continuous improvement.

Beginning his educational journey at Francis Patton, he subsequently attended Somerset Primary, Sandys Secondary Middle School, and the CedarBridge Academy, before continuing his education abroad at York University In Toronto, Canada where he obtained a Bachelor of Arts in Urban Studies. Mischa also holds a Master’s of Science degree in Information Systems from Brooklyn College in New York, USA.

Returning home in 2017, Mischa first worked at the Ascendant Group Ltd. to develop enterprise system integration solutions before moving to a Bermuda-based international reinsurance company to lead a team of software developers as the Assistant Vice President of Applications and Management Information.

Mischa regularly volunteers for local youth outreach opportunities, sharing his IT journey and career advice with middle and high school students. Having close to 10 years of computer science education and training experience, Mischa is acutely aware of the value of IT education and the need to grow the ratio of women in the [STEM] industries.

Mischa also brings grass-roots community organizing experience to the team and has been a core member of Social Justice Bermuda since its inception. His contributions include leading the Cannabis Legalization team and contributing to SJB’s Education reform team. He also serves on Chewstick’s Board of Elders [Directors].

Within the PLP, he has served in various roles, currently as a member of the Research & Platform Committee and also as the Chief Technology Officer.

Mischa hails from the multigenerational Darrell & Fubler families of Flatts Village and Smith’s, Bermuda. He is married to wife, Gia, and together they have two children.

Update: Mr Fubler’s remarks

Greetings to the Party Leadership, Members of parliament, senators, party executive, members, family and friends…

Whether in-person here in the historic Alaska Hall at the Reginald A. Burrows building or watching via live-stream, I’d like to first thank you all for joining us today as I officially introduce myself to the political landscape of Bermuda.

For those of you out there that don’t know me already, I’m Mischa Fubler and I’m here to proudly announce my candidacy to represent the Bermuda Progressive Labour Party in the upcoming C-8 Smith’s South by-election

I would like to commence the process of building your trust and support. To that end, I’ll be taking a few minutes to share my background, values, and vision with you, the people of Bermuda…and more specifically, to those of you residing in constituency 8. It is my hope that this additional context will aid my reception upon meeting you on your doorsteps, in the polling station, or out and around our community. Let’s start with my background.

While my first home was on Ord Valley Lane, “home” has changed enough times for me to learn that home is where you build your community. So while the homestead will always be Granny Lorraine Fubler’s on Kilderry Lane…I’ve built home in many spaces and places:

• be it in Crawl, where I attended Francis Patton
• Or Dockyard and Somerset, while attending Somerset Primary and Sandys
• Then back to Warwick to start my high school journey at CedarBridge Academy.

As an aside, you may have noticed that I am indeed a proud product of our public education system; a system that I am deeply committed to assisting with growing from strength-to-strength for our future generations.

Turning further afield, my wife Gia and I have also been privileged to build communities while living in metropolises like in Toronto, Bangkok, and New York City.

Throughout these adventures abroad, I’ve found that the key to successful community building has been to focus on being genuine and favouring collaboration over competition.

Although, given the circumstances, I suppose that some competition will be required and I am confident that my values, vision and variety of skills will confirm for you that I am the best fit for the role.

For those of you that do already know me, especially since my return home, my values will likely be unsurprising:

I value economic justice. All of us deserve a fair chance at making a financially stable existence. We need a fair economic system that protects the people already here, while also attracting our desperately needed population growth.

I value walkable and bikeable urban areas with mixed use land zoning. We’re so small, driving and parking shouldn’t need to rank so high on our list of concerns and there’s little reason for Town to be the only developed economic area on the island.

I value social safety nets. I believe that health care and housing should be a right. We can not claim to be an advanced society while also allowing some of us to slip through the cracks.

I value energy utilities that drive expansion of promising renewable energy sources. Energy resiliency is imperative being so isolated from everything else and we deserve to have utilities that leverage emerging technologies to drive down cost and improve reliability.

I value the green spaces and the natural beauty that is found on and around our nation. Environmental stewardship is our responsibility. We have a duty to ensure that our existence minimizes negative impact on the flora and fauna we share the world with.

I very much value data driven decision making. Feelings are an important input to the decision making process, but if they don’t align with the measured observations, then our approach has to change and a compromise of our longstanding convictions may be required.

I feel like I could go on for far too long about values, but in the interest of brevity, and to avoid repetition, turn to the work that the Social Justice Bermuda team has produced if you’d like to know more about my values.

I’m proud to work with such a great cross-section of our island nation’s considered, passionate and compassionate advocates for positive change and I’d like to contribute that ethos to the Progressive Labour Party in the House of Assembly.

And now onto vision… what do I see for our future?

Specifically, for Smith’s South, I’d like to see enhanced protection and stewardship of our parks and green spaces. Increased economic activity through the nurturing of small businesses in the area.

I’d like to see a return to community building and this time around, have it cross our socio-economic stratification. Think revitalization of our neighbourhood community centers and mixed income housing development. Either we’re all in this together, or none of us are.

On the national scale, my strongest desire is to see our government undergo a digital transformation.

Technology is the lynchpin undergirding every significant organizational process change, and we need to start paying off some of the technical debt we’ve accumulated over the decades in order to facilitate a more agile government that is capable of quickly pivoting to meet the populace’s needs. Our 50 sq km fishhook of an archipelago in the middle of the Atlantic is the ideal testbed for innovation. We the people just need to engage with the process…and each other.

My educational and work experience place me in prime position to assist our government and community in addressing many of our issues. I am ready to work for you.

I’d like to close by thanking the team that will be assisting me through this journey, the family members who were able to join me here today, the friends I’ve met along the way, and the viewers at home for indulging my little speech this morning.

Most importantly, I need to thank my wife Gia for her love, care, and additional support as our family sacrifices through what undoubtedly will be a challenging time. I also want to say hi to Soleil and Adi, who will probably need to skip through most of this to get to their shoutout. Daddy loves you.

Again, thank you all and good day.

Update: Opposition Leader Jarion Richardson said, “The One Bermuda Alliance extends a warm welcome to politics to Mischa Fubler, the candidate for the Progressive Labour Party in the Bye-Election for Constituency 8. Admittedly, we were surprised that Senator Owen Darrell would not continue his electoral challenge in Constituency 8, as he did in the General Election 2020. Nevertheless, we are looking forward to a rigorous, thorough examination of the candidates by the voters. We, of course, are committed to ensuring the victory of our candidate, Senator Ben Smith.”

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