Nick Kouvalis, who helped manage Rob Ford’s successful Toronto mayoral campaign has announced on his Facebook page that he will be election day chair for Kitchener-Waterloo’s Conservative candidate Peter Braid.

A key element in Ford’s victory was Kouvalis’s ability to identify the vote, and get those supporters into polling on election day. Braid’s campaign manager, Rob Wallace, confirmed Kouvalis’s appointment to the Braid organization.

“Since there was little support for this needless election, it’s a challenge to get people engaged, but we’ll work hard to return Peter to Ottawa,” Wallace said.

The Windsor-based Kouvalis and Richard Ciano run Campaign Research, which states on its website that “more than 70 staff and a dedicated data collection call centre bring their expertise together to solve our clients’ most difficult challenges and help them identify and capitalize on their opportunities.”

Dr. Barry Kay, an associate professor at Wilfrid Laurier University and a member of the Laurier Institute for the Study of Public Opinion and Policy (LISPOP), said a well-organized get-out-the-vote campaign can pay off for a candidate. This is especially the case in a riding that was decided by only 17 votes in the last election, when Braid edged Liberal incumbent Andrew Telegdi.

“As shown in the 2008 results, Kitchener-Waterloo is likely to be among the most competitive contests in the country. Local constituency effects…can have an impact of as much as five per cent of the vote,” said Kay.

In addition to the Liberal Telegdi, Braid has to get-out-the-vote against NDP candidate Bill Brown, Green Cathy MacLellan, Steven Scott of the Pirate Party of Canada, Marxist-Leninist candidate Julian Ichim, and Independent candidate Richard Walsh-Bowers.

Get-out-the-vote requires a significant budget and an army of volunteers. Near the end of the campaign, and in a matter of hours, hundreds of volunteers have to be managed and thousands of phone calls made.

Kouvalis would not disclose details but he did tell OpenFile Waterloo Region that he was "busy" with a few campaigns.

In a weekend column – Polls point to election deja vu – Liberal campaign war room expert and Daisy Consulting Group president Warren Kinsella noted that the “Liberals still have an organizational deficit. To get out the vote, the Cons have more money and more people.”

However, with five previous election victories Telegdi is expected to run a strong election day campaign and that will contribute to keeping the Kitchener-Waterloo riding on the national political-campaign radar. Many observers will be waiting to see if Kouvalis’s efforts turn into success for the Conservatives.