Nominations for mayor, city councillor, and school board trustee open on Tuesday.
Now, everyone knows that the media loves a good horse race. Who’s up? Who’s down? Who’s twirling, twirling, twirling towards freedom? It’s fun!
But at the heart of any election campaign is people. People who believe that they can make a difference. People that may already have experience making a difference. Be they dreamers, idealists, activists, or experts, maybe someone who’s just good with a calculator, there are a lot of people in town that can contribute to council, and I thought we might name some of them.
Of course, none of this is to say that anyone presently on council *must be* replaced.
I also want to give credit to GuelphToday reporter Tony Saxon for coming up with this column idea. (Although if you hate the idea, and you hate seeing your name here, Tony Saxon takes the exclusive blame. I simply gave in to peer pressure)
Let’s start with former politicians. Many people have told me that they’d like to see former MP Frank Valeriote get back into politics, and with his experience, and his long history of community involvement, he would have a lot to contribute to the work around the horseshoe.
How about a former councillor? My old (video store) boss Ian Findlay left council in 2014, but has nonetheless stayed involved on the issues, specifically energy efficiency and as a Friend of the Guelph Public Library. It’s hard to imagine two bigger files in front of the next term of council.
I would also like to nominate former mayoral candidate Ray Mitchell. If you follow Mitchell on Facebook then you know he throws a lot of flashbangs into the debate of downtown issues. He would definitely be a powerful, contrarian voice on council.
So if we’re getting into the realm of activism, there are a lot of voices who could be ripe to join a chorus on council.
Many campaigns in the provincial election (that is starting any day now) have already been talking about water. Guelph has been, and should remain, at the forefront of that discussion, so wouldn’t it be great to bring the enthusiasm of the Wellington Water Waters to our local political body? Hey Mike Nagy and Arlene Slocombe, what are you up to for the next four years?
We know that Mayor Cam Guthrie is running for re-election, and he’s been tweeting a lot about biking and active transportation. Let’s give him a potential ally in Yvette Tendick, the president of the Guelph Coalition for Active Transportation.
As for regular transit, though they’ve both run for council before, it’s hard to think of two more passionate people about transit in town than Sian Matwey and Steve Petric. Council may finally be ready to listen when it comes to transit concerns.
Susan Watson speaks passionately on a number of issues – electoral reform, a new library main branch, development – she spends so much time advocating to council, maybe she should consider trying to get a job there.
Speaking of frequent council delegates, how about Pat Fung? He’s pretty passionately insisted that council needs an accountant, and you know what they say about if you’re wanting something done right…
And if we want to talk about doing it yourself, let’s recruit Susan Carey. She’s helped turn the old Tytler School building into a community hub that houses the Guelph Tool Library, and now the Guelph Seed Library. The need to build resiliency and sustainability into communities is something we keep hearing, and will keep hearing, more about.
Part of resiliency is to help lift people out of poverty, which is why council might be benefited by someone who knows about the issue first hand. Perhaps Randalin Ellery of the Guelph and Wellington Task Force for the Poverty Elimination would be intersted. Another good choice would be Jaya James, the director of Lakeside HOPE House.
Sustainability? How about getting plastic straws out of our lives. Shayne Ward has been leading those efforts locally, and he just helped add some youth to the local provincial ballot by helping Aggie Mlynarz become the NDP candidate. Maybe he can add some youth to council.
Speaking of youth, Jay Reid and Hayley Kellett turned comedy into big business with the Making-Box, and wouldn’t it help the candor and free-flow exchange of ideas on council with a couple of improv experts in the house?
And while we’re talking about the youngs, getting younger people to get out and vote in any election is hard, let alone municipal politics. How about an expert in getting out the vote? Vote Savvy’s Yvonne Su is working on her Ph.D. and the University of Guelph, but maybe she can make being a city councillor her new side hustle.
And finally, there’s you. Whoever you are, you’re reading this, so obviously you’re interested in civic affairs, so don’t count yourself out! Let’s make this an election of not just of ideas, but an election of all the ideas.
