The school bus driver/county warden

Jeff Green | Jan 13, 2021

It is common for South Frontenac Mayor, and 2021 Frontenac County Warden, Ron Vandewal to beg off Frontenac County meetings that extend into the afternoon because he has to pick up students from Sydenham High School and drive them home.

And even though in-school learning is off right now because of the province-wide lock-down, he is still driving twice a day because one special needs student on his run is still attending in-school classes.

But he does not think that the added responsibility as County Warden will be particularly onerous this year.

“When I gave my speech, if you can call it that, as I took the oath of office in December, all I said was that I can't promise anything this year with all that is going on,” he said this week in a phone interview from his home. “Just like anything Frances Smith hoped to accomplish last year was swept away by COVID, the same will be true this year.”

The oath of office was administered by South Frontenac Director of Financial Services Louise Fragnito in the empty South Frontenac Council chamber and witnessed virtually by members of Frontenac County Council on Zoom and broadcast on Youtube.

The first time Vandewal took the oath of office as Warden in the crowded Rotary Auditorium at Fairmount Home in 2017, he became emotional reflecting on his father, who served as County Warden in 1983.

Similarly he thinks that serving as Warden this year will be pretty low-key as well.

“There are monthly Eastern Ontario Warden'e meetings to attend and I've registered for the ROMA (Rural Ontario Municipal Association) conference, but I expect I will attend everything from my living room, which is less time consuming, and cheaper, than travelling. You don;t learn as much when you don;t meet people in person. I have learned a fair bit from some of the people I've met, over the years, at different events, and I've brought that information back to South Frontenac. Being the Mayor of South Frontenac is still my main job, the warden role is less demanding” he said.

He has already set a new precedent for himself as Warden, when he voted in favour of the 2021 County budget.

“I've made it clear throughout my career that I will not support a budget with an increase over 2%, and because of some funding changes the county budget came in lower than expected an I voted for it,” he said.

He added that he does recognise that Frontenac County Chief Administrator Kelly Pender has influenced his thinking on county budgets.

“Kelly is correct when he points out that almost all of the county budget comes from salaries and you can't do much about that. In the township we can decide to put off some road work if we want to being in a lower budget but the county can't do that.”

One thing that does not interest Vandewal is the idea of jumping to another political level, which is relatively common among municipal politicians.

North Frontenac Mayor Ron Higgins is seeking the Progressive Conservative nominatoin for the next provincial election, which will take place in 2022 or earlier, and former Central Frontenac Mayor and current council member in both Central Frontenac and Frontenac County, Bill MacDonald, ran provincially for the Liberal Party twice.

“I have no interest in that level of politics. My interest is in South Frontenac and that is it,” he said.