Provincial election underway

Jeff Green | May 09, 2018

Local candidates ready to campaign in earnest

By the time this paper hits your post box on Thursday morning the Ontario election campaign will have been announced. With Queen’s Park finally shutting down and the election “writ” period under way the candidates in the new provincial riding of Lanark-Frontenac-Kingston (LFK) will be out campaigning in earnest. With a short campaign and the interruption brought on by the Victoria Day Weekend, the Frontenac News was unable to put together two dates for all candidates meetings with all four candidates, so we will be holding only one, in Sydenham on May 28. The exact location will be finalized this week. The meeting, which is co-sponsored by the Frontenac Federation of Agriculture, will run from 7-9pm. Full details will be available at Frontenacnews.ca and in next week’s paper.

The candidates this time around include Randy Hillier (PC) the incumbent in most of the new riding as the member from Lanark Frontenac, Lennox and Addington. He is a former electrician from Perth. Amanda Pulker-Mok, a member of Council in Mississippi Mills, is the Liberal Party candidate. Ramsey Hart, the Executive Director of the The Table in Perth, a community food program, is the NDP candidate. Anita Payne, a retired teacher from Perth, is the Green Party candidate.

The new riding mirrors the federal LFK riding, which was contested for the first time in 2016 when the Conservative Party candidate, Scott Reid won the local election with just under 50% of the vote even as his party was removed from power and relegated to the opposition benches.

As the election call arrives, the PC sit at around 40% according to an aggreagation of recent province-wide opinion polls, with the NDP and the Liberals both polling in the 25%-30% range. This leaves a few questions, such as will the Conservatives under leader Dough Ford maintain or increase that level of popularity, and if they don’t which other party will emerge as the most likely to upend them on June 7?  At the News we will be interviewing each of the local candidates for a feature edition on May 31st, our primer to the 2018 election in LFK.

Meanwhile ...

Hurry up and wait
There have not exactly been a flurry of nominations for municipal office in the first couple of weeks since the nomination period opened. With a provincial election now underway and set to gain more and more attention throughout the month May leading up to the June 7 election date, there is no real reason why candidates should be in a hurry.

The only advantage that comes from submitting nomination papers early is the ability to spend money on the campaign, which not a lot of candidates are doing. But still a number of candidates are already in.

Here is the list as of Tuesday, May 8. (In) stands for Incumbent

Addington Highlands - Henry Hogg, (In) Reeve.

Central Frontenac - none

Frontenac Islands - Bruce Higgs, (In) Howe Island

Lanark Highlands - Terry Donaldson, Mayor

North Frontenac - Ron Higgins, (In) Mayor - Gerry Martin (In) Councillor Ward 2

South Frontenac - Ron Vandewal, (In) Mayor - Alan Revill, (In) Bedford councillor - Ross Sutherland, (In) Loughborough Councillor.

Tay Valley - Susan Freeman, Reeve - Barry Crampton, Deputy Reeve – Fred Dobbie, (In) Bathurst ward councillor - Mark Burnham, (In) Sherbrooke ward councillor

In term of their legal role, Reeve and Mayor mean the same thing – both refer to the ‘head of council’ position.