Last Updated on: 19th April 2016, 12:53 pm
Some quick results/observations on a few of the Guelph election races:
- Karen Farbridge won another term as Mayor, beating David Birtwistle by around 4300 votes. I’m fine with this. Nothing is ever perfect, but for the most part I’m happy with how the city has been run since she came back in 2006. If I could ask one favour though it would be please do everything in your power to not repeat the no transit on Sunday’s in the summer fiasco again. I didn’t think it was fair that people started calling the service cuts Karen days, but at the same time I think there maybe could have been a harder line taken against unions and anyone else concerned to prevent that from happening. The cry in this city is that we want people to use the transit system and look at it as a convenient option, but it’s not very convenient when all the buses are parked when we could really use ’em, is it? Transit and garbage collection are essential services that should never be touched. All over this city there are people who can’t or don’t drive for whatever reason, and it’s just plain wrong to take the best, sometimes only transportation option they have away from them.
- Ray Mitchell, friend of the comments section, pulled in 1182 votes. Not too shabby for a guy nobody was going to vote for. I’d be really interested to see what would happen if he decided to run again. He got much more support than he expected going into this election, and name recognition is a funny thing. I’m not sure if he could ever win, but even if he doesn’t, races need people like him to make things interesting, especially when those people have the potential to take a solid number of votes away from the ones at the top.
- Speaking of name recognition, Andy Van Hellemond is now one of our Ward 2 councillors. Yes,that Andy Van Hellemond.I’ll admit that I didn’t follow a lot of the Ward races outside of where I was voting as closely as perhaps I should have, but what I’ve read and seen has me somewhat sure that he won based on being who he is and not what he stands for. What exactly does he stand for, anyway? That’s a serious question. I guess time will tell what he brings to the table. Please, just don’t let what he brings to the table be 4 years worth of shitty, supposedly clever hockey-related references in every goddamn news article that will be written about him. Listen media: I know you love doing that stuff, but 9 times out of 10 you’re really bad at it and it’s sad. Leave the humour to those of us with a sense of it. Thanks.
- Nothing changed in Ward 3, where Carin and I live. Maggie Laidlaw (2,296 votes) and June Hofland (2,202 votes) were both re-elected easily. I didn’t vote for Maggie this time, but I’m mostly ok with her coming back and pretty much expected it. The thing is that between thecage-free egg nonsense last yearand her position on and handling of herself during the downtown roundabout issue, she lost me. she didn’t even have the courtesy to respond to Carin’s roundabout letter even though the 2 don’t agree. It’s a lot easier to respect somebody who can coherently state a position you disagree with than it is a person who ignores you completely, then acts like a bit of a baby during the meetings.
- And on the subject of things that kinda suck, word is that voter turnout was down from 2006. It was 33.9%, 6% off the previous mark. Way to go Guelph, especially at a time when some places are reporting higher numbers.
- There wasn’t a lot of changes to the way things have been for the last 4 years, but there are a few new faces on Council. One of the things that a lot of people remark on is how little fighting and dysfunction there’s been with the current group as opposed to the previous one. With the new folks on the way in it’ll be interesting to see if that continues. I’m hoping it does, because we need things accomplished, not politicians yelling at each other while the city crumbles.