It’s election season here in Guelph! The nominations are open for this fall’s Municipal Election, and interested residents are filing their papers to run for positions as mayor, for city council and for a spot on one of the local school boards. Each week, this space will break down who’s new to the race, who’s running again, and where we’re still waiting for someone to show an interest!

Returning Champions

The one returning champion this week isn’t trying to win her old seat, she’s trying to win a new one.

Linda Busuttil has decided that she wants to trade in her seat on the Upper Grand District School Board for a seat on city council representing Ward 4 after 16 years representing two different areas on the local separate school board. Outside of her work on the board, Busuttil has been actively working with Willow West Village in various capacities and has represented Upper Grand at the Ontario Public School Boards’ Association.

Busuttil is the third person to file their papers to run for Ward 4, where we know there will definitely be one open seat this fall. Mike Salisbury announced that he would be stepping down from city council at the end of this term back in May, and his wardmate Christine Billings has yet to announced her intention to run for re-election. Councillor Billings is the only member of the current council who’s fate is still unknown.

New Faces

Although not technically a new face, Ray Ferraro is not currently an incumbent on city council. He hasn’t been a city councillor in nearly 20 years.

Ferraro may be more familiar to modern Guelphites as the Progressive Conservative candidate in the 2018 Provincial Election where he finished a distant second behind Mike Schreiner. Fifteen years before that though, Ferraro won the second council seat in Ward 2 thanks to 19.2 per cent of the vote, and with wardmate Dan Moziar he represented a right-wing swing on Guelph council that was met with a swift swing back to the left in 2006. Ferraro and Moziar finished in fourth and fifth place in that year’s election.

There are now five people running in Ward 2 including incumbent Rodrigo Goller. The other incumbent city councillor from this ward, James Gordon, announced last month that he will be stepping down from council after two terms.

What’s Next?

As stated above, we’re still waiting to hear what Councillor Billings is going to do, we’re also still waiting for some more candidates to run in any of the school board races.

A week from Tuesday, there will only be one month left to file your nomination papers if you intent to run for mayor, city council, or one of the local school boards.

The deadline for applying to run for mayor, city council, or any of the school board positions is August 19 at 2 pm. Election Day is October 24.