Kingston-area candidate’s election posters continue to be vandalized – Kingston | The Canadian News

With the final leg upon them, campaign volunteers and candidates continue to work to reach out to voters.

One way is by signposting along the roads and on private properties. But, some of those signs are being vandalized.

“One night we had shotgun shells going through a sign,” says Paul Proderick.

Proderick volunteers as a sign coordinator in Mike Bossio’s re-election campaign in Hastings: Lennox and Addington.

“ATV is running them over. Now, in the last two or three days, they are literally disappearing, they are not even broken and lying on the side of the road, ”he continues.

And Proderick does not believe that these cases are exceptional.

“There’s a sign behind me that I put up four times on the corner of Coronation and Taylor Kidd. The first time he was knocked down, the second time he was hit by an ATV, you could clearly see the tracks overhead, ”says Proderick. “The third time, the thing’s legs were immediately broken and then the fourth time it literally snapped in half and was left there.”

The Hastings: Lennox and Addington aren’t the only ones getting hit by hooligans.

Leeds-Grenville-Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes Liberal candidate Roberta Abbott says she is shocked and surprised by the vulgar language spray painted on her campaign posters.

“I didn’t expect something like this to happen in Leeds-Grenville,” he says.

Abbott has been subjected to heinous vandalism that includes insults to his gender.

I mean, it’s a cowardly, misogynistic thing. But actually, it makes me more determined to stay in politics, ”says Abbott.

Gender-specific insults are not new to women in the world of politics.

“Sadly, something that women in politics have to deal with. And it shouldn’t be the case, but there are people who feel like they want to scare women out of the political discourse, and that’s just not going to happen, ”Abbott says.

Proderick is responsible for fixing the broken and stolen signs on his driving and says he will continue to do so.

“Whether people tear down our signs or another candidate’s signs, we will come back the next day to put them back up,” he says. “So you’re wasting our time, but more importantly, you’re probably wasting your own time.”

Interfering with election cartels is a crime under both the Canadian Penal Code and the Canadian Elections Act.