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Wasting no time, Leamington Mayor Hilda MacDonald has declared she will seek re-election this fall.
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The first-term mayor filed her nomination papers last week for the Oct. 24 municipal election. Nominations opened May 2 for the Ontario municipal elections.
“I’ve always announced close to the beginning,” said MacDonald. “I like to get those things out of the way so that it’s clear.
“I know the first time I ran for council, I filed the first week. I was one of the first people. Get it out there and move on. No one needs to wonder.”
With many important municipal projects at various stages of planning and some community issues that need “nurturing,” MacDonald said she isn’t ready to walk away.
“Definitely COVID put a pause on some of the plans that we had for the four years,” she said. “So we’ve got some important things that are in the cue and will not far enough along that I feel that I want to let go.”
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Projects like the multi-million dollar conversion of the former Leamington district high school property into affordable and attainable housing and the north trunk sewer line, which are in the planning and financing stages.
Calling it a “delicate” process, MacDonald would also like to find a lighting solution for area greenhouses “that is fair and equitable on both sides, that still allows the industry to grow but doesn’t negatively affect the residents.”
As well, housing for temporary foreign workers is an ongoing issue.
“I think it takes some careful conversation to get it to where you find the perfect balance and we’re not there yet,” she said.
And she’s excited about a new waterfront master plan that also needs some “nurturing.”
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“It isn’t that I have to have my fingers on it,” MacDonald said. “It’s that I want to be part of it. I want to see some of these things through to completion.”
The 68-year-old life-long Leamington resident beat the incumbent mayor, John Paterson, in 2018. Before that, she served one term as deputy mayor and two terms as a councillor.
She believes she will face opponents in the election, although as of Monday there were no other declared candidates.
“It’s early. I’ve heard rumors so I do expect to have a few (opponents), more than one probably.”
MacDonald worked part-time for many years for an optometric company after being home raising her children.
She said being older is considered a part-time job but she doesn’t work part-time hours.
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“I’m here every day,” she said. “I feel that it requires me to be on the job every day and that includes weekends.
“I do see this as a full-time job. I think it’s difficult to not be available to staff and to the public.”
But she added, “It has been a great exciting challenging term. I’d like another go.”
MacDonald is the only woman this term to hold the position of mayor in Windsor or Essex County.
Three current majors — LaSalle’s Marc Bondy, Amherstburg’s Aldo DiCarlo and Pelee Island’s Raymond Durocher — have all announced they will not seek re-election in the fall.
