Mon July 6: Owen Sound & Grey-Bruce Community News
News and updates involving Owen Sound Election 2026, Hepworth Sawmill Trails, Arran-Elderslie, 'Find the Fish' in Walkerton, the wreck of the 'Erie Belle,' and a lot more
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EDITORIAL OPINION
Owen Sound has a curious problem heading into the fall election: more people want to lead the team than join it.
The mayor’s chair has drawn a crowd. The seven seats where the actual work of running the city happens have not; the field there sits a candidate short of even filling the ballot. We break down who’s in, who isn’t, and which incumbents have yet to file in the piece below.
It’s worth asking why the top job attracts a lineup while the harder, quieter work of council goes begging. Part of the answer may lie in the term now ending — four years in which the public’s place at the table narrowed more than once, and residents told the City, in its own survey, that they felt shut out.
And they weren’t quiet about it. When the City asked residents how it should shape the next 25 years to get us to a prosperous and successful Year 2050, the answers that came back — nearly a thousand of them — read less like a wish list than a demand for a different way of doing things.
People asked to be heard. They asked for follow-through. They asked, plainly, for change. We published and analyzed those responses, and the through-line is hard to miss: residents want a council that listens and acts.
One change is already locked in. Mayor Ian Boddy is not seeking re-election, so whoever wins the crowded race for his chair, the city will have a new face at the head of the table.
But the mayor casts one vote of nine. The other seven — the votes that actually carry a decision — are where change would have to be built, and that's where the field is currently thin. No one, so far, has filed to challenge the deputy mayor.
More details inside:
Miranda Miller
Editor
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Public Notices
Notice of Virtual Public Town Hall July 7: Bruce Area Solid Waste Recycling (BASWR) Service Review - Municipality of Arran-Elderslie
Public Meeting called re: Rezoning Application for lands at the southwest corner of the intersection of 6th Avenue West and 10th Street ’A’ West - City of Owen Sound
Grey County moving forward with plans to transfer roads with local municipalities - Grey County
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