As residents of Fort Frances receive their mail-in ballots for the upcoming municipal election Nov. 10, there are three names there that some may not have expected.
You may have seen the signs erected around town announcing who is running for mayor and council and nearly every second day you can find the candidates debate being re-run on Shaw Cable channel 10.
So who are those three extra names?
They’re candidates for the two seats as public school trustees with the Rainy River District School Board.
Oh, maybe you do recognize those names after all. Well a couple of them, that is.
Running for this election are long-time board trustees Gord McBride (who has sat on the board for a remarkable 27 years and is the current chair) and Dan Belluz (who has spent nearly two decades there himself, off and on, and is vice-chair).
Filling out the candidates is newcomer Linda Wall.
Wall chose to run because she felt it was time to get involved.
“I felt it was important to have a trustee who is in the school system with children using the school system now,” she said, adding that she has a six-year-old son named David. “I’m not running because I have a beef with the current board.”
She admitted that the political atmosphere in the province had more to do with her decision to run, from the stance on environment to the way the government and boards have sometime treated teachers.
“I always think of teachers as nurturing, caring people,” she said. “I don’t like the provincial atmosphere, I don’t think its fair to teachers.
“I’m worried about the curriculum and not keeping up to technology and the environment,” she continued, adding that it is with the youth that you have to start if you want to change people’s thinking on the environment.
Wall is an employee of the Ministry of Natural Resources. She believes this position gives her an advantage when vying for the spot on the board.
“I have extensive supervisory experience, budgeting experience, and experience with the implementation of government legislation,” she said.
Wall points to her time on the economic development committee for Ignace. She is also the chair of the Fort Frances Day Care Advisory Committee.
“I’m involved and very, very concerned with early childhood development,” she said.
Wall explained that she feels that there could be more integration between the day care, early childhood development initiatives and the school system.
One thing that she has seen in other communities she liked was a system where parents could drop kids at the day care, buses would pick them up and drop them off after school, and parents could go to one place to pick up their pre-school and school aged children.
“Before and after school there’s not enough cooperation,” she said.
“The quick fix [here] was to put students in the Sixth Street school,” she continued. “That’s not going to last [with the school’s closure next year].”
For Gord McBride, putting his name back in the hat is more about unfinished business than anything else.
“Over the next three years, school board members will be responsible for expenditures of about $90 million,” he said. “And it will need to be spent wisely.”
McBride indicated that it is his extensive experience on the school board over the last quarter-century that will help spend that money wisely. Plus he has a vested interest himself.
“I have 13 grandchildren. I hope that’s the right number,” he said jokingly. “I’m a grandparent of seven children in at least four different schools in the region.
“If you have that many grandchildren in the schools and you don’t get involved. . .” he added trailing off more seriously.
“There’s a lot to learn about how the system operates,” added McBride of how his experience would benefit by being re-elected.
He is also very involved in the community. Formerly the manager of CFOB radio, McBride has been retired for several years and has time to get involved.
“I’m just generally interested in the community,” he said. “I’m a member of the Lions’ Club and have been a member of the Fort Frances economic advisory council for three years.
“On three separate occasions I’ve been president of the Chamber of Commerce,” he noted, adding “I was ‘Volunteer of the Year’ this past year.”
Dan Belluz has also sat on his share of boards and committees.
“I am chairman of the Committee of Adjustment [for the town],” said Belluz of his involvement, adding he is also on the planning advisory committee and safety committee for the town.
“I like the community, and would like to be part of the community [by being on the board again],” he added.
“I bring to the table the experience of knowing our system and knowing our staff,” Belluz said of his reason for running this time around. “I know what it takes to keep our system running. My experience would be a valuable asset to the board.”
Belluz, who works at the local Safeway, is also committed to seeing some of the things he’s been a part of come to fruition.
“I’d like to see the completion of J.W. Walker School,” he said. “And the analysis of the west end of the district [students and efficiency]. I’d like to be a part of it.
“I want to be a part of the new funding model with the new Liberal government,” he said, indicating that he was intrigued by the promises of capped classroom sizes.
Anyone who lives in the town of Fort Frances and wishes to vote for the trustee positions can mark their choices on their mail-in ballot. Mail-in ballots must be cast and mailed by Nov. 6.
For those who are represented by the two Fort Frances trustee positions but reside in the unorganized areas directly north and east of Fort Frances, including Watten, Halkirk, and Fairnington, you must vote either in the advance poll to be held Nov. 1 at board office in Fort Frances (next to Robert Moore School) from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. or at the same location on election day.
Fort Frances Times
Local News from Across the Rainy River District
