Midland has moved forward these past four years, together.
Over the past term, we've delivered real results for our community:
- $30+ million in non-tax revenue and grants brought in, easing pressure on taxpayers.
- More than 2,000 new homes approved, with over 100 already built, plus supportive and affordable housing projects underway.
- New commercial development bringing jobs to Midland.
- New parks and recreation facilities, including Midland's first splash pad for families to enjoy.
- Master plans completed for our waterfront, parks and trails, and tourism.
- Infrastructure upgrades across roads, sidewalks, sewers, and water systems.
- And one of the lowest municipal tax increases in the region (0.98%) without cutting a single service.
We brought you festivals, dozens of events, re-started music in the park, and brought you the Snowbirds!
There's still more to do. It never stops. But together, we've built real momentum for Midland's growth and future.
Steady Leadership
Power given back. A team kept together.
- Ontario extended Strong Mayor powers to Midland in May 2025, including authority over the CAO, department heads, committee appointments and budget vetoes. Days later, Bill voluntarily delegated nearly all of it back to Council and staff.
- The one power the law does not allow a mayor to hand back is preparing the annual budget. For the 2026 budget, the first under these new rules, Bill chose not to use his veto over Council's amendments, keeping the same collaborative process Midland has always used.
- A largely new Council has worked together for four years without splitting into factions or blocs, something many municipalities have struggled with this term.
- Council lost two of its own during this term: Deputy Mayor Jack Contin, a close friend and Bill's right hand, and longtime councillor and former mayor Jim Downer. Both vacancies were filled through an open, public appointment process, in full view of residents, and Council never missed a beat.
- Rebuilt the Town's relationship with the Downtown Midland Business Improvement Area, now backed by a dedicated staff liaison so communication and collaboration on events and downtown beautification actually work.
- Repaired the relationship with the Midland Public Library, which had frayed in previous terms, and put a Council representative back on the Library Board this term.
- Settled numerous outstanding appeals to the Official Plan and restored a working relationship with the local development community. The proof is in the results: rising development applications, new growth and business expansion across Midland this term.
- Part of a broader effort to mend relationships with community partners that had been damaged before this Council took office, because Midland works better when the Town, its community organizations, the development community and its residents are pulling in the same direction.
- That same collaborative approach extends to our neighbouring municipalities. Shared regional facilities like the Sports and Recreation Centre and the Public Library depend on partners doing their part, and when that funding gets shaky, Bill's instinct is to find a workable solution together rather than pull back unilaterally, the same thinking behind adding a septage receiving station to Midland's own headworks project so Tiny Township and other rural neighbours have a local place to dispose of hauled septage, instead of leaving them without an option.
- County Councillor, County of Simcoe, since November 2022: the County delivers services across the region including social housing, land ambulance, waste management, Ontario Works, children's services, long-term care and land use planning, and Midland has a voice in every one of those decisions.
- Vice Chair, Southern Georgian Bay OPP Detachment Board, since April 2024: an inaugural member of the new community governance model for local policing under Ontario's Community Safety and Policing Act.
- Commissioner, Huronia Regional Airport Commission, since February 2023: working to grow the airport's role in the region's economy and quality of life.
- Board Member, Simcoe Muskoka District Health Unit, since January 2023: helping shape public health programs and services across the region.
- Responds personally to phone calls, text messages and social media messages from residents, rather than routing everyone through staff.
- Stays active on social media despite the negativity and toxicity that often comes with it, because being reachable matters more than staying comfortable.
- Routinely meets residents directly to hear their concerns, taking action himself where it's within the Town's jurisdiction and pointing people to the right resource when it isn't.
- That kind of accessibility carries real personal cost and little political upside. Most mayors won't put themselves out there the same way, but residents deserve a Mayor they can actually reach.
Keeping Taxes in Check
Below inflation on what Council controls.
- Secured over $30 million in non-tax revenue and provincial or federal grants over the term, reducing the burden on local taxpayers.
- Delivered the 2026 budget, Midland's first under the province's new Strong Mayor authority, still built collaboratively with Council, holding the core municipal operations portion of the tax rate to a 0.98% increase, well below inflation and the piece of the bill Council actually controls. The blended total taxpayers see, once OPP policing, outside agencies, county and education rates are all factored in, comes in at 3.15%, a number shaped as much by county and school board rates as by anything Council decides.
- Costs outside the Town's control, like OPP policing, are the biggest driver of the rest of the bill, not municipal spending choices: after a staggering 26% OPP cost increase in 2025, Bill lobbied the province directly, and 2026's OPP increase was held to 11%, still steep, but a fraction of where it was headed.
- When the province and federal government challenged municipalities to cut development charges by up to 50% over three years in exchange for a shot at grants covering up to 90% of housing-enabling infrastructure costs (normally paid for by those development charges), Midland stepped up: Council pledged a 60% cut, conditional on securing funding, and put forward five major infrastructure projects worth a combined $35 million-plus in this funding round.
- Started charging a nominal fee for non-residents using Midland's public boat launch to access Georgian Bay. The revenue goes directly into the harbour budget to offset maintenance and operations, and has already paid for significant upgrades to the docks and ramps.
- The Sports and Recreation Centre costs more than $1.5 million a year to operate, a bill made harder by funding that neighbouring municipalities have withdrawn or refused to share. Council explored non-resident user fees to help close that gap.
- After extensive consultation with the facility's core user groups, Council started with an easier win instead: naming rights. Bourgeois Auto Group, a major local employer, won the bid for a yearly sponsorship, and the former North Simcoe Sports and Recreation Centre is now the Bourgeois Community Centre. The sponsorship dollars take pressure off local ratepayers without charging residents more to use their own rec centre.
- Launched the Mayor's Annual Charity Golf Tournament, which now funds the Community Grants Fund entirely, no longer paid for through taxation. The 2026 intake awarded $48,000 to local charities and community groups as seed funding for programming and activities that serve the Midland community, drawing applications from 34 organizations.
- Midland's Municipal Accommodation Tax brings in well over $150,000 a year from hotel and motel stays, funding Destination Midland's tourism marketing instead of the property tax base, marketing that would otherwise come out of residents' pockets, or not happen at all. Extending that same fairness to short-term rentals, already underway, only grows this revenue stream further.
Enabling the Homes Midland Needs
More homes, more housing types, more fairness.
- More than 2,000 new homes approved for construction this term, with over 100 already built and nearly 5,000 in the approval pipeline.
- Launched a review to correct natural heritage designations wrongly applied to more than 800 privately owned properties under the old Official Plan, land the Town does not own, not municipal property or parkland. Those baseless designations exposed Midland to legal liability and cost private owners money to appeal; correcting them means sticking to the Town's proper role as land use planner, not imposing restrictions without merit.
- Backed the Redwood Park Communities project at 259 King Street: 15 affordable rental units for adults with developmental disabilities.
- Donated Town land at Tiffin Park to the Georgian Bay Native Friendship Centre to support affordable seniors housing.
- Championed the Balm Beach Road subdivision, provincially approved for roughly 488 homes, including affordable units, rental apartments, attainable townhomes and lots donated to Habitat for Humanity.
- Approved another mixed-housing subdivision from the same developer at 983 Yonge Street, roughly 137 homes made up of low-rise rental apartments, townhouses and single-family homes, right on Midland's transit route and close to schools and shopping.
- Settled numerous outstanding Official Plan appeals and rebuilt a working relationship with the development community, one of the biggest reasons applications, growth and business expansion have picked up across Midland this term.
- Bill believes in the Housing First model: stable housing as the foundation that makes it possible to address addiction, mental health and other challenges, not something people have to earn after solving those challenges on their own.
- Much of what drives homelessness, addiction and mental illness, and most of the funding and programs that respond to them, sits with the provincial and federal governments and the County of Simcoe, not with the Town. Midland has focused its efforts where they can actually make a difference: community safety, and getting more homes built.
- Works directly with the County of Simcoe to advocate for more outreach programs and services on the ground here in Midland.
- As a lower-tier municipality, land use planning, approving new projects and streamlining the process for property owners and developers, is Midland's single biggest lever for housing affordability, and where this Council has focused its energy.
Downtown & Waterfront
Protecting what makes Midland special.
- Relaunched the Midland Bay Landing process with a fresh public collaboration phase, including an online survey and a community open house, before any call for proposals went out.
- When proposals didn't work for taxpayers under today's market conditions, Council chose not to rush into a bad deal, protecting the site's future for the community.
- In June 2026, Council formally declined to award the Midland Bay Landing development contract to any proponent, after proposals fell short on the community priorities identified through public engagement: waterfront access, appropriate scale, the right land uses and lasting public benefit. That leaves the next council with a real choice, and I intend to re-engage the community first, the same way we did when this plan was originally built a decade ago, to review it and consider changes that reflect where Midland's priorities stand today, before deciding whether to try another call for proposals once market conditions improve, or take inspiration from the existing master plan, modify it to reflect that renewed community input, and keep the project under municipal control, phasing in development on the Town's own timeline as funding becomes available. Either way, it's a decision residents will make by choosing who sits on the council elected this October.
- In the meantime, the Town is improving public access to the east side of the site: better parking, trails and pedestrian access to the water.
- Eliminated paid downtown parking after residents and businesses spoke out about confusing pay-and-display machines and a roughly $250,000 annual deficit.
- Downtown parking has stayed free for the rest of the term.
- Ran a full public Parking Study in 2025, with an open house on the future of downtown, harbour and boat launch parking, to shape what comes next with resident input rather than behind closed doors.
- Midland's Municipal Accommodation Tax has funded Destination Midland tourism marketing since 2024, paid for by hotels and motels.
- Short-term rental hosts have not been required to collect or remit the same tax, despite benefiting from the same tourism marketing that fills their listings.
- Council advanced a light-touch, registry-style short-term rental bylaw, now headed to public consultation, so hosts contribute their fair share alongside hotels.
Investing in Infrastructure
Roads, sewers and water, funded responsibly.
- Completed a generational reconstruction of Yonge Street, one of Midland's major east-west arterial roads, from King Street to County Road 93.
- Replaced aging sewer and watermain infrastructure below the street, the kind of unglamorous work that has to happen before anything else can be built on top of it.
- Reconfigured the road itself for safety, adding new cycling lanes and a design built around traffic calming and pedestrian safety, not just moving cars through faster.
- The layout wasn't decided behind closed doors. The Town held numerous public engagement sessions so residents could weigh in directly on the street's design, and that input shaped the final plan.
- The second-largest infrastructure project Midland has completed since the King Street downtown revitalization the previous term, delivered in five phases from May 2025 through spring 2026 to keep the corridor as usable as possible throughout.
- Major road reconstruction underway on Eighth Street and Hugel Avenue. For Eighth Street, Council chose a design that keeps on-street parking while still adding bike lanes on both sides, replacing aging sewers and watermain below.
- Five infrastructure projects worth more than $35 million submitted for provincial cost-sharing funding.
- Secured $30.1 million in provincial Housing-Enabling Water Systems Fund grants in 2024 to upgrade the Town's wastewater headworks and the 12/93 corridor, unlocking capacity for more than 3,000 future homes without new costs to ratepayers.
- Continued upgrades to sidewalks, sewers and water systems town-wide.
- Updated Midland's provincial funding request for the Town's headworks project to add a new septage receiving station, replacing an aging, out-of-compliance one the Town itself no longer needed. The new station gives Tiny Township and other rural neighbours a local place to dispose of hauled septage from residents who aren't on municipal sewer service. Midland pursued it because the business case worked and the province was willing to help fund it, a practical way to help our rural neighbours instead of leaving them without an option.
Parks, Recreation & Culture
More reasons to love where we live.
- Building Midland's first splash pad at Little Lake Park.
- Celebrated the grand opening of brand-new amphitheatre seating and a stage, which has been in steady use all year for concerts, events and community gatherings.
- A new small dog off-leash park opens at Little Lake Park this fall.
- Installing a new commemorative crosswalk honouring our veterans near the cenotaph, completed this October.
- Completed master plans for the waterfront, parks and trails, and tourism.
- Helped close the final gap in the Ganaraska Hiking Trail, connecting Midland's waterfront to a 500-kilometre trail network stretching from Port Hope to Collingwood, the result of years of cooperation between Midland, Penetanguishene and Tiny Township.
- Launched the first-ever Georgian Bay Waterfront Festival.
- Ontario's Best Butter Tart Festival drove an estimated $24 million in regional visitor spending, and Tall Ships Midland drove nearly $10 million more over its weekend, per the Tourism Regional Economic Impact Model for our regional tourism zone, real proof that investing in these events pays off for local businesses.
- Brought the Canadian Forces Snowbirds to soar over Midland Bay for a community-wide celebration.
- Restarted the Music in the Park summer series.
- Most of these upgrades were made possible by successfully securing provincial funding, rather than relying purely on property taxes to pay for them.
Community Safety & Support
Compassion and safety, working together.
- Launched an annual Hope, Housing and Health community symposium, now in its third year, bringing residents face-to-face with the service providers and experts working on homelessness, addiction and poverty.
- The symposium series produced a practical Community Response Toolkit for residents and local businesses.
- Added private security patrols to the marina, Little Lake Park and the downtown core to respond to vandalism and keep our public spaces safe.
- Partnered with Waypoint Centre for Mental Health Care and the Downtown Midland BIA, split 50/50 with the BIA, to launch the Curbside Cleaners program: participants from local mental health rehabilitation services provide roughly 30 combined hours a week of hands-on cleaning and upkeep in the downtown core, pairing a cleaner, more welcoming downtown with real, barrier-reduced employment for people working their way back into the workforce.
- Launched automated speed cameras on September 2, 2025 in two elementary school zones: William Street outside Sacred Heart Catholic School, and Yonge Street outside Mundy's Bay Public School, using a legal safety tool municipalities across Ontario have relied on for years.
- In the roughly ten weeks the cameras operated, they measurably slowed drivers down in both school zones, exactly what the program was meant to do.
- The province ordered every municipal speed camera in Ontario switched off on November 13, 2025, ending Midland's program along with every other municipality's, only weeks after it went live. The Town did not lose money winding it down.
- Reasonable people saw this differently: some residents were glad to see the cameras go, others rallied to keep them. Bill respects both reactions. What hasn't changed is the goal, speeding near our schools remains Midland's top traffic complaint, and Council will keep using every tool available, enforcement or engineering, to protect kids walking to school. Yonge Street, one of the two camera locations, is also where this term's biggest road project built permanent traffic calming and new cycling lanes right into the redesign.
Better Transit, Done Right
Not rushed. Reliable.
- Approved a joint Request for Proposals with Penetanguishene in March 2026 to explore a hybrid transit model, blending Mid-Pen Transit's existing fixed routes with flexible, on-demand microtransit service.
- After a thorough due diligence review of the winning proposal, staff couldn't get sufficient assurance the model would maintain current service levels without unacceptable operational or financial risk, so Council chose to pause rather than gamble with residents' transit service.
- Mid-Pen Transit continues operating exactly as it does today: same routes, same schedules, same fares, no disruption for riders.
- Midland and Penetanguishene remain committed to exploring transit improvements, but only once a model can be shown to be reliable, responsive and sustainable.
"Every major decision this term, from the Yonge Street redesign to Balm Beach Road to the pause on microtransit to the future of our waterfront to the splash pad at Little Lake Park, started with a conversation with residents, not a decision made for them."~ Bill Gordon, Mayor of Midland
My Platform for 2026–2030
Top 10 priorities for next term.
- We need to keep spending under control, the same way any small or mid-sized business, and most families, separate wants from needs when the budget gets tight. We cannot run deficit budgets, and we cannot operate as though residents can absorb whatever increases we push their way.
- As we build our plan for growth, we have to keep our financial house in order and focus on doing more with less, rather than simply adding more resources.
- With a like-minded council, I'll make careful cuts to spending, look for revenue streams that are fair and equitable to the people using those services, and press the Province to fix the inequity in Municipal Partnership Funding that leaves Midland receiving a disproportionate share compared to our rural neighbours.
- The goal is keeping taxation fair and affordable, so you feel you're getting good value for what you spend to live, work and play in Midland.
- Let's be clear: housing is not Midland's jurisdiction. The funds you're taxed for affordable housing go to the Province, who then move them to the County of Simcoe.
- Midland's role is to support and attract development: helping with re-zoning, expedited planning, development charge relief, offering qualifying Town land to the County for its housing projects, and removing red tape and discretionary delay from our processes. We can't side-step the building code or the Planning Act, and we still need the Province to make good on its own promises to streamline home building in Ontario.
- I will work with every tool available to me to make Midland a developer-friendly community, one that's easy and attractive to do business in.
- I support the Housing First strategy for homelessness, and the limited but important role Midland can play. I'll keep working with our partners at the Simcoe County Alliance to End Homelessness and their national counterparts, along with our local shelter and mental health and addiction service providers, on the foundational causes that often lead to homelessness.
- Bold steps we can take together as a community:
- Add more gentle, 'discrete' density that blends into our predominantly low-rise suburban neighbourhoods, the 'Missing Middle' between single-family homes and towers: secondary units, townhouses, medium-sized multiplexes, stacked fourplexes, side-by-side and stacked duplexes, and stacked triplexes, among others.
- Communicate openly with neighbourhoods about the benefits of housing diversity. NIMBY opposition is a real obstacle, and I believe elected officials should see promoting the benefits of density and affordable housing as part of the job.
- Pursue funding for, and adopt policies that encourage, purpose-built rental units, accessible units, smaller units within low-density neighbourhoods, and family-sized units within mid-rise buildings.
- Celebrate the wins, and the people this housing is for.
- Use the municipal planning tools available, including those offered by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities.
- OPP officers are responsive when called, but this term has shown there's room for a more proactive, visible presence: routine foot patrols downtown, radar enforcement in town, and consistent coverage across our neighbourhoods, not just the highway and county roads.
- OPP resources cover a wide area, stretching from Honey Harbour to Woodland Beach to Sawlog Bay, and Midland needs to keep advocating for our fair share of that attention.
- In the meantime, I'll keep building on tools that are within Midland's own control: expanding on this term's private security patrols at the marina, Little Lake Park and the downtown core where they're needed most, and exploring public safety cameras for the downtown core and parks to support, not replace, an active policing presence.
- I'll explore every legal option in our school and community safety zones to hold accountable the speeders who show no respect for our children and most vulnerable, and look at establishing increased penalties in areas not yet designated as community safety zones.
- I'll look at passive traffic calming measures, like speed bumps and other techniques, to slow drivers down in our residential neighbourhoods.
- I'll keep working with the OPP through the police services / detachment board to make proactive policing and a stronger community presence a real priority for Midland.
- There's a case for selling to the first qualified developer who comes along: recovering our original investment in the land, and new tax revenue from the homes proposed for phase one. But those phase-one homes, planned for the east side where the parking lot and fishing access are today, are luxury units that wouldn't meaningfully add to Midland's supply of affordable or attainable homes, and we already have hundreds of other homes, condos and apartments in the development pipeline.
- Selling off the waterfront entirely also makes it harder to build Midland into a four-season waterfront destination, if residents are left with nothing but a narrow promenade. To be fair, the current master plan has real promise: mixed-use commercial, residential and public access features, but most of that only takes shape in phase two, decades away from being built.
- I will continue to re-involve the community, just as we did a decade ago when this plan was first built, to review it, consider changes that better reflect where Midland's priorities stand today, and get a clear mandate before moving forward. That may mean amending the master plan and delaying the sale of the land while we do it, this is what I've heard from the community for four years, through petitions, letters, emails and countless articles in our local media. From there, it's a choice between trying another call for proposals once market conditions improve, or taking inspiration from the existing plan and phasing in development under municipal control, on the Town's own timeline, as funding becomes available.
- With Council's support, I will lead the community through that re-think and stay committed to seeing it through to completion, or as far as it can go this term.
- Years ago, Midland commissioned a KPMG audit to look for efficiencies and savings through collaboration with our neighbours.
- We already share a Chief Building Official with Penetanguishene, and both communities have benefited. We also share transit and some public works equipment.
- There's room for more. I will work with Tiny, Tay and Penetanguishene to explore further shared service opportunities.
- Route93 Innovation Hub (formerly the Economic Development Corporation of North Simcoe) leads on attracting industrial, agricultural, technical and skilled trades investment to Midland and our neighbouring municipalities, and the municipality supports it financially and in other ways.
- It's been difficult to get a clear measure of that effort and quantify our return on investment over the years. I remain hopeful the new executive delivers on that early in the new term.
- Midland needs business-friendly policy, a supported and nurtured downtown BIA, and fewer impediments to commercial success.
- The parking rollout was a lesson for all of us in how not to introduce change. I will stay on top of paid parking and other user-fee decisions that affect business growth, and make sure public consultation remains a top priority before any more major changes are considered or rolled out to our community.
- Residents need to be far more involved in our decision-making than simply being left to the statutory public meetings for the few matters where we're required to ask for input.
- When the public is routinely left out of collaboration in our decision-making, it only feeds the perception that the "tail wags the dog" at Town Hall. We've made real progress this term, and I intend to keep that momentum moving forward.
- When people feel included and part of the process, trust in leadership and government increases. Midland's growth and prosperity can only be achieved when we all work together toward a common goal.
- Establishing that goal, our North Star, will be the first major undertaking for the new Council, and it has to involve the community.
- I don't measure a park's value by how many people use it on a given day. The renewed appreciation for natural outdoor spaces is one of the few good things to come out of the pandemic, it's often only when you lose access to something that you realize how important it is to you.
- Publicly accessible waterfront parkland is almost an extinct resource in Midland, and it's one worth fighting for.
- Other parks, like Little Lake Park, have benefited from Council's effort this past term. Four-season use returned once we started plowing Little Lake Park Road, and it was rewarding to see people using it all winter. Winter lights in the trees, and perhaps a skating trail, an outdoor rink and other activities, can all return if there's public appetite for them.
- I look forward to working with residents to help protect, preserve, repair and enhance our outdoor spaces.
- We have millions of dollars of upgrades and repairs still to do in our community. Some of our water and wastewater pipes are pushing 100 years old, and we've been repairing them as they collapse and fail.
- The municipality has established a multi-decade capital works plan, along with forecasts for expenses and the status of our dwindling reserves. We've won grants and funding from the Province and the federal government to help repair and replace this aging infrastructure.
- Midland has challenges that require careful planning, financial stewardship and savings to stay on top of the planned work and the emergency repairs, and there's more to do in 2027 and beyond: the waterfront trail behind Aberdeen Boulevard, more combined sewer separation, water tower replacements, wastewater plant remediation, road repair, sidewalk maintenance and more.
- We're in the service delivery business, and we have to do it responsibly, and as affordably as possible.
- Every bit of effort adds up. We already have LED streetlights and energy audits in municipal buildings, along with new technology that has a smaller carbon footprint and delivers energy savings.
- We don't have the money to move our entire fleet to EV yet, but there are opportunities we haven't explored. I've seen programs that could help us capture the heat from our ice-making activities at the North Simcoe Sports and Rec Centre and use it to reduce our reliance on natural gas.
- I will look to organizations like the Municipal Climate Change Action Centre for ideas on how to adjust our policies and operations to help reduce our emissions, and explore solar installations on municipal buildings like our Rec Centre, where we could passively capture energy for use in our own complex or sell back to the grid.
- New programs and policies need to align with our goals to help mitigate climate change and its localized effects on the things that touch our infrastructure, like our weather.
What's Next
The work continues in 2026–2030.
A Personal Note
One more thing, before you vote.
What matters to me: An effective Mayor collaborates with every councillor, builds consensus and finds compromise. That takes strong leadership and a clear sense of purpose, tempered by a real willingness to seek advice from residents, respect the experience and opinions of councillors and staff, and the courage to change course when a past decision no longer serves our community's best interests. I won't promise you things that are beyond my control, but as your Mayor I can promise a continuously accessible, responsive and collaborative Council and Town Hall, one that keeps focused on holding taxes at or below inflation, keeps looking for new ways to control spending, and keeps seeking non-tax revenue and grants, as we all deal with inflation, climate change, homelessness, affordability, healthcare and community safety. Even as Mayor, I can't promise you an outcome, but I can promise we'll have the conversation. Open, accessible government isn't just a catch-phrase to me.
If you've followed local politics this past term, you'll know I stand with the community, put your needs first, and I'm not afraid to pivot to community concerns and change direction when it seems we've lost our way. I don't shy away from asking for advice or seeking community input on decisions, and I'm not discouraged by adversity, I'm still willing to work with anyone, even those with vastly different viewpoints. I will always look for compromise, except in matters of integrity or honesty. I will always put our community first.
My ask: If Midland re-elects me as mayor, I have one more ask: send me a council I can actually work with. Being effective for this town takes more than one office, it takes a team that shows up, works together, and keeps moving Midland forward instead of relitigating the past. When you mark your ballot for council, look past the signs and the slogans. Look for candidates with a plan, who are willing to collaborate instead of grandstand, and who are building something instead of just objecting to it.
Know their jurisdiction: Look, too, for a clear understanding of what's actually within Council's jurisdiction and what isn't, and be wary of anyone who'll promise you anything to get your vote. That instinct to agree with everyone about everything might feel good on the doorstep, but it sets voters up for disappointment and anger down the road, once reality meets a promise that was never Midland's to keep.
On experience: Some of this term's councillors have a real record now, four years of votes, attendance, and whether they actually showed up for residents between elections, not just during them. That record is public. I'd encourage every voter to look at it, and to ask each candidate directly why they'd be the right fit for Midland's next four years.
On my running mate: I'll say this plainly, because it matters to me: I hope to see Deputy Mayor Beth Prost back at the council table. We've worked together for coming up on eight years now, first as fellow councillors, then these past four years as she stepped up to serve as Deputy Mayor after we lost Jack Contin. That's a real, tested working partnership built on trust and a shared commitment to getting things done for Midland. She doesn't always vote with me on every issue, and that's fine, but we're aligned on the issues that matter most to Midland's future. Of course I'll work with whoever residents send to that table, that's the job, but I'll be voting for Beth, and I'd ask you to consider doing the same. Progress takes a team, and having a partner I can count on is a big part of how we got here.
Midland's next four years will be shaped by a full council, not just a mayor. Choose it carefully.
~ Bill Gordon, Mayor of Midland