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Norwich Township to Hold Ward 1 Byelection

Wednesday, 10 January 2024 at 11:20

By Marcie Culbert X @marcieculbert

A byelection will be held in Norwich Township to appoint the next councillor for Ward 1.

NORWICH TOWNSHIP - It's official, another byelection will be taking place in Norwich Township.

The Ward 1 Council seat is currently vacant after John Scholten retired at the end of 2023.

Council directed staff to create a bylaw that would trigger a byelection during yesterday's meeting. CAO Lee Robinson should be brought back to council sometime in February.

"Probably by the end of February, you will start seeing people being able to be nominated. We're thinking there will be an election probably in May sometime."

This will be the second byelection for Norwich Township for this council term, after a Ward 2 byelection was held last year. Ward 2 represents the village of Norwich, while Ward 1 represents the southern portion of the Township including the villages of Otterville and Springford.

Robinson tells us how much this byelection could cost.

"We are estimating that in addition to staff costs, it's going to cost between $17,000 and $20,000 to run the election."

During yesterday's meeting, Ward 3 Councillor Shawn Gear asked what the process would look like if council were to decide to appoint someone to the Ward 1 council seat. Robinson told him that staff would put together a report with their options which would include appointing the runner-up from the last election or accepting applications for the position.

Ward 2 Councillor Lynne DePlancke chimed into the discussion, stating that she believed a byelection was necessary because we're less than halfway through the current council term. Gear responded saying that he agreed that a byelection was the right choice but he was concerned about the financial impact, especially because the Township already had a byelection last year.

Mayor Jim Palmer stated that he was also in favour of a byelection and called the vote, in which all members of council voted in favour.

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