Reader's Question - Does a City Councillor Have To Resign To Run For Mayor
With the civic byelection set for November 3rd we were asked by a reader if a councillor decided to run for the vacant mayor’s chair would they have to resign?
To get the answer we put the questions asked to the Ministry of Government Relations.
In a written response the Ministry responded as follows:
Please find below the answers to your questions.
1. If a current sitting councillor runs for mayor, do they need to resign to do so?
· As per section 71 of The Local Government Election Act, 2015, when a by-election is called for mayor in an urban municipality, including cities, a councillor can be nominated without having to resign from their current elected office.
· If the successful candidate is a council member, they are deemed to have resigned from their current office of councillor on the day before the election results are declared. The successful candidate would not be required to submit a written notice of resignation.
· If the council member is not the successful candidate, they would continue in their current elected office.
2. If they do have to resign, what is the process for that and how soon do they need to resign?
· A council member is not required to resign. However, a council member may resign from their elected office at any time by submitting written notice of their resignation to the clerk or administrator.
· Once a written notice is delivered to the clerk or administrator, the resignation cannot be withdrawn.
The issue of a councillor not having to submit their resignation to run for mayor took the political spotlight during Monday evening’s discussion for setting the date of the byelection to fill the vacant mayor’s seat.
At that meeting Councillor Heather Eby expressed the opinion if a councillor did run for the mayor’s job that they resign as councillor first so that a byelection could be held for a councillor as well.
Councillor Eby’s reasoning was that if a councillor was elected and did not voluntarily resign to run that it could force a second unnecessary and unwanted byelection.
Other Council members agreed saying they did not understand the Province’s reasoning.
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