Wood Buffalo elects new mayor

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The Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo, which includes the communities of Fort McMurray, Fort McKay, Fort Chipewyan, Anzac, Janvier and Conklin, has a new mayor.

Doug Faulkner was elected to the position at the May 26 byelection in the northern municipality.

"We did it. The people of Wood Buffalo came through," Faulkner said after the final ballots had been counted.

He won the election by only 254 votes over competitor Jim Carbery.

Faulkner, a former clergyman, said he is dedicated to all residents of the municipality.

"People have made fun of me about my preaching background and I don't care," he was quoted as saying. "I want to preach to all corners of Wood Buffalo."

In the Aboriginal communities, returning officer Pauline Gauthier said voter turnout was not as high as she would have liked to see.

"The Native turnout was quite low," she said, but added that municipal elections historically have a low Aboriginal response.

Gauthier, who is also returning officer for the upcoming federal election, said it is not uncommon for upward of 80 per cent of Aboriginal communities to vote federally. Aboriginal people living on reserves are not eligible to vote in municipal elections, so only Aboriginal people living off the reserves were counted on the voters' list.

In the Fort Chipewyan area, of the 650 eligible voters, 132 made it to the ballot boxes. Fort McKay recorded just 57 of 250 eligible votes cast. The Anzac community had a good turnout with 156 of a possible 360 people casting votes. Twenty-three votes were counted in Janvier out of a possible 113, and Conklin saw 46 people hit the polling station out of 109 registered electors.

Only 9,000 of an eligible 22,000 votes were cast in the entire municipality.

In each of the Native community polling stations, Faulkner came in a distant second to Carbery, except in Anzac where Faulkner received 108 of the 156 votes tallied.

Faulkner was surprised first by the fairly low voter turnout in Aboriginal communities and also by the low number of votes for him.

"I didn't do so hot at all," he said.

Faulkner said he made a special effort to travel to the rural areas of the massive 67,000 sq. km area, but despite his disappointment, he is committed to visiting each area several times more through his term.

Already, one of his top priorities is to bring the Aboriginal communities closer to discussion tables on issues dealing with the entire municipality.

"I have committed myself to being a people's mayor."

During the planned community visits, Faulkner said he will listen to the needs of the people and not just go there and tell them what is being planned around them.

"I am not going to go into those communities and tell the Aboriginal people what to do. . . I will go there to listen to them."

Faulkner was officially sworn into office on June 3.