He is seeking a third term on city council and for Gary Clarke, as in his two previous campaigns, infrastructure renewal an affordable housing are top-of-mind issues.
As he stressed in 2018, “We have to partner with service clubs and other levels of government.
“We can’t do it alone.”
In this re-election bid, Clarke is promoting the need for an addiction treatment centre to serve both St. Thomas and Elgin county.
Clarke is one of six St. Thomas councillors seeking re-election.
He would like to see a push forward with a palliative care hospice for St. Thomas and Elgin.
The city has already donated land on South Edgeware Road overlooking Waterworks Park for Hospice of Elgin but, apart from several large financial donations, no visible progress has been made on the facility.
St. Joseph’s Health Care Society will own and sponsor the hospice with governance through a local board of directors. Two years ago, the construction costs were in the range of $5.2 million.
With homelessness and affordable housing hot-button issues in the Oct. 24 municipal election in St. Thomas, Clark points out that progress has been made over the term of this council to address both.
With rising costs across the spectrum, Clark cautions the new council will have to be sensitive to significant increases in property taxes while ratepayers wrestle with stressed-out budgets.
One area that has received minimal attention this campaign is energy resources.
Clarke notes the lack of land available to attract new industries to St. Thomas, although the process of acquiring 800 or so acres of farmland in the northeast quadrant of the city will begin to address that shortage.
Looking back at the 2018 election results, Clarke finished third with 5,032 votes, behind Steve Peters and Jeff Kohler.
Written by Ian McCallum
