It’s been a night of ups and downs, with one notable down:
1469 – Nancy Stewart
1083 – Tony Viola
So while my candidate didn’t win, there is a story to tell in a minute. In other races I had successful candidates (Annette Groves with 70% of the vote; Jason Payne with 37% of the vote) and a significantly unsuccessful one – Garry Moore at Mayor with 5084 votes to Marolyn Morrison’s 7150. It’s a tough blow for a Town that were never full aware of the damage this lady has caused, and who are likely about to find out in a big way.
For Tony, there’s some good news. Number one, his goal of knocking off three-time winner Nancy Stewart was realized. He established enough doubt in voters minds to sway their attention off of her. Unfortunately they weren’t willing to give him the ball to run with, going with the 17-years experience of Richard Whitehead. Here’s where things get interesting.
As previously noted, Tony’s signs went missing en masse twice. Last weekend they all left my Greenpark subdivision here on the south end of the ward, including the one on my lawn. Last night, every sign in Caledon East (the entire village) went missing. These were significant as they were near a major polling station which now had no Viola coverage. It gets better. The two polling stations in the south, where Tony’s support was, were the only ones in Caledon requesting identification. Best of all, an area in south Albion where it was well-known Tony would do well due to the sheer number of signs and support, went completely missing from the voter list. Everyone there would have to add themselves, all during the evening drive home.
So sadly we’ll never know if these “events” cost Tony the couple hundred votes that might have made the difference. But in the end I sadly acknowledge a failed effort to get Tony in, regardless of a noted great campaign. We tried hard, we did our best, and by God, we got rid of Nancy Stewart. Huzzah.