One on One with Markus - Caroline Hallsworth

Two hours into her first job with the city, Caroline Hallsworth was told Sudbury would no longer exist and that it would be amalgamated with seven other surrounding areas.

Hallsworth, who is now recently retired from the city, sat down with CBC Morning North host Markus Schwabe. It's part of a special interview series called One on One with Markus that features longer conversations with some of the interesting people in our communities.

Hallsworth eventually ended up working for the City of Greater Sudbury after getting a degree in history and english. Her parents were both librarians, and she remembers her father telling her not to become a librarian as he felt she wouldn't get a job.

Despite that, Hallsworth started her career at McMaster University and eventually she and her husband came back home to Sudbury to work. After working part time at the libraries at Laurentian University and Cambrian College, Hallsworth got the position of the CEO of the Sudbury Public Library.

"My first day at the Sudbury Public Library was an adventure," she said. "I walked in at 9 a.m. and they'd had a break-in overnight."

Two hours later, she says it was announced the amalgamation of the City of Greater Sudbury, a plan to combine eight areas into one city.

"I had two hours of seniority," she said. "I kept my job and volunteered to sit on the task force that looked at libraries and museums and how we would amalgamate seven different library systems into one."

Transforming the library system

During the amalgamation process, Hallsworth says she worked to bring libraries into town centres within the new city.

"We transformed how we deliver library services because one of the premises of amalgamation was that you could still do municipal services in your home community," she said.

"In some places, like in Dowling, we transformed the town hall into a new library because their library was a teeny, tiny box that really didn't meet what we needed. In other places, we transformed the library into having a service counter."

That model got Sudbury noticed. The city was recognized on a national level and Hallsworth says she was the only Canadian to get an award from the American Library Association that year.

Hallsworth says she didn't realize how much the library model was getting noticed until she went to visit a library on vacation in rural Nova Scotia.

"They said 'We heard about what you do in libraries in Sudbury'," she recalled. "I spent an hour talking to them."

Council chambers

Hallsworth says during her career, she was also involved in assisting new city councillors learn meeting procedures after they got elected.

"We do a lot of orientation at the beginning," she said. "We do mock council meetings to practice procedure."

Hallsworth says she's a "real believer in democracy" and says as executive director of legislative services and city clerk, her role was to protect it. She says there were many times at city council when she didn't agree with the decisions the councillors were making.

"But that doesn't matter," she said. "I'm one of 160,000 people who live in this community. I don't get to say yes or no."

She also helped implement online municipal voting in Greater Sudbury. Hallsworth says the system was stressful to implement, but made democracy more accessible.

"The online polls allowed people to vote who might not otherwise have been able to vote," she said. "My kids voted from university."

Looking ahead

Now retired, and despite working near politicians for most of her career, a second career in politics is not in the cards.

"I have no interest in running in politics," she said.

"I think I'm going to go and do some new and different things. I'm not sure what they are yet."

Hallsworth says she's had a few offers and may consider doing consulting work for future elections. She says she and her family have no intention on leaving Greater Sudbury.