As election day winds down, Thunder Bay waits to see who'll take mayor's office

Voters can expect change at Thunder Bay City Hall, both in the mayor's office and around the council table, with a number of incumbents choosing to sit out of this fall's race. 

So far, election day has gone smoothly, with city officials just reporting a slight slowdown at polls early in Monday morning. Polls are set to close at 8 p.m. ET, and Krista Power, the city clerk, said she expects results to begin coming in shortly after 8:30 p.m.

The field of five candidates running to replace the outgoing mayor, Bill Mauro, is a mix of political veterans and newcomers, who've made their pitch to lead the northwestern Ontario city as the campaign came to a head over the past month.

But none of the candidates issued comprehensive policy documents or laid out multi-step plans for how they would tackle Thunder Bay's complex problems.

Those challenges include having the highest per-capita opioid overdose death rate in Canada last year, a police service and oversight board rocked by internal divisions and external investigations, and reports of pervasive racism toward Indigenous people.

Ken Boshcoff has the most political experience of the five candidates, having served two previous terms of council — including two as mayor, from 1997 to 2003. He also served two terms as an MP for Thunder Bay-Rainy River. 

During the 2022 election campaign, he made that experience a key part of his pitch to voters, highlighting his track record in working with community organizations and boards. 

Likewise, Clint Harris, a former newspaper publisher, based his campaign pitch on experience. He compared the role of mayor to the head of a large company and challenged other candidates to put their resumés online, as if the race were a job interview. 

Peng You is the only candidate of the five seeking to win consecutive elections, coming off a four-year term as an at-large councillor after blowing away the competition in a landslide victory in 2018. 

In 2022, he campaigned on a pledge to bring "positive energy" to Thunder Bay, to be an enthusiastic champion for the city, and to leverage his contacts at higher levels of government to bring spending to the city. 

Gary Mack, a small business owner and the former executive director of Shelter House, has tried to sell that pedigree to voters, saying his work in social services makes him best placed to tackle Thunder Bay's well-documented social issues, including the opioid crisis, homelessness and crime. 

Robert Szczepanski has positioned himself as a political outsider without ties to the establishment. He championed unique solutions to key issues, like pledging to go as far as donating part of his mayor's salary to restore street outreach services. 

As the campaign developed, key themes included each candidate's approach to social issues, solving the ongoing debate over recreational facilities, and the need to secure more money from the provincial and federal governments. 

Once the results are tallied, voters will be looking at whomever wins a seat on the council table to make good on those promises.