Minto Mayor George Bridge will not seek re-election in 2022.
After serving 12 years as Mayor in three consecutive terms starting in 2010, Bridge is stepping aside this year.
His father, Milton Bridge, and his grandfather George, also had long public service careers.
Milton served as Harriston Reeve for 12 years and also served time as Wellington County Warden. George served on Palmerston Council for over 30 years with 15 years as Reeve.
In reflecting back on his own career, the younger George says he'll miss the people he got to serve with and the staff and residents who make Minto special.
"The people of course, and we have a great staff in Minto and Wellington County, and all the other things I've been involved with, I'll miss all that good stuff. One thing I'll miss and have missed the last couple of years is all the social events we get to go to, all the fairs and the neat things you get to do when you're the mayor, so hopefully I'll get a bit of that this summer before I go."
Bridge is the first Minto mayor to hold the position for 12 years. Additionally, in his time as mayor, he has also served as Warden of Wellington County, was elected to the Board of Directors for the Federation of Canadian Municipalities and served as Chair of the Western Ontario Wardens’ Caucus Economic Development Committee.
As he now looks back on his time in office, Bridge is reminded of something his father told him and his father before him.
"My dad told me that his dad told him this, that if you're going to live in a small community, you got to pay back the community and do what you can. We have a lot of great volunteers out here that work in service clubs and other organizations. I just thought I could try to do my part after coming back, I left the area when I was 18 and came back at 53, so I tried my best to help out."
In terms of helping out, Bridge certainly has done so with his annual Mayor’s Charity Golf Tournament, which he founded in his first year as mayor. To day it's helped 38 local community groups and handed out over $117,000 to be used for various community projects. It will run again this year.
"The Mayor's Golf Tournament, by the time we're done with it this year we'll have over $125,000 given out to about 40 charities, and all the way back to my first year as Mayor starting that, it's something I've really appreciated with all the work with different charities that we've done."
With regards to other accomplishments he's proud of in his time on council, Bridge says there's just too much to recall over 12 years, but recently he says in this last term some great work was done.
"We got the hub, the Groves Youth Centre, we got that up and running in Palmerston, the renovation of the Palmerston Arena coming along. Lots of subdivisions coming in, and we've sold all our industrial land, unfortunately, but we do have some great stuff coming in there."
Being a growing and inclusive community is something important to Bridge, as well, he says, and that's been reflected recently in his advocacy for the local Minto Pride group. At the most recent council meeting, Bridge was in full support of a new inclusivity crosswalk that will be installed in Harriston at the intersection of Elora Street South and Young Street celebrating the LGBTQ2S+ and BIPOC communities. Bridge says it is important to ensure the community is inclusive for all, not only because it's the right thing to do, but it's the only way the community can continue getting stronger.
"Sometimes in small towns we think we're friendly and everything, but at the end of the day, we have to reach out and make sure we're being inclusive to everybody. The only way we're going to survive is we need workers, and immigration and migration to this area, so we have to be inclusive. But the Minto Pride group, I give them a lot of credit, and they've done an amazing job, and there's not very many of them, I think they only have like 10 or 15 people running that, but they've done a lot of great projects and brought so much to the table. Our next steps is to ensure that our Indigenous and our black communities feel comfortable, as well."
The new pedestrian crossover project will feature rainbow painted crosswalks at the intersection, with purple, blue, green, yellow, orange and red representing the LGBTQ community, with light blue and pink representing the transgender community, and brown and black representing the BIPOC (Black, Indigenous and people of colour) community. The installation has been included in Minto's 2022 capital budget, and Minto Pride is funding the cost of the colour pallet inclusion, estimated at around $7,000. Any future maintenance expenses will be included in the Minto and Wellington County budgets.
As his time as Mayor draws to a close later this year, Bridge says in the official release from the town that he's looking forward to more family time and spending time with his grandkids. He says he appreciates the community's support and input over the years, and that the municipality will be in good hands for the future.
