Lynda Hawn
Trustee
Lynda Hawn – Children are our future
Lynda Hawn is a newcomer to South Frontenac. She lives in Verona now after living in Kingston for a few years. Before that she lived in Ottawa.
She works for an entertainment and event management firm. Before that she worked for 25 years in the travel industry, many of those years operating her own travel agency.
Her interest in education stems from her interest in children.
“Children are our future. I help a lot of people in any way I can all the time, and as trustee I would give parents a voice at the school board office and at the board table,” she said.
Bullying is a major issue for her in the schools and is one that she would like to focus on as a trustee.
“I would try to get the board to acknowledge that there is a problem that we need to fix. It is complicated because children do some of the bullying because they are depressed in some cases,” she said.
She said she would encourage schools to engage older children to reach out to the younger ones who are being picked on.
Another concern of hers is the state of music and arts education within the Limestone Board.
“The schools used to have music teachers but that is gone and we need to do something. The arts and musicians in the community have such a passion for what they do; they are a resource the school board can tap into,” she said.
She said that she will be canvassing parents during the campaign and after, and will bring their concerns to the board.
“I will have to meet the other trustees and see about the issues that concern them and work with them to improve education in South Frontenac,” she said.
For Lynda Hawn, “It’s about the children, their safety, their education. We need to move forward to make sure they get the proper education and that what they are learning interests them and helps them in their future endeavours.”
READ MORESuzanne Ruttan
Trustee
Suzanne Ruttan – opening doors and promoting rural education
Suzanne Ruttan is running for re-election to a second term as trustee of the Limestone School Board.
“A lot of great things have happened in South Frontenac over the last four years,” she said. “The expansion of Sydenham High School is the most high profile one but there have been others. The parent councils in South Frontenac have raised over $80,000 for their children's education; Perth Road School is now heated by a geothermal system under the
Ontario Green Energy projects; and kindergarten rooms were refurbished in a number of schools to accommodate full-time Junior Kindergarten, which is now available at all the elementary schools in the township.”
Suzanne Ruttan lives “on beautiful Buck Lake” off Perth Road with her husband Randy. They have one child who attends French immersion at Rideau PS. She works as the regional co-ordinator for school nutrition programs in Leeds and Grenville County.
French immersion is an interest of hers and she is anxious to address French instruction in her next term in Limestone.
“One thing that I am looking forward to is the French review that the board is undertaking. I think there are opportunities to enhance French programming in the rural schools,” she said.
Over the last four years she has become familiar with each of the schools in the township, and this has shown her that each of them has unique challenges.
“There are rural challenges in some locations, such as access to resources like child care, social services and transportation, and in some places Internet access is limited as well,” she said.
She has been compared to an ombudsman for parents and students in their dealings with their school and with the board when problems arise, or when they are seeking information about options.
“It is an important part of my job. I look at it as opening doors for people,” she said.
She is committed to continuing that role in the future, as well as to “ensuring that all South Frontenac schools receive the resources that they require and are entitled to in order to meet the needs of the entire student population, and supporting Limestone District School Board staff and administration as they provide quality instruction to South Frontenac students.”
She is sensitive to the fact that the campaign for re-election has become personalized to a certain extent and wants voters to be clear that she lives permanently in South Frontenac and does not work for the Limestone DSB, except as a Trustee.
“I stick to my focus on the education of the students in the community where I live,” she said. “Where board-wide issues are concerned, I am one vote out of nine, and once a vote is taken I support the decision of the majority.”
READ MOREBrad Barbeau
Councillor
Brad Barbeau - musician turned politician
Brad Barbeau works as an associate director of technology at the Queen's School of Business, but he is better known in South Frontenac and Kingston for his musicianship. He is the organist and musical director at St. Paul’s Anglican Church in Sydenham, and at one time he was the acting musical director at St. George’s Anglican Cathedral in Kingston.
With the birth of his son, he pulled back from St. George’s, but continues in Sydenham.
His interest in municipal politics comes from observing council over the years, and from his father-in-law, who is the reeve of Madoc Township and is always talking about municipal politics.
One of the motivating factors for him comes from living very close to Road 38 in Harrowsmith. He notes that vehicles roar through the village each day, which brings two things to mind for him.
“There is a question of safety with all that traffic, and there is also an issue about the lack of business on that stretch of road,” he said. “It is very encouraging that we now have Gilmour's at the north end of Harrowsmith, but we need to find a way to support the businesses we have in the centre of the village and bring more in. I'm not sure what council can do, but we need to look at it.”
He is also interested in what he calls “affordable rural living” which includes considering property taxes, and other factors that make it expensive to live in South Frontenac.
“I know people in Kingston who would like to move to the country, and everything the township does to make it easy to move here, to build here, and to live here, will make a difference.”
He said that some costs are higher, but that keeping a tax advantage as compared to Kingston is something that can counteract that somewhat.
One of the things that interests him is affordable energy.
He sees himself as a new generation of South Frontenac resident because he was raised north of Sydenham, went off to Kingston, and has now came back and is raising a family in South Frontenac. He is now looking to bring that perspective to council.
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