| Mar 31, 2011


After such a long wait, the cry “hurry up” rang out in phone calls among riding associations in Lanark Frontenac Lennox and Addington last week. Predictions of a spring “011” election, have been rampant for at least six months. However, the fact that an election has predicted almost continuously for at least two years has led many party activists, never mind the general public, to think that the politicians would once again manage to step back from the brink.

Liberal, Dave RemingtonFor the two largest vote-getting parties from LFL&A in the 2008 election, the candidates have been in place all along. Incumbent Scott Reid (Conservative) is seeking his 5th term in office, having started as the Reform Party MP in the former Lanark-Carleton Riding, and Liberal Dave Remington (photo right), the one-time mayor of Napanee and a former parliamentary assistant, has been in place almost ever since he finished second to Scott Reid in 2008.

The other parties were not as prepared. The Green Party selected John Baranyi as their candidate last Sunday. Baranyi, a native of Lanark village, has been a candidate in previous elections, both federal and provincial. He is coming back this time around, he told the News, out of a commitment to the vision of the Green Party.

“The other parties are stuck on the endless growth spiral. We need to figure out how to get conservative voters to realise that the party that they have been voting for is more committed to concentrating wealth on a global basis than in the conservative values of their supporters,” he said.

BaranyiJohn Baranyi (photo right) ran for the provincial Green Party in 2003 and federally in 2004. He lives in Middleville, in Lanark County, where with his wife Christine Kilgour he runs Pulse foods, a vegetarian frozen food company that uses locally Ontario grown vegetables, organic where possible.

The NDP is having their candidate selection meeting in Sharbot Lake on Sunday, April 3. Doug Smyth, a resident of Beckwith township near Carleton Place, is the only declared candidate and will likely be selected at that meeting. Smyth is a business development/marketing manager for an automotive technology company, and previously owned a small construction company. In a release from the local riding association, Smyth is described as someone who “is very aware of the economic challenges resulting from recessions and economic downturns,” which have hit LFL&A residents hard, particularly in the Smiths Falls area.

As part of our ongoing coverage of the campaign, the News will cover the NDP nomination meeting and will look at all the candidates more closely as the election approaches. For the benefit of the population in our corner of the riding, we will be presenting two all-candidates meetings, on Monday April 11 at the Kaladar Community Centre at 7 p.m. and on Wednesday, April 20 at the Verona Lions Hall, also starting at 7 p.m.

We have invited the candidates from the four major parties, and we will be inviting candidates from other parties and independent candidates as well, as they come forward.

In 2008, Scott Reid received 30,280 votes (55.9%) and Dave Remington 11,827 (21.8%). The NDP candidate received 13.2% of the vote, and Green Party candidate 8.6%.

 

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