Leonard Krog will be on the ballot for Mayor of Nanaimo in the October 2022 municipal election. (Jordan Davidson/NanaimoNewsNOW)

By NanaimoNewsNOW Staff

FIRST IN

Leonard Krog announces re-election campaign for Nanaimo Mayor

Aug 30, 2022 | 10:12 AM

NANAIMO — Incumbent Mayor Leonard Krog says he’s ready for another term.

The man at the helm of Nanaimo’s City Council for the last four years announced his intention to seek re-election during an event at Maffeo Sutton Park on Tuesday Aug. 30.

“I had concluded some time ago that I wanted to run again,” Krog told NanaimoNewsNOW. “My standard answer to people was if I’d said ‘yes’, they’d expect me to start campaigning and the work wouldn’t get done, and if I said no I’d be a lame duck and the work wouldn’t get done and neither was a palatable choice.”

Krog pointed to his work over the last four years which he said took place during a period of great stability at City Hall.

Record-breaking population growth was identified by Krog as a big challenge for the next Mayor and Council to deal with.

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“That requires leadership, consistency and also managing that growth. I brought last time, as I said to people, experience and commitment and an ability to work together and I think that’s been proven.”

Krog said he wanted to continue his work with the major stakeholders in the region including Snuneymuxw First Nation, the Chamber of Commerce, Nanaimo Port Authority and Vancouver Island University.

He said the outgoing Council has been a “very good” iteration of the governing body, which was a stark contrast to prior to the 2018 election.

Krog won convincingly four years ago with just under 73 per cent of the vote, ahead of Don Hubbard and Raymon Farmere.

His move from provincial politics, as MLA for the Nanaimo riding, to municipal triggered a domino of by-elections over the months which followed.

Sheila Malcolmson moved from the federal level to fill Krog’s seat in Victoria in January 2019, while the Green Party’s Paul Manly won a May 2019 byelection to replace the NDP’s Malcolmson in the Nanaimo-Ladysmith riding.

Krog is the first mayoral candidate to publicly announce he is running in the Oct. 15 election.

He will look to return to City Hall with up to as many as seven of the eight councillors he currently shares the table with.

Only Jim Turley has said he is not seeking re-election.

The nomination period for candidates intending to run this October officially opened at 9 a.m. on Tuesday.

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