Barrie voters elect six new faces into council

New faces in Barrie city council CTV's Rob Cooper reports on the newcomers to Barrie city council and what the mayor thinks of the change.

Nearly 25-thousand voters in Barrie spoke out in resounding fashion last night, sending Jeff Lehman back to his Collier Street office for four more years with the city’s top job.

Retaining 90-percent of the vote, he will head into his third term with six new councillors.

Here is the breakdown of the council seats elected last night.

Clare Riepma won Ward 1 with nearly 30 percent of the vote, 122 votes ahead of Shaugna Ainsworth, the next closest competitor.  Riepma will replace Bonnie Ainsworth who, after two straight terms in council, has chosen to retire from politics.

Keenan Aylwin won the Ward 2 position with 42 percent of the vote. The former Green Party Candidate for Barrie-Springwater, Aylwin takes the downtown seat from Rose Romita.

Incumbent Doug Shipley’s won Ward 3 with nearly 70 percent of the vote in the north-end ward with 1,614 votes.

Long-serving member of council, Doug Ward remains in his Ward 4 seat that he has held for 18 years.

New councillor-elect Robert Thomson will oversee Ward 5.  Thomson takes the position from incumbent Peter Silveira, who held the seat since 2010.

In Ward 6 Natalie Harris was elected with 39 percent of the vote.

Gary Harvey won the south-end Ward 7 position with 1,066 votes, compared to incumbent Andrew Prince’s second place with 776 votes.

Jim Harris narrowly took Ward 8 from second place finisher Brad Thompson with a mere nine-vote lead.  Ward 8 incumbent Arif Khan chose not to seek re-election.

Sergio Morales was acclaimed in Ward 9.

And Mike McCann will keep his seat in Ward 10. This will be McCann’s second term as councillor.