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PRINCE ALBERT — There is a new trustee in Subdivision 3 in the Saskatchewan Rivers School Division after Jill Brown defeated longtime incumbent Jaimie Smith-Windsor in trustee elections on Nov. 13.
Smith-Windsor, who had represented the subdivision since 2009. She was the longest-serving incumbent up for re-election and served as president of the Saskatchewan School Boards Association (SSBA).
Subdivision 3 represents Christopher Lake, Candle Lake, Meath Park and surrounding rural areas. Brown received 434 votes, while Smith-Windsor received 104 votes.
The margin of victory came as a shock to Brown.
"I was a little bit surprised,” she said. “It was very reassuring to see the amount of support that I have from all of the communities.”
Brown won all but one polling station, the one in Smith-Windsor's home of Christopher Lake. She carried polling stations in Meath Park, Albertville, Candle Lake, Paddockwood and Spruce Home School. Brown said she appreciated the support she received.
"It was just really nice to see. I got out and I talked to a lot of people, and it was great to hear so many different viewpoints from different people in different communities which all like very similar types of concerns and interests and what they want to see moving forward, so it was it was good.”
In the City of Prince Albert, there are two new trustees Mira Lewis and Darcy Sander.
Lewis finished fifth with 1,537 votes while Sander finished second with 2,473 votes. They will replace former trustees Grant Gustafson and Michelle Vickers, who declined to run in this election.
Returning to the board as in-city trustees are longtime trustee Arne Lindberg, who finished first with 2,838, Alan Nunn who was elected to a second term with 2,324, and Barry Hollick who finished fourth with 2,049 votes.
"I'm excited to meet everybody and to start to work with the board and new and returning,” Brown said. “I'm excited to get started and just see how we can work together and move forward.”
In Subdivision 1, Bill Yeaman was re-elected for a third term with 403 votes with opponent Shannon Andrews finishing second with 78 votes. In Subdivision 2, which was formerly represented by board chair and current Batoche MLA Darlene Rowden, Neru Franc was first with 175 votes while Carlos Correa was second with 109 votes.
As a new trustee, Brown said her focus would still be rural issues, but throughout the campaign, she saw similar issues expressed by both rural and urban voters.
"There's a lot of stuff that they want to see improved upon and continued and moving forward,” Brown said. “Class complexity is a big concern, (as are) safety within the classroom and the schools.”
Resources in schools were an issue that came up repeatedly throughout her campaign.
“As I did more research, I learned and discovered that Sask Rivers School Division is getting less money from the government, actually, approximately $13 million per year than they were in 2010, which is shocking,” Brown said.
“I did not realize that it was that much and there's this 36 per cent inflation that's happened and we're getting less than this … so I'm hoping that we can somehow move forward to make this work so that we do have more resources, so that we are getting more the more the money that we should be given, I guess you could say,” Brown said.
Finishing sixth in Prince Albert was Shayne Morley with 1,500 votes, in seventh was Tim Yeaman with 1,419 votes, in eighth was Daphne Masih with 1,310, in ninth was Cherie
Rustulka with 1,132 votes, in 10th was Kurtis Hamel with 1,042 votes, in 11th was Alex Crawley with 1,029 votes and in 12th was Michael Dormuth with 788 votes.
The board will meet for the first time on Friday, Nov. 22 with an organizational meeting to select a new chair and vice-chair followed by a regular meeting.
"I'm excited to get going here and see how things go,” Brown said. “We have orientation and meetings on Friday here coming up. I've been getting all kinds of stuff from administration to get me set up and started so looking forward to moving forward with this.”
The Daily Herald reached out to Neru Franc and did not receive a response.
