Mayor Ryan Bater is running for election in North Battleford. (Submitted Photo/City of North Battleford)

By Josh Ryan

Mayoral Incumbent

North Battleford mayor announces re-election bid

Sep 18, 2020 | 5:41 PM

As the election nears in the Battlefords, Mayor Ryan Bater is now preparing for his re-election campaign.

The incumbent for North Battleford announced his intention to run on Thursday, having served as mayor since 2016 and on city council since 2012. Bater said he’s been candid with people in the community about running, but had held off officially addressing it during the uncertainty of the COVID-19 pandemic. With nominations opening up next week, he decided to stop waiting.

“I felt it was important to make my intentions clear, so that there was no ambiguity,” Bater said.

The decision is one that Bater said wasn’t made lightly, with a number of challenges being faced by the city during the pandemic. Moving forward was also made within the backing of family.

“It’s a hard job that requires a lot of hours of hard work and hard decisions,” Bater said. “Without the support of my family, I wouldn’t be able to do this.”

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Bater has seen a number of major projects during his time as mayor, including downtown revitalization and the UPAR program. While he said debt reduction and elevated services remain important, he’s focused on the pandemic and trying to provide stability in the city during this time.

“[It’s] thrown a lot of us off of routines, so we’re developing new routines and new ways of doing things,” he said.

Campaigning will have a particularly new way of doing things, with social distancing guidelines and limits on the size of large gatherings providing a wrinkle for the hosting of events, as well as Bater said he prefers to be a door knocker.

“But we have public health order and door knocking will need to be done differently now.”

He’s also aware of the dynamic of having a provincial election happening concurrently with the municipal election. Candidates running for various levels of government throughout the region preface the final days of the city’s election cycle.

“It will be very interesting to see how all these campaigns interact and get messages out to voters,” Bater said.

Some of the projects he hopes to keep moving forward include looking at the feasibility of renewable energy and the recreation master plan coming to council next month.

“There’s a lot to look forward to here and I think these projects are made stronger by having experienced leadership around the table,” Bater said.

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josh.ryan@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: @JoshRyanSports