After deciding shortly after they were voted into office in the 2021 municipal election to hold internal votes every six months for the title of deputy-mayor, Lac La Biche County councillors have selected their newest candidate.
Plamondon-area councillor Colette Borgun was selected during council's most recent public meeting.
Borgun will replace councillor Lorin Tkachuk who was selected for a six-month term that began at the end of last October.
Tkachuk nominated Borgun for the position during the Tuesday, April 5 council meeting. New councillor Kevn Pare was also nominated for the position by councillor John Mondal. Councillor Sterling Johnson was nominated as well, by councillor Darlene Beniuk. Johnson turned down the nomination at this time.
A secret ballot was used to determine if it would be Borgun or Pare. Municipal administrators counted the hand-written ballots from council, and announced the new deputy mayor. There was no recorded result of the vote and the ballots were destroyed after the count in accordance with Municipal Government Act regulations.
Borgun will remain as the Deputy Mayor, filling in for Mayor Paul Reutov in his absence, approving council expense sheets and taking on shared signing authority with the mayor — along with other tasks— until October 21 of this year.
The initial plan for council when they developed the time-frame for the deputy-mayor votes last October was to be able to include all eight elected officials into the six-month term over their four-year term in office.
Tkachuk will now be called on to be the council's designated acting mayor in the absence of both the mayor and deputy mayor.
The Deputy Mayor title does come with a slight bump in pay based on the half-year term of work. According to the municipality's guidelines for remuneration and expenses, the deputy mayor is paid a base salary of $38,110, approximately $6,000 more over the full year than the current $32,156 base pay for a councillor. The base pay figures do not include meeting pay, mileage and other expenses. The Lac La Biche County mayor's annual salary is $110 143 and includes all internal and external meetings and engagements. The mayor's salary does not include travel expenses.
