Cranbrook has a new mayor — the 25th in its history — as Wayne Price won the Cranbrook Municipal Election on Saturday, Oct. 15.
Wayne Price topped the vote count with 2,721, defeating incumbent Lee Pratt, who garnered 1,758 votes.
Pratt was seeking a third term as mayor, having been acclaimed in the 2018 election. Price was finishing off a term as City Councillor.
Cranbrook City Council has a couple of new faces joining the table. Lynnette Wray, who topped the votes for Council, was elected for the first time. Wayne Stetski edged out Jeremy Youngward for the sixth Council seat.
Norma Blissett, Wesly Graham, Mike Peabody and Ron Popoff were all comfortably re-elected.
4,479 total ballots were cast.
At Price’s election night gathering at the Cranbrook Curling Centre Saturday night, he said he and his team had been preparing for the mayoral run for six months, but had really got underway campaigning over the past six weeks. Price took took time to thank his campaign team and credit them for his election success.
Without the committee that I had this race might have been a lot closer.
Price and the newly elected council are facing a host of issues of great concern to the public.
”There are way more issues than a lot of people realize … and it’s (Council’s) job to make this council healthier. I have a pretty good sense of where we need to go, and how we need to get there, but that ‘s going to be Council — we’ll sit down as a council and decide how we’re going to get there.
“Because we all care. And I believe Lee, as well, had good intentions for the City. We all want the same thing, it’s just how we’re going to get there. Lee’s taken more of a direct charge. I really believe Lee had the best intentions, it’s just our approach is different.”
Below are the final unofficial results are in for the Cranbrook Municipal Election, October 15, 2022.
For Mayor of Cranbrook:
Wayne Price - 2,721
Lee Pratt - 1,758
For Cranbrook City Council:
Lynnette Wray - 3,244
Mike Peabody - 3,181
Norma Blissett - 3,147
Ron Popoff - 2,959
Wesly Graham - 2,603
Wayne Stetski- 2,114
Jeremy Youngward - 2,066
For School District 5 Board Of Education:
(Five of the six candidates in the running are elected to the Board)
Irene Bischler - 2,570
Chris Johns - 2,459
Trina Ayling - 2,337
Doug McPhee - 2,387
Wendy Turner - 2,231
Stan Chung - 1,869