Whitchurch-Stouffville election night live 2018: Iain Lovatt unseats Justin Altmann

Former NHLer Keith Acton places second in mayoral race

Yorkregion.com
October 23, 2018
Simon Martin

Change is afoot in Whitchurch-Stouffville.

Voters ousted Mayor Justin Altmann and chose Iain Lovatt as the town’s new mayor on Oct. 22.

With 34 of 34 polls reporting, Lovatt had 5,329 votes, Keith Acton was nearly 1,000 votes behind with 4,421, while Altmann came in third with 3,060. Mayoral candidate Anand Date was fourth with 1,260.

Lovatt’s supporters packed the King’s Landing to celebrate the victory. Spontaneous chants of “Lovatt! Lovatt!” rang out as they celebrated a hard-fought campaign.

“I’m incredibly humbled,” Lovatt told the crowd. “I did not anticipate it would be like this.”

Lovatt said he looks forward to working with a unified council.

“We need to turn the page and move forward,” he said. “The last four years have been way too much drama and distraction.”

Lovatt will helm a council that looks a lot like the old one -- minus Altmann and Ward 6 Councillor Rob Hargrave. Incumbents Ken Ferdinands, Maurice Smith, Hugo Kroon and Rick Upton were all re-elected. The two new members of council -- Richard Bartley in Ward 5 and Sue Sherban in Ward 6 -- are no strangers to the dais.

Bartley served as Ward 5 councillor previously before running for mayor and losing to Altmann in 2014. Sue Sherban is the former mayor and served as Ward 6 councillor previously. Both races were close as Sherban defeated Hargrave by 135 votes, while Bartley defeated Mike Humphreys by 81 votes.

“I can tell you it was a hard fight,” Sherban said. 

Altmann’s C3 slate was shutout on the night. There was palpable desire from all the winners to put the last 4 years in the rearview mirror and that starts with the new council’s respect for the mayor.

“I think the residents can feel very comfortable (with Lovatt),” Ward 1 winner Ken Ferdinands said. “What you see is what you get.”

Ward 4 winner Rick Upton said he thinks Lovatt will be great for moving the town forward.

“We’re counting on him to bring our reputation back,” he said. Upton said the previous council got along except for one person.    

Keith Acton was unavailable for comment on election night. Multiple press members were turned away from Justin Altmann’s event at the Tipsy cow. He did not respond to requests for comment via phone.

And thus ends a tumultuous council term marred by high-profile staff departures, multiple integrity commissioner investigations and legal battles between Altmann and the town.

In 2015, past CAO Andrew McNeely and assistant Concetta Connolly were both put on administrative leave by the town and eventually resigned. There was no discussion about the reasons for the resignations at the time in council.

The CAO who followed McNeely, Marc Pourvahidi wasn’t long for the job either. The town sacked Pourvahidi in November of 2016 after he was put on leave earlier in the year. Pourvahidi had been on administrative leave since April 2016 due to a “personnel matter”, as stated by a town press release. The duration of his leave was written as “unknown”, effectively leaving the town without an official CAO for seven months. The town did not release further details on the decision.

Pourvahidi’s leave of absence -- first stated as sick leave -- followed a revelation that the town had an exodus of 30 employees from January 2015 to April 2016.

There was high drama at a council meeting toward the end of 2016, when the town restricted the use of the mayor’s chain of office after some councillors grew upset about what they perceived as the mayor’s liberal use of the chain at events such his wedding and putting it on Smiley the dog.

In 2017, integrity Commissioner Suzanne Craig investigated a “CSI-style” photo wall in Altmann’s office washroom that included pictures of staff, former politicians and members of the public, linked together with black lines and graphics.

Craig’s report found that the wall was “vexatious and disturbing,” and akin to “workplace harassment.”

At the time, council docked Altmann one month’s pay and asked that he apologize to staff. But the mayor adamantly refused to do so, citing errors in Craig’s report.

In March of 2018, town council voted 5-1 to endorse most of the integrity commissioner’s recommendations from an investigation that found Mayor Justin Altmann shared confidential information during an interview and another probe into his failure to apologize for the wall.

The penalties imposed were six months of docked pay as well as the mayor being banned from the municipal office and talking to town staff amongst other things.

In June of 2018 a new integrity commissioner reprimanded Altmann for a boycott of the New Year’s Eve fireworks and an allegation he made that two town staff members broke into his office during a Whitchurch-Stouffville Chamber of Commerce event.

Last month, a judge found that the town didn’t have the authority to ban Altmann from talking to town staff and from entering municipal facilities amongst other things after Altmann had appealed the decision in June.