{"id":5377,"date":"2014-01-29T16:48:13","date_gmt":"2014-01-29T21:48:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=5377"},"modified":"2014-02-05T22:15:31","modified_gmt":"2014-02-06T03:15:31","slug":"politics-as-usual-games","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/politics-as-usual-games\/","title":{"rendered":"POLITICS AS USUAL: Games"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Games Have Not Yet Begun
\nBy Alison Collins-Mrakas<\/strong><\/p>\n

This was a week of bombshell announcements in our community.
\nWe learned on Tuesday that Frank Klees, MPP for Newmarket-Aurora, has decided that he is retiring and will not seek re-election.
\nI have to say that was a complete shock to me. Perhaps insiders had an inkling, but to those of us on the outside, we saw our community representative at Queen\u2019s Park continue to fight on a daily basis for better government and for the betterment of our community in particular. No signs that he had grown weary of the battle. And now we are losing that champion. I, for one, am disappointed.
\nIn my experience, he was committed, engaged and accessible. A call or email to his constituency office was always returned within 24 hours. His staff in particular is top notch. Full disclosure first folks. Lest you think this is some sort of love-in, I am not a supporter of the Progressive Conservatives.
\nI am a registered member of a different party. What I am a supporter of, however, is someone who did a great job for our community.
\nRecognizing the significant achievement that MPP Klees made to our community should be free from partisanship. I don\u2019t have to be PC to think he did a good job.
\nAs an aside, extreme partisanship is part of the problem, frankly, with our political system. You can think the candidate for the \u201cother\u201d side, would do a fantastic job, but you won\u2019t vote for him\/her because, well, you don\u2019t think the Party will do a good job.
\nThat\u2019s how we get some real duds there in Ottawa and at Queen\u2019s Park.
\nVoting in your party\u2019s candidate, instead of the person that you think will really do the job\u2026oh well, pardon my naivet\u00e9, that is politics as usual I guess. But, I digress.
\nRegardless of one\u2019s political stripes, one cannot deny Frank Klees did an incredible job for our community. Those are some pretty big shoes to fill.
\nAnd, my goodness, the jockeying to fill them has begun in earnest. Across the political spectrum, there is now extreme urgency in the nomination process as candidates both declared and those still waiting in the wings see a seat that they think is \u201cget-able\u201d.
\nAs we saw reported here in The Auroran, Newmarket Councillor Maddie Di Muccio is \u201cconsidering\u201d a run for the nomination. Also considering the same thing is fellow Newmarket Councillor Jane Twinney. But, those are just two who have made their musings public. I have heard from sources that there are a number of folks who are also considering a run for the party\u2019s nomination. I\u2019m not sure how true that is, but should be a very exciting nomination process regardless!
\nOn the Liberal side, we have only one candidate thus far who has put his name forward for nomination \u2013 Aurora Councillor Chris Ballard. He declared in late fall that he would be seeking the nomination. However, just like the PCs, I have heard of a number of fairly prominent folks who are similarly considering throwing their hat in the ring.
\nAgain, we shall see who actually puts their name on the dotted line, but will make for some interesting times.
\nIn the midst of all this jockeying, there is the wee fact that an election \u2013 though expected, even imminent \u2013 has not yet been called, let alone a writ been dropped. Given what will surely be a dramatic nomination process in both Party riding associations, I will bet my shoe collection that we are in for one heck of a wild ride in Aurora and Newmarket come election time!
\nUntil next week, stay informed, stay involved because this is, after all, Our Town.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Games Have Not Yet Begun By Alison Collins-Mrakas This was a week of bombshell announcements in our community. We learned on Tuesday that Frank Klees, MPP for Newmarket-Aurora, has decided that he is retiring and will not seek re-election. I have to say that was a complete shock to me. Perhaps insiders had an […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5377","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-1oJ","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-25 22:57:35","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5377","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5377"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5377\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5377"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5377"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5377"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}