With 40 years of experience in public service, Doug Vincent says he is running for mayor for the “immense rewards of helping people, helping communities.”

His last gig before retiring a year and a half ago was a stint working alongside the Thunder Bay Police Service (TBPS) as the City of Thunder Bay’s Manager of Licensing and Enforcement, a role he performed for more than six years.

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“I think I have the skill set, the leadership skills that are needed to have a very cohesive council,” says Vincent. “That’s really important he because we have at least five new members of council. And I worked for and supported 10 different councils in my career in different municipalities.”

Vincent presents himself as an outside the box thinker, who can draw on varied experiences from different institutions to bring unorthodox solutions to the table.

He says public safety is a core issue in election, and would like to see more resources directed to the police, either through efficiencies in the city budget or through more provincial assistance.

“People need to feel safe in their own homes. They need to feel that they’re free from crime, and the police can’t do it all.”

Vincent thinks the new special constable program employed by the TBPS is a great start, with a lot of room to grow.

“The police need all the help they can get, but they also need the social tools and infrastructure in place to deal with the issues we have here.”

The mayoral hopeful says he would go so far as to lobby the provincial government to impose stricter mandatory minimum sentences for drug dealers.

On the topic of the new Temporary Shelter Village, Vincent says the city has taken a good first step, but also acknowledges that homeless and addictions are nationwide issues that can’t be solved by municipal governments alone.

“But we have to do something,” he adds. “We can’t sit by. We need to have compassion. We need to help people.”

Vincent says fresh ideas are needed in the city, and has made a few of his own suggestions in his platform:

He wants to use overlooked parts of the municipal act to attract more developers with better incentives.

“You know, we have so much potential here,” Vincent remarks. “I would like to get special status or revisions to those sections of the Municipal Act for bonusing. Make us a special economic zone so that we’re not competing with other northern municipalities.”

He also wants to work with the Ontario Police college to create a satellite campus in Thunder Bay for training officers in northern Ontario, much in the same way that Thunder Bay has worked to develop its own law school, school of medicine, and veterinary medicine school in recent years and decades.

The development of green space for housing has emerged as an issue over the last term of council: Vincent says he would not want to look at using green spaces before first taking advantage of vacant lots in the city.

He suggests taking over vacant lots as vested properties, and then turning them over to organizations or developers to build affordable housing, accessible housing, and other forms of housing for the disadvantaged.

One particular vacant property Vincent is looking at is the former Lakehead Psychiatric Hospital (LPH), which has also attracted the attention of the current city council for potential redevelopment.

“The city wants to spend taxpayers’ money to purchase it,” he explains. “I’m sure that they would then turn around and sell off some of this and perhaps make a profit. But I see it as a phenomenal opportunity to just do what’s right, and that’s give it back to the people that originally owned the land and still own the land.”

Vincent believes that one of the Indigenous organizations would likely be interested in “figuring out a use for that property that would be in their best interest. And if it’s in their best interest, it’ll be in our best interest.”

On Strong Mayor Powers, Vincent says he would treat them as tools in a mayor’s toolbox.

“The Strong Mayor Powers are put in there for a specific reason,” he says.

Vincent says that using the mayor’s powers would be a last resort, and that “99.99 per cent of decisions are going to be made on a vote.”

Looking ahead, Vincent believes he’s the right man for the job, arguing that the city “needs to expand our thinking and our horizons,” and that his long life in public service, and his unique experience, will help the city do just that.