A local businessman says it's time to reinvest in his hometown.
Richard Lafleur is one of three candidate vying to be Timmins' next mayor in the Oct. 24 municipal election.
“I’m not a politician. I’m not saying things just to get votes. I’ve never been on council, I’ve never (run) before, I’m not a politician; I’m a businessman, I’m a father and I’m a grandfather. I’ve got a lot invested in this community,” he said.
Locally, Lafleur owns Vet's Taxi and Dr. Wrench Automotive. He's also setting up a land development company and owns a Name Your Car Price in southern Ontario.
“I lived here most of my life. I left for a period of time for my career in the automotive industry and I made a promise when I left Timmins that I would eventually come back when I became financially … independent and that I would reinvest in my hometown—and that’s what I’ve done,” he said.
Communication, transparency and fiscal responsibility are at the top of his priority list.
The first thing that needs to be fixed, he said, is communication and transparency.
Through his work, he deals with people every day.
“And people have questions, I have questions, concerns and we’re not getting the answers. As the mayor, for me, I want to be available to the public. A mayor, I believe, is somebody that represents and works for the people of the city that put him in that position,” he said.
If elected, he wants to start a regular program to make himself available and allow people to have direct contact to ask questions.
"And if I don’t have the answers, I can get them their answers,” he said.
“The mayor needs to have more communication with the people and to be visible and I want to do that."
For transparency, Lafleur also wants to make it easier for people to find out what's council's been working on. Whether it's crime, homelessness or the opioid crisis, he said people have concerns and aren't getting answers.
Fiscal responsibility, he said, is a fancy word that people are also talking about.
“As a city and as an individual, we all have suffered the strains of the recent COVID-19 pandemic and the rising costs of living. We have lost revenue from big corporations like Malette Lumber, Tembec, Kidd Creek, Sears, now Staples. These are all revenues that the city was getting that are gone and we haven’t replaced it. The city hasn’t gone out and attracted businesses in this town. They have not shopped our city,” he said.
Lafleur has been quietly doing his part to help out.
On a cold night in 2016, he was driving down Airport Road and offered a young couple walking in spring jackets a ride. That trip opened his eyes to the struggles of people and led to Nobody Gets Left Out in the Cold.
The program offers free taxi rides to people at the food bank, to get to emergency shelters, and to parishioners at a church that previously had a charge account to get people to and from services.
“I was doing some of the driving myself and the stories that I was hearing from people, I didn’t realize how many people were struggling in this city and it really bothered me,” he said.
The program stopped for a short period because of COVID and is starting up again this fall.
“I just look at what’s going on in the community, with the homeless, what’s going on with the opioid crisis and there’s people in our city dying. And people in our city are going to bed hungry, people are not even going to bed because they don’t even have a bed, they don’t even have a roof. We shouldn’t have that in Timmins,” he said.
A newcomer to politics, he believes council must work as a team— the mayor, he said, is a figurehead with one vote.
"You can’t be in there squabbling ... it’s got to be a team effort or you’re not going anywhere. You’re not going to get any work done and for me, it’s about working together as a team,” he said.
The other candidates running for mayor are Michelle Boileau and Joe Campbell.
