Municipal elections will be held across Niagara Region later this month, but this year there will be no elections for Regional Council. Instead, the new Council will be composed of Niagara’s 12 new mayors, all of whom will be elected by voters on Oct. 26 and headed by an appointee of the Ford government.
Voting will occur via weighted voting, meaning each mayor will have a vote weighted according to the size of the population of his or her municipality.
Niagara’s next regional chair will succeed Bob Gale, who had a very brief stint as regional chair from December 2025 to March 2026. Gale resigned amidst controversy some items contained in his private historical collection.
Former chair Jim Bradley had been appointed by the Ford government to serve the full 2022 to 2026 term, but Bradley passed away in September 2025, leaving the chair’s role vacant.
Since Gale resigned, councillors have simply filled in as chair on a rotating basis, something the Ford government doesn’t plan to continue beyond the end of the current election cycle.
Five candidates have applied to serve as the next regional chair, including outgoing Welland Mayor Frank Campion, outgoing Niagara-on-the-Lake Mayor Gary Zalepa, and current regional councillors Rob Foster, Wayne Olson, and Peter Secord.
The selection process began back in July, when the position was posted on the province’s application portal. Interviews have taken place. The Ford government has narrowed down the selection process, although it is not yet clear who the finalists are at this time.
The new regional chair will face significant challenges, including reining in tax increases that have raised the ire of the public over the past several years, dealing with a massive infrastructure deficit, and navigating a new governance system in which only mayors sit on regional council rather than mayors and elected regional councillors.
Municipal affairs minister Rob Flack has said the Ford government will not announce the new appointee until after elections are held for lower-tier municipalities later this month.
Jay Goldberg is the Canadian Affairs Manager at the Consumer Choice Center. He previously served as the Ontario Director at the Canadian Taxpayers Federation and a policy fellow at the Munk School of Public Policy and Global Affairs. Jay holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Toronto.
