And the race is on

By Lethbridge Herald on September 24, 2025.

Herald photo by Alejandra Pulido-Guzman City Clerk/Returning Officer Bonnie Hilford speaks to media about the upcoming election Tuesday afternoon at City Hall.

Alejandra Pulido-Guzman
Lethbridge Herald

With the 2025 municipal election just around the corner, the City of Lethbridge is sharing information about the voting process, candidates and a projected timeline for results. 

Bonnie Hilford, City Clerk and Returning Officer, says the City has an official candidate list after the 24-hour period for candidates to be able to withdraw after the nominations were closed on Monday at noon.

“For the four-year term of October 2025 to October 2029, for Mayor of the City of Lethbridge there are four candidates, for the eight positions of councillors there are 18 candidates,” says Hilford. “For the seven positions of public school trustees for the Lethbridge Public School Division, there are 14 candidates, and for the five positions of trustees for the Holy Spirit Roman Catholic Separate School Division Ward 2, there are six candidates.” 

Lethbridge voters can begin to vote in advance on Oct. 8, at either the Core Van Raay YMCA or the Lethbridge Trade and Convention Centre. 

“On Oct. 20, the last day of voting, electors can also vote at the Trinity Reformed Church (located at 1100 40 Ave. N), voting times are from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.,” says Hilford. 

The City’s website, lethbridge.ca/election, has lots of information for voters, including the list of candidates, links to election candidate forums and meet and greets. 

“We are in the process of producing popular two-minute information videos of each candidate for voters to watch ahead of the election,” says Hilford. “They are anticipated to be posted on our website by Friday this week.”

A detailed election brochure is now online, and due to their current delivery disruptions with Canada Post, paper copies will be delivered through other means. 

“Paper copies will be delivered next weekend to most Lethbridge residents via the Lethbridge Herald, which will also include non-subscribers. Copies will also soon be available at various locations across the city.”

The City’s “where do I vote and wait time app” will be back to offer details for each voting station. 

Hilford says a second information video will be launched later this week and both videos will be able to be viewed on the city’s website. 

“As for election results, based on the 2021 voter turnout, results after the election will take a bit longer as we will be hand-counting the estimated 100,000 ballots.”

Officials expect it will take around 20 hours for 20 teams of four people to count the ballots. 

“That equates to five four-hour shifts, which will take us to Wednesday afternoon,” says Hilford. “We will be counting Monday night, but we will not have any full contests results by then.”

Tabulators will try their best to provide daily results, but since hand-counting is uncharted territory for them, they can’t guarantee anything at this point. 

“Some changes that voters can expect at the voting stations (include), the election registry laptops will be at voting stations where all voters are to check in to verify they are on the list, and if not, they will have some forms to fill out,” says Hilford. 

Voters will also receive more ballots when they arrive at the voting stations. There will be a colour ballot for each contest: mayor, city council and either public or separate school ballot. 

“There will be three corresponding ballot boxes to deposit your ballots in, you must mark your ballots with an X, and of course there are less voting stations, but instead efficient super stations to accommodate more people and more space,” says Hilford. 

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Chmie

2 days ago

Maybe now our news outlets will send questionnaires to all candidates with topics that are pertinent to the position and relevant to all voters. I don’t care where they work, if they’re married with 2 1/2 kids and have a dog named Rex. I need to know if they support a specific political party and its policies, do they support separation, do they support book banning, do they support taxpayer spending on must haves and not nice to have projects? These are just some very important issues that concern me that the news outlets have not covered and I’m sure there are many more. Get on it.

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