This article needs to be updated.(December 2023) |
Eddie Francis | |
---|---|
33rd Mayor of Windsor | |
In office December 1, 2003 –November 30, 2014 | |
Preceded by | Mike Hurst |
Succeeded by | Drew Dilkens |
Personal details | |
Born | Edgar Francis May 1974 (age 50) Windsor,Ontario,Canada |
Alma mater | University of Western Ontario,University of Windsor Law School |
Profession | lawyer,entrepreneur |
Edgar "Eddie" Francis (born May 1974) is the former mayor of Windsor,Ontario. He was 29 years old when he was elected mayor in 2003,the second-youngest mayor in Windsor's history and one of the youngest mayors ever elected in Canada. He is also Windsor's first Lebanese-Canadian mayor.
Born in Windsor to Lebanese Maronite Catholic parents who had recently immigrated to Canada from Lebanon,Francis is fluent in both English and Arabic.
Francis is an alumnus of Notre Dame Elementary School and Holy Names Catholic High School,both in Windsor. While in high school,Francis was a major contributor to student life while participating in the student council,and held the office of student body president. He holds a combined honour's degree in chemistry and biochemistry from the University of Western Ontario. He graduated from the University of Windsor Law School and was called to the Bar in 2002. [1]
Prior to entering politics,Francis ran and operated Royal Pita Baking Company with his brothers. Under their stewardship the "mom and pop" operation's distribution quickly expanded to other markets,including London,Ontario,Toronto and 12 U.S. states. [2]
This section of a biography of a living person does not include any references or sources .(July 2023) |
Francis was first elected to Windsor City Council in a by-election in June 1999,following the resignation of Rick Limoges. He became the youngest city councillor in Windsor's history,beating a record previously held by Limoges,when he was chosen to represent Ward 5 (Riverside / Forest Glade) at the age of 25. Shortly after being elected to city council,Francis enrolled in the University of Windsor Law School. He graduated in 2002 and articled with the international law firm of Miller Canfield Paddock and Stone. Subsequently,Francis was called to the Bar of the Law Society of Upper Canada.
In the November 2000 general election,Francis was re-elected to his Ward 5 seat with the largest majority ever recorded in a Windsor municipal election. As an active member of city council,Francis was involved in many of the city's major committees,agencies and boards. He held the positions of director of Windsor Canada Utilities,member of the Detroit–Windsor Tunnel Commission,chair of the Windsor Licensing Commission and chair of the International Relations Committee.
Francis was first elected mayor in the 2003 municipal election,winning narrowly over fellow councillor Bill Marra. At 29 years old,Francis became Windsor's second-youngest mayor,behind Daniell Willis Mason,who was 26 years old [3] when he was elected as Mayor in 1895.
One of his first acts as mayor was to join the planning committee for the 2006 Super Bowl festivities in Detroit,ensuring that Windsor would receive some of the economic benefits of participating in a major tourist event. [4]
He was subsequently re-elected in the 2006 election,garnering 77.56 per cent of the votes cast in the mayoral race,for which 38.2 per cent of registered voters cast a ballot. [5] He won again in the 2010 election,with 56.17% of the vote.
During Francis' mayoralty,Windsor has consistently reduced municipal debt and passed six consecutive budgets with zero tax increases. [6] [ dubious – discuss ]
Francis announced in March 2014 that he will not run for a fourth term as mayor,and will instead take a job as executive vice-president of the Windsor Family Credit Union beginning on December 1,2014. [7]
On July 29,2008,Francis announced one of the most ambitious projects of his mayoral term,a waterfront redevelopment proposal which would transform a struggling section of downtown Windsor into a waterfront park by converting the block bounded by Crawford,Caron and University Avenues —an area which currently consists primarily of parking lots and a disused section of railway track —into an inland marina cut back from the Detroit River,and converting either Chatham Street or Pitt Street into a canal and adjoining boardwalk,which would extend easterly for three blocks from the marina to a spot near the Art Gallery of Windsor,and then from there back to the river at the eastern edge of Dieppe Park. [8]
He appointed Dave Cooke,a former Member of Provincial Parliament,to chair a feasibility study on the proposal. On August 19,councillor Alan Halberstadt criticized Francis for allegedly being secretive about the plan, [9] and in response Cooke was brought in to speak to city council about the plan on September 2. [10]
The project was never commissioned,lacking public support and funding.
On August 7,2008,Detroit mayor Kwame Kilpatrick,already in the midst of pending felony charges,was jailed for violating his bail conditions after travelling to Windsor on July 23 for a meeting with Francis regarding a proposed deal pertaining to the Detroit–Windsor Tunnel,which would have seen the city of Windsor take over operational control of the tunnel in exchange for a $75 million loan to the cash-strapped city of Detroit. Kilpatrick stated that Francis had requested the meeting on short notice,while Francis and other city bureaucrats indicated that the meeting had in fact been at Kilpatrick's request. [11] The meeting resulted in a 14-month investigation by Windsor's Integrity Commissioner,Earl Basse,who cleared Francis of wrongdoing in his relationship with Kilpatrick. [12]
Francis later stated that he was confident that Kilpatrick's resignation on September 4 would not threaten the tunnel deal,indicating that he also had a strong working relationship with Kilpatrick's successor,Ken Cockrel. [13] However,Cockrel himself indicated that he would prefer to renegotiate an alternate agreement to maintain joint management of the tunnel between the two cities. [14]
Following Detroit's July 2013 bankruptcy filing,Francis said that his city would consider purchasing Detroit's half of the Detroit–Windsor Tunnel if it was offered for sale. [15]
In 2014, [16] Francis announced he would not be running for a fourth term,and left office that year having served 11 years as mayor. This made him the second longest serving mayor in Windsor's history (behind Arthur Reaume,who served for 13 years from 1941 - 1954. [17] )
1999 Windsor Ward 5 by-election (June 13,1999) | ||
---|---|---|
Candidate | Votes | % |
Eddie Francis | 1,822 | 25.43% |
Jo-Anne Gignac | 1,507 | 21.03% |
Gale Simko Hatfield | 1,370 | 19.12% |
Frank Battal | 663 | 9.25% |
Larry Macneil | 608 | 8.48% |
Al Nelman | 388 | 5.41% |
Michael Gladstone-White | 240 | 3.35% |
Douglas Kenney | 173 | 2.41% |
Tom Toth | 108 | 1.51% |
Ernie "The Baconman" Lamont | 72 | 1.00% |
Duncan Boutilier | 69 | 0.96% |
John Rutherford | 40 | 0.56% |
James Whyte | 38 | 0.53% |
John Brown | 33 | 0.46% |
Steve Farrell | 22 | 0.31% |
Louis Lapensee | 13 | 0.18% |
Source:City of Windsor [18] |
NOTE:(X) Indicates an incumbent candidate.
2000 Windsor municipal election: | ||
---|---|---|
Candidate | Votes | % |
Eddie Francis (X) | 10,797 | 45.56% |
Tom Wilson (X) | 7,801 | 32.91% |
Mary-Jane Limoges | 5,103 | 21.53% |
Source:City of Windsor [19] |
2003 Windsor Mayoral election | ||
---|---|---|
Candidate | Votes | % |
Eddie Francis | 39,042 | 53.45% |
Bill Marra | 31,517 | 43.15% |
Ernie "The Baconman" Lamont | 2,484 | 3.40% |
Turnout: | ||
Source:City of Windsor [20] |
2006 Windsor mayoral election | ||
---|---|---|
Candidate | Votes | % |
Eddie Francis (X) | 44,527 | 77.56% |
David Wonham | 10,308 | 17.95% |
Mohamad Chams | 1,502 | 2.62% |
Mohamad-Ali Beydoun | 1,074 | 1.87% |
Turnout: | 38.20% | |
Source:City of Windsor [21] |
2010 Windsor mayoral election | ||
---|---|---|
Candidate | Votes | % |
Eddie Francis (X) | 39,384 | 56.17% |
Rick Limoges | 28,354 | 40.44% |
Anthony Brothers | 979 | 1.40% |
Michael Mosgrove | 748 | 1.07% |
Robert W. Vinson | 377 | 0.54% |
Sam Sinjari | 273 | 0.39% |
Turnout: | 46.28% | |
Source:City of Windsor [22] |
Windsor is a city in southwestern Ontario,Canada,on the south bank of the Detroit River directly across from Detroit,Michigan,United States. Geographically located within but administratively independent of Essex County,it is the southernmost city in Canada and marks the southwestern end of the Quebec City–Windsor Corridor. The city's population was 229,660 at the 2021 census,making it the third-most populated city in Southwestern Ontario,after London and Kitchener. This represents a 5.7 percent increase from Windsor's 2016 population census of 217,188. The Detroit–Windsor urban area is North America's most populous trans-border conurbation. Linking the Great Lakes Megalopolis,the Ambassador Bridge border crossing is the busiest commercial crossing on the Canada–United States border.
Kwame Malik Kilpatrick is an American former politician who served as the 72nd mayor of Detroit from 2002 to 2008. A member of the Democratic Party,he previously represented the 9th district in the Michigan House of Representatives from 1997 to 2002. Kilpatrick resigned as mayor in September 2008 after being convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice. He was sentenced to four months in jail and was released on probation after serving 99 days.
Glen Ronald Murray is a Canadian politician and urban issues advocate who served as the 41st Mayor of Winnipeg,Manitoba from 1998 to 2004,and was the first openly gay mayor of a large North American city. He subsequently moved to Toronto,Ontario,and was elected to the Legislative Assembly of Ontario as a Liberal Member of Provincial Parliament (MPP) for Toronto Centre in 2010,serving until 2017.
The Detroit–Windsor tunnel,also known as the Detroit–Canada tunnel, is an international highway tunnel connecting the cities of Detroit,Michigan,United States and Windsor,Ontario,Canada. It is the second-busiest crossing between the United States and Canada,the first being the Ambassador Bridge,which also connects the two cities,which are situated on the Detroit River.
Arthur John Reaume was a Canadian politician.
David Bing is an American former professional basketball player,businessman,and politician who served as the 74th mayor of Detroit,Michigan from 2009 to 2014. He is a member of the Democratic Party.
Dave Cooke is a former politician in Ontario,Canada. He was an NDP member of the provincial legislature from 1977 to 1997,and was a senior cabinet minister in the government of Bob Rae.
Freman Hendrix is an American politician from the state of Michigan. A Democrat,Hendrix served as deputy mayor for former Detroit mayor Dennis Archer from 1997 to 2001. He ran twice,unsuccessfully,as a mayoral candidate in the city of Detroit:in 2005 against Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick,and for the 2009 special election called to replace the ousted Kilpatrick.
Richard "Rick" Limoges is a retired Canadian politician,who represented the electoral district of Windsor—St. Clair in the House of Commons of Canada from 1999 to 2000.
Albert Howard Weeks was the 28th mayor of the city of Windsor,Ontario,Canada,from 1975 to 1982 and considered by many to be its best in recent memory. Previously,he had been a perennial candidate in the Windsor area for the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) and its successor,the New Democratic Party (NDP). He ran 22 times between the 1950s and 1980s,winning 12 times at the municipal level. It was during a 1974 November blizzard that stretched the voting into a second day and night that Weeks upset then mayor Frank Wansbrough to win his first term as mayor. He went on to serve two more terms. During Weeks's first term,he successfully advocated to change the term length from two to three years as he felt mayors would be more productive with three-year terms. When he retired from the mayor's office in 1982,he left the city of Windsor with a balanced budget.
The 2000 Windsor municipal election was held in the City of Windsor,Ontario to elect a mayor,councillors and school trustees.
The Detroit–Windsor region is an international transborder agglomeration named for the American city of Detroit,Michigan,the Canadian city of Windsor,Ontario,and the Detroit River,which separates them. The Detroit–Windsor area acts as a critical commercial link straddling the Canada–United States border and has a total population of 5,976,595. It is North America's largest cross-border conurbation.
Michael D. Hurst is a municipal politician in Windsor,Ontario,Canada. He served as 32nd Mayor of the city of Windsor from 1991 to 2003,and oversaw several major changes in the city's development.
Monica Ann Conyers is an American politician in Detroit,Michigan. Elected to the Detroit City Council in 2005,she was elected by its members to serve as president pro tempore of the council for the four-year term.
Kenneth Vern Cockrel Jr. is an American journalist,nonprofit executive,businessman,and former politician who served as the 73rd mayor of Detroit,Michigan from September 2008 to May 2009. A member of the Democratic Party,Cockrel served as a member of the Detroit City Council from 1997 to 2008,and again from 2009 to 2013,and as the Council's president from 2005 to 2008 and May to December 2009.
Thomas R. Brophey was a journalist,lawyer and politician in Ontario,Canada. He served as mayor of Windsor briefly in 1951.
Andrew "Drew" Dilkens is a Canadian politician,who is the 34th and current mayor of Windsor,Ontario. He was elected mayor in the city's 2014 municipal election. Dilkens is married to Jane Deneau,and has two children.
The Detroit mayoral special election of 2009 took place on May 5,2009. It was a special election to fill the remainder of the term of Kwame Kilpatrick who had resigned as mayor.
The 2010 Windsor municipal election occurred on October 25,2010,to elect the Mayor of Windsor,Windsor City Council and the Greater Essex County District School Board,Windsor Essex Catholic District School Board,Conseil scolaire catholique Providence and Conseil scolaire Viamonde.