Hazel McCallion used her final council meeting as the mayor of Mississauga to pay tribute to the staff and colleagues who have helped her shape the city over the last 36 years and to assure residents that the best is yet to come.
The 93-year-old McCallion, who will officially hand over the reins of Mississauga to Bonnie Crombie during a swearing in ceremony on Dec. 2, delivered a brief speech to members of council on Wednesday in which she reflected on her time in the mayor’s chair and the growth the city has enjoyed during that time, calling it a “wonderful journey.”
“On my first day as the mayor of Mississauga cows and horses were grazing in what is our city core today and certainly a lot has happened since then,” she said. “We have built this city together; there is no question about it. No one person can take credit for it. It has been a team approach. We had to make tough decisions and now reflecting on it I think we did our homework pretty well.
The City of Mississauga has grown from about 172,000 residents when McCallion was first sworn in to more than 713,000 today, making it the sixth largest municipality in Canada.
The growth helped McCallion become immensely popular in Mississauga and elsewhere, often allowing her to forgo campaigning all together as she cruised to lopsided election wins.
In total, McCallion served 12 terms as mayor, but decided to not seek re-election following her last victory in 2010.
“We have brought the city to a certain status and now it must move on,” McCallion said Wednesday. “I know that under the leadership of Bonnie Crombie as mayor, the new councillors that have come on and those that were re-elected this city will move forward. It has a sound foundation and it is a case of building on that sound foundation.”
McCallion is expected to speak with reporters about her time in office later this morning.
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