Meet Ellen

Born and raised locally, Ellen has dedicated the majority of her life (both personal and professional) to the betterment of her community.  Ellen refers to the Town of the Blue Mountains as the closest thing to "Heaven on Earth" because of its charm, its location and, most of all the residents, with their strong volunteer ethic, ready to lend a hand where needed.

Currently serving her second term as Mayor of the Town of the Blue Mountains, Ellen has over ten years of political experience and a strong understanding of federal, provincial and municipal politics.  Ellen’s leadership was evident from a very young age, when in 1988, she became Canada’s youngest female Mayor.   Adding to that, she first brought recycling to the Town, and we were the first community in Canada to ban bottled water in municipal facilities (the Federation of Canadian Municipalities and the Association of Municipalities of Ontario subsequently took her stance as a recommendation to their member municipalities), showing clearly both Ellen’s passions and her leadership.

Ellen’s life prior to, and outside of, politics has provided her with experiences that have largely shaped her approach to her mayoral duties.  No stranger to hard work in a rural setting, Ellen was raised on a farm where she developed her love of animals through delivering calves, exercising and training difficult horses, and teaching riding.  Ellen’s favourite pastimes include hiking or riding along local roads and trails with her daughters, Meigen and Morgan, amongst the fragrant lilac and apple blossoms.

As a teenager, Ellen worked at a local centre for troubled youth, where she developed a compassion for those experiencing challenges and difficulties in finding the right path in life.  She later translated this experience into leadership, delivering personal coaching, counselling and motivational speaking, specializing in seeing the positive in the negative.  As a team player, Ellen demonstrates a remarkable ability to listen, facilitate and motivate, and to encourage those around her in making the most of their opportunities.

Ellen’s resourcefulness and innovation have proved useful in launching several entrepreneurial business endeavours, including a consignment store, a cleaning service, physical fitness classes, satellite tv sales and installation, and a property management firm.  Ellen’s instructional strength, her dedication to problem solving, and her time management skills have served her well in managing  several other businesses, including an equine farm. 

As a fitness coach, Ellen cherishes the recreational opportunities that abound in the Blue Mountains.  She boasts about the hundreds of kilometres of hiking and cycling trails and the nearby Beaver River, famous for its salmon and rainbow trout fishing.  Ellen believes the ability to walk out your back door in winter to some of the province’s best downhill skiing, cross-country skiing and snowshoeing makes the area an icon of fitness and a holistic community.

The waters of Georgian Bay are pristine, and wonderful for swimming and boating, and Ellen is committed to preserving and improving the state of all water in the region – from drinking water to streams, rivers and lakes, to Georgian Bay and the Great Lakes ecosystem.  She has a long record with public and private organizations as a passionate public speaker on a broad variety of environmental issues that bear on our community and country.

Ellen has dedicated her efforts to engage others in the vision of the Town of the Blue Mountains as the most highly respected municipality in Ontario as a result of its innovative style in becoming a leader in sustainability and the environment.  It is Ellen’s opinion that great strides have been made in the past few years, and she is eager to be able to continue to support these efforts in a community of which she is so proud, and so honoured to be able to serve.