To many folks in Schreiber this past election has come to known as “the election that should never have been”.

Schreiber Media Centre spoke to many residents a few days after the final results were announced and the overall feeling from people was this election should never have happened. Most were not surprised by the outcome and many more were disappointed with what they believed was an inevitable conclusion.

In larger urban areas such as Toronto there were large cues at many polling stations and frustration from electors as they tried to cast their ballots. In Schreiber the story was quite different. Most took advantage of the early polls and by the end of that run nearly 40% of residents had cast ballots. The overall impression was very positive with people commenting on how professional the staff were and how painless the process was. This was made even more poignant by the fact that early on there were hardly any people signed up to work at the polls and a last minute appeal was followed up with an equally brief training session in the Service Ontario offices in nearby Marathon. As this was a “COVID” election the voting stations would all be required to follow health protocols that were put in place. As a result no catering was aloud and staff had to prepare in advance for the long days ahead. Twelve hour working days for the first four days took a toll on staff but the carried on with their duties and made everyone feel welcome. 

As is usually the case in an election, many of the workers would return for the final voting day in what was to be a somewhat hectic event. The sixteen hour shift ended with the vote counting and final clean up of the recreation centre. It became obvious during the final tabulations that not much had changed from the previous election with much of the area around the North Shore of Lake Superior maintaining the status quo.

The overall response to the results was not so much focused on what party had the most votes but why this election happened in the first place. Schreiber has always had a very dedicated turnout of voters and in the end over 78% of registered voters had cast ballots. This would normally indicate a desire for some sort of change but the final tally showed that there was really not going to be much of a change at all. Many residents were angered by the cost of holding an election that in their minds proved to be pointless.