Eric Greer
Courtesy Photo

EMBRUN – “I want to make an impact on my community,” Eric Greer said. “I basically grew up here, then moved into the City of Ottawa, and then moved back after the pandemic and wanted to get involved. After talking to Pierre [Leroux] and Mike Tarnowski and some other members of the community who are doing their part to give back, it just really seemed like the right thing to do.”

Greer, who is bilingual and who grew up in Russell, is running for a position on the township of Russell’s council for the upcoming term. With Mayor Pierre Leroux already acclaimed as mayor, there are still four open councillor positions that need to be filled following the Oct. 24 municipal election.

“There’s a wide range of topics that I want to touch upon and help out with the community,” he said, adding that he’d like to find ways to involve more people in community life. “One idea is lowering the voting age to 16. Also, implementing rank choice voting. That way, people can get involved and we have a more democratic system.”

A member of the Kin Club of Russell, Greer said he’s invested in the community. He has a long list of things he’d like to see accomplished and some of these include expanding the fitness trail, raising awareness for a variety of youth events, improving roads by supporting densification in the towns’ cores, bettering the township’s walking and biking infrastructure, promoting more festivals, modernizing community centres to be more accessible, adding bike and electric vehicle parking, and creating safer sidewalks.

“I’m helping out fundraising money for charities,” he said, noting the Kin Club’s upcoming Abba event at the Camille Piché Community Centre in Embrun on Oct. 29. “I’m going to be helping with setting up some dances, possibly a pop-up movie theatre, that’s outdoors – the list goes on and on, just getting as involved as possible, as much as they possibly can to move all these projects. That way, we can feel like a community, so we don’t become more isolated and divided, especially since the township has grown so much. [We] want to introduce all these opportunities for us to really spend time with each other.”

Greer has been sharing his love for the municipality through a podcast – Local Pod – that is available through Spotify. He’s recently started a new podcast of sorts via YouTube where he’s taken on the task of interviewing fellow candidates. So far, he’s interviewed both Mayor Leroux and Marc Lalonde, who is also running for a councillor position. Greer is a strong supporter of lowering the voting age to 16 (vote16.ca) and proportional representation (fairvote.ca).