By Linda Saxon, The Burg Watch
As we head into the final days before the October 26 municipal election, accountability remains a priority for Amherstburg voters.
Recently, Deputy Mayor candidate Linden Crain’s visit to Malden Central Public School sparked justifiable community concern regarding where campaign boundaries start and stop.
In online discussions, some defenders have asked how a candidate could possibly be expected to know the intricate ins and outs of school board rules.
Under Ontario law, ignorance of election guidelines is never an acceptable defence—especially for an incumbent politician.
Two Hats of an Incumbent
Linden Crain is not an inexperienced candidate launching a first-time campaign. He has spent the last four years sitting at the Amherstburg council table.
He has visited local schools in the past, so he is well aware that entering a public school requires strict clearance, formal office check-ins, and a completely non-political presence.
However, when you go from being a neutral town councillor to actively campaigning for Deputy Mayor, the rules change drastically under Ontario’s Municipal Elections Act. A candidate cannot simply be a visitor while simultaneously using public school classrooms and student faces as promotional content for an active election campaign.
The Legal Framework
There is a strict, legally mandated framework designed to ensure every single certified candidate understands where they can and cannot campaign:
- The Statutory Deadline: Under Section 88.18 of the Municipal Elections Act, the Greater Essex County District School Board (GECDSB) is required by provincial law to have its specific election resource rules finalized, locked in, and publicly available before nominations even open.
- The Clerk’s Information Package: When any candidate files their nomination papers at Town Hall, the Municipal Clerk hands them an official candidate package. This package explicitly lists resources, including the Education Act.
- The Standard Vetting Protocol: Experienced campaigns know that school board properties must remain strictly non-partisan. To protect student privacy, compliant campaigns maintain a zero-tolerance policy against uploading pictures of minors to active political pages. If an invite is issued by a teacher or parent group, standard protocol dictates routing it through the Principal and Board Communications for formal administrative sign-off first.
The Bottom Line
The ultimate proof that a boundary was crossed does not come from political discourse—it comes from the school board itself.
Following the classroom visit, the GECDSB issued a formal written finding confirming that “established guidelines and procedures were not followed”. The board subsequently requested the immediate removal of the political materials and student imagery from the campaign’s social media platforms.
Part of basic campaign due diligence is verifying where you are legally permitted to campaign.
Public school classrooms are never on that list, and our elected officials must be held to the standard of knowing better.
