Hazel McCallion | |
|---|---|
 McCallion in 2010 | |
| 1st Chancellor ofSheridan College | |
| In office June 6, 2016 – January 29, 2023 | |
| Preceded by | Position established |
| 5th Mayor of Mississauga | |
| In office December 1, 1978 – November 30, 2014 | |
| Preceded by | Ron Searle |
| Succeeded by | Bonnie Crombie |
| 3rd Mayor of Streetsville | |
| In office January 5, 1970 – December 31, 1973 | |
| Preceded by | William Tolton |
| Succeeded by | Position discontinued |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Hazel Mary Muriel Journeaux (1921-02-14)February 14, 1921 Port Daniel, Quebec, Canada |
| Died | January 29, 2023(2023-01-29) (aged 101) Mississauga, Ontario, Canada |
| Party | Independent |
| Spouse | |
| Children | 3 |
| Profession |
|
| Signature |  |
Hazel Mary Muriel McCallionCM OOnt (née Journeaux; February 14, 1921 – January 29, 2023) was a Canadian politician who served as the fifthmayor of Mississauga. First elected in November 1978, McCallion was mayor for 36 years until her retirement in 2014,[1] making her the longest-serving mayor in the city's history.[2] She was a successful candidate in twelve municipal elections, having beenacclaimed twice and re-elected ten times.[1] She was nicknamed "Hurricane Hazel" for her outspoken political style with reference to thehurricane of 1954, which had a considerable impact.[3][4][5] When the1979 Mississauga train derailment occurred early in her tenure, she helped oversee evacuation of 200,000 residents from the resulting explosion, fire, and spill of hazardous chemicals.
Before marriage, McCallion played professional women'sice hockey while attending school inMontreal, then worked for engineering firmCanadian Kellogg, and was transferred toToronto in 1942. She moved toStreetsville in 1951, and left the business world in 1967 to pursue politics. She served as mayor of Streetsville from 1970 to 1973, prior to its amalgamation intoMississauga. Following her tenure as mayor of Mississauga, McCallion remained an active public figure, serving as the firstchancellor ofSheridan College,[6] on theGreater Toronto Airport Authority board, and as a special advisor to theOntario government.
McCallion received multiple honours including theOrder of Canada in 2005, theOrder of Ontario in 2020, theQueen Elizabeth II Golden Jubilee Medal in 2002, theQueen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal in 2012, and honorary doctorate of law degrees from theUniversity of Toronto, andRyerson University. She died at 101, and was given astate funeral on what would have been her 102nd birthday.
Hazel Mary Muriel Journeaux[7] was born on February 14, 1921, inPort Daniel, on theGaspé Coast of Quebec. Her father, Herbert Armand Journeaux (1879–1944), owned a fishing and canning company. Her mother, Amanda Maude Travers (1876–1955),[8] was a homemaker and ran the family farm. The family included two older sisters and two older brothers. After graduating fromQuebec High School, she attended business secretarial school inQuebec City andMontreal.[1]
Journeaux began playingice hockey in the late 1920s in Port Daniel with her two sisters, and was a forward on their team. She then joined a professional women's hockey team while attending school in Montreal, receiving $5 per game. The team was sponsored by Kik Cola and was part of a three-team women's league.[9] She wanted to attend university, but her family could not afford it.[10] After beginning her career in Montreal with the Canadian division of engineering firmKellogg, she was transferred toToronto in 1942, where she helped set up the local office.[1][11] She left the business world in 1967 to devote her life to a career in politics.[1]
McCallion began her political career inStreetsville (now part ofMississauga). Her first campaign was in 1964 for the position ofdeputy reeve. It was unsuccessful, and she later considered herself to be a victim of "dirty tricks".[12] Having later been appointed the chairman of the Streetsville Planning Board, she was elected as deputy reeve in the 1967 election[13] and was appointed reeve in 1968.[14] She was elected as Streetsville's mayor in 1970, serving until 1973.[15]
The Town of Streetsville was amalgamated with theTown of Mississauga and theTown of Port Credit to form the City of Mississauga at the beginning of 1974; McCallion advocated unsuccessfully to preserve Streetsville as a separate municipality.[10][11][16] In the same year she was elected to theMississauga City Council,[1][10][11] and retained her seat on the council byacclamation in the 1976 municipal election.[17] By the time she was elected mayor of Mississauga, she had sat on virtually every committee inPeel Region and the City of Mississauga. She had also served on the executive of many federal and provincial committees and associations.[18]
McCallion was first elected mayor in 1978, defeating popular incumbentRon Searle by about 3,000 votes.[19] She had been in office only a few months when the1979 Mississauga train derailment occurred, in which aCanadian Pacific train carrying toxic chemicals derailed in a heavily populated area near Mavis Road. A large explosion and fire ensued as hazardous chemicals spilled. McCallion, along with thePeel Regional Police and other governmental authorities, oversaw the evacuation of the city. There were no deaths or serious injuries during the week-long emergency, and Mississauga gained renown for the successful evacuation of its then 200,000 residents.[20]
During McCallion's terms in office, Mississauga grew from a small collection of towns and villages to one of Canada's largest cities, with much of the growth occurring after the 1976 election ofRené Lévesque'sParti Québécois government sparked an exodus ofAnglophones and corporations from Montreal to the Greater Toronto Area (GTA).[21][22][23] The high rate of low-density growth led to McCallion being nicknamed "Queen of Sprawl" by urban planning critics.[24]
McCallion was easily re-elected throughout her tenure as mayor, with no serious challengers coming close to unseating her.[25] She received more than 90% of the votes at the1997,2000 and2003 mayoral elections.[11] She never campaigned during elections and refused to accept political donations, instead asking her supporters to donate the money to charity.[26] Her final term as mayor, won in the election of October 2010, was her twelfth consecutive term.[27] She announced during her final term that she would not be running for re-election in the2014 municipal elections[28] and endorsed councillor and former federalmember of ParliamentBonnie Crombie to replace her as Mayor.[29] Crombie defeated former city councillor, member of Provincial Parliament and federal cabinet ministerSteve Mahoney to win the 2014 municipal election.[30]
In 2012, McCallion was the third-highest paid mayor in Canada, with a salary of $187,057.[31]
In a first-person account for Canadian magazineConfidence Bound, McCallion credited her faith with giving her energy, and said she still did her own household chores. "Housework and gardening are great forms of exercise and keep one humble."[32]
On her 90th birthday in 2011, McCallion was assessed by Dr. Barbara Clive, ageriatrician, who stated that "at 90 her gait is perfect, her speech is totally sharp and she has the drive to still run this city. She's the poster child for seniors".[33]
In 1982, McCallion was found guilty of a conflict of interest on a planning decision by theOntario High Court of Justice due to not absenting herself from a council meeting on a matter in which she had an interest. In 1983, The Municipal Conflict of Interest Act would have required her to vacate her seat and prohibited her from running for the following term.[34][11]
In 2009, McCallion was the focus of public opinion when it was alleged that she failed to disclose a conflict of interest when attending meetings that concerned her son's company, World Class Developments Ltd.[35][36] On October 3, 2011, Judge Douglas Cunningham found McCallion "acted in a 'real and apparent conflict of interest' while pushing hard for a real estate deal that could have put millions of dollars in her son's pocket."[37] On June 14, 2013, charges under theMunicipal Conflict of Interest Act were dismissed as World Class Developments did not have a financial interest as defined under the Act, and the application was also statute-barred.[38] In a later ruling concerning costs, Judge J. Sproat said, "Out of seven major issues, Mayor McCallion was successful on only three. On two of the three issues Mayor McCallion was successful, not because of any prudence or diligence, but only because World Class Developments's project had not progressed at a faster pace."[39]
While party preferences are not usually expressed in Canadian municipal politics, McCallion supported theLiberal Party at the federal and provincial levels, and was asked in 1982 to consider running for the leadership of theOntario Liberal Party.[40] She endorsedKathleen Wynne on the convention floor of the2013 Ontario Liberal Party leadership election,[41] and later endorsed her and her party in the2014 Ontario general election.[42] Otherwise, McCallion was sometimes described as asmall-c conservative.[43] McCallion endorsed Liberal leaderJustin Trudeau for the2015 election.[44] She also appeared in a notable television advertisement for the federal Liberals during the final days of the2015 election.[45] In the2018 Ontario provincial election, McCallion endorsed PC leaderDoug Ford, who went on to becomePremier of Ontario.[46]
In 2007, McCallion responded to the federal government's refusal to give any of theCanadian goods and services tax to cities, a funding source long requested by many municipalities across Canada, by planning a five percent surcharge onproperty taxes in the city. She was able to have the levy introduced and approved on the same day by Mississauga City council. Most media coverage, as well as Toronto mayorDavid Miller, noted that McCallion was arguably one of the few mayors in the country with the political capital to implement such a strategy.[47]
McCallion was one of the first Canadian politicians to openly support the creation of aPalestinian state. Addressing the annual convention of theCanadian Arab Federation in 1983, she argued that Palestinian issues had been distorted by the national media and was quoted as saying, "The Palestinians need and require and deserve a country of their own. Why shouldn't they get it?"[48]
McCallion established the GTA Mayors' Committee in 1992. She brought together the 30 mayors, later adding the chair ofMetropolitan Toronto and the four regional chairs to work cooperatively for the economic promotion of the GTA. From 1992 to January 2000, the committee, chaired by McCallion, was a strong voice on key issues affecting the future of the GTA.[1] She was a founder and honorary co-chair of theGreater Toronto Marketing Alliance.[49]
In 1996, McCallion was appointed to the "Who Does What" panel. She was also appointed to two sub-panels: Assessment and Property Taxation Reform, andEmergency Services. She represented theAssociation of Municipalities of Ontario on the Electricity Transition Committee for the Ministry of Electricity, Science and Technology.[50]
McCallion is the first woman to hold such significant positions as president of the Streetsville and DistrictChamber of Commerce, president of the Anglican Young Peoples' Association of Canada, mayor of Streetsville, and mayor of Mississauga. She was responsible for the formation of Hazel's Hope, a campaign to fund health care for children afflicted withAIDS andHIV in southern Africa.[51]
McCallion hosted an annual gala in Mississauga to raise money for arts and culture in the city.[52]
At the1987 World Women's Hockey Tournament, the championship trophy was named the Hazel McCallion World Cup.[53] McCallion was once a board member of theCentral Ontario Women's Hockey League, and was instrumental in the construction of theHershey Centre in Mississauga. She provided assistance toDon Cherry's group to bring anOntario Hockey League franchise to the city in 1998, and she was instrumental in bringing theIIHF Women's World Hockey Championships to the city in 2000.[54]
.jpg)
In November 2015, McCallion was appointed chief elder officer (CEO) ofRevera Inc., to provide advice and counsel to the senior living sector company.[55]
In September 2011,Sheridan College opened the doors to its Hazel McCallion Campus in Mississauga, which was greatly expanded in 2018, more than doubling its enrollment. Furthering her ties with the college, in 2016, McCallion was named Sheridan's first chancellor, as part of its bid to attain university status.[6] In February 2015, McCallion became a special advisor to theUniversity of Toronto Mississauga (UTM), the Mississauga campus of theUniversity of Toronto, providing advice on matters related to strategic development of the school.[56]
In 2017 McCallion was appointed to the board of theGreater Toronto Airport Authority, a position for which she accepted a three-year renewal in April 2022.[57] In January 2019, Ontario Premier Doug Ford appointed McCallion as a special adviser.[58] She soon after said she wanted more details before accepting or declining,[59] but later decided to decline the job offer.[60] In October 2022, McCallion was appointed the head of theGreenbelt Council advisory group by Premier Ford. In January 2023, she endorsed his plan totake protected areas out of the Greenbelt for housing development, calling it "brave".[24]
Journeaux met her future husband, Sam McCallion (1923–1997),[61] at anAnglican Church congregation in Toronto in 1951; they married on September 29 of that year.[62] As a marriage present from McCallion's in-laws, a piece of land near the village of Streetsville was given to the newlyweds, to which they moved in December 1951.[63] The couple had three children, and were married until Sam McCallion's death from Alzheimer's disease in 1997.[12] Their son Peter unsuccessfully ran for Mississauga Ward 9 councillor in the2022 municipal election.[64][65]
As a volunteer, McCallion served as president of the Anglican Young People's Association of Canada, and was a district commissioner with theGirl Guides of Canada in the early 1960s.[66] Before politics, she and her husband foundedThe Streetsville Booster in 1964.[a][12]
McCallion died frompancreatic cancer at home on January 29, 2023, at age 101.[67][68] Astate funeral was held for McCallion on February 14, 2023, on what would have been her 102nd birthday. Her body lay in repose atMississauga Civic Centre for two days, prior to her funeral at theParamount Fine Foods Centre.[68] Dignitaries attending the funeral included prime ministerJustin Trudeau, former prime ministerJean Chrétien, and Ontario premierDoug Ford. Flags in Ontario were flown at half-mast on the day of her funeral.[69]
In 2016, February 14 was renamed Hazel McCallion Day across Ontario in honour of her birthday.[70]
The following have been conferred on McCallion:
The following have been named in her honour:
The Hazel McCallion Hall has been the home to every type of reception and event imaginable.
As mayor for 36 years, she read the changing moods of her city and transformed it, distinguishing herself as a master of realpolitik
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | Mayor of Mississauga 1978–2014 | Succeeded by |
| New title | Ward 9 Councillor,Mississauga 1974–1977 | Succeeded by Ken Dear |
| Preceded by Jack Graham | Mayor ofStreetsville 1970–1973 | Amalgamation with Mississauga |
| Preceded by D.E. Hewson | Reeve of Streetsville 1968–1969 | Succeeded by Wm. Appleton |
| Preceded by G. Parker | Deputy Reeve of Streetsville 1968 | Succeeded by Wm. C. Arch |
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Other | |
