Curated by Bobbie Fox

When Lethbridge became a town in 1891, the councillor form of governance was adopted and Charles A. Magrath was elected mayor. Over the last 129 years Lethbridge has elected twenty-five mayors and this October Lethbridge citizens go to the polls to elect their 26th person to hold this title.  From 1891 to 1912 mayoral and councillor terms lasted for a year. Prior to 1952 the mayor's term was January to December.  Following 1952, mayors served an October to October term.

The election of 1914 brought in the commission form of city government which saw the mayor as one of three commissioners who ran the city. This change was approved by the province and made Lethbridge one of the first cities in Canada to adopt this form of municipal governance. The commission system lasted until 1928 when it was replaced with the councillor-manager system that is still used to run Lethbridge presently.

Early on, the election of the mayor was done internally from the pool of seven elected aldermen. The council then appointed a city manager who was responsible for the city’s staff and to administer the policies council adopted. The citizens of Lethbridge in 1961 decided they wanted to have a voice about who became mayor and vote directly for them. This marked not only a change in the office of mayor but also in the number of aldermen able to sit on council which was raised to eight. In 2012 it was decided that aldermen would be called councillors as it was a more inclusive term.