Nancy Diamond (1941 – February 12, 2017) was a municipal politician in

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Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

, who served as mayor of

Oshawa Oshawa is a city in Ontario, Canada, on the Lake Ontario shoreline. It lies in Southern Ontario, approximately east of downtown Toronto. It is commonly viewed as the eastern anchor of the Greater Toronto Area and of the Golden Horseshoe. It ...

from 1991 to 2003."Former Oshawa mayor, long-time politician Nancy Diamond passes away"

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, February 13, 2017. Previously she served as a city councillor from 1988 to 1991. In 2010, she returned to council and served as a city and Durham regional councillor until her death in February 2017.

Background

Diamond was born in

Sudbury Sudbury may refer to: Places Australia * Sudbury Reef, Queensland Canada * Greater Sudbury, Ontario ** Sudbury (federal electoral district) ** Sudbury (provincial electoral district) ** Sudbury Airport ** Sudbury Basin, a meteorite impact cra ...

, in 1941."Diamond out to attract brains, business: Oshawa's new mayor wants 'recession-proof' university for the city". ''

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'', December 5, 1991. She studied economics at Queen's University and worked in university and college administration. Diamond and her husband Fred raised one daughter. Fred died in 2011 after a long illness.

Politics

After running for

Oshawa City Council Oshawa City Council is the governing body of the city of Oshawa, Ontario. The council has 11 members, consisting of 5 regional and city councillors and 5 city councillors plus the mayor. The city posts agendas for council and committee meetings. ...

in 1985 and losing by a margin of just seven votes, Diamond won election to council in 1988. She ran for mayor in the 1991 municipal election, defeating incumbent mayor Allan Mason."Oshawa mayor loses to local councillor". ''

'', November 13, 1991. Her campaign focused on a controversial downtown redevelopment project championed by Mason, which Diamond dismissed as "unrealistic, unmanageable and unfinanceable." She was not opposed to the redevelopment in principle, and later supported a revised version of the proposal, but objected to several aspects of Mason's proposed financing and implementation plans. Nancy Diamond Oshawa Mayor 1990s

One of her first stated goals as mayor was the establishment of a

university A university () is an educational institution, institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several Discipline (academia), academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly ...

in the city, a goal which was attained when the

University of Ontario Institute of Technology The University of Ontario Institute of Technology, branded as Ontario Tech University or Ontario Tech, is a public research university located in Oshawa, Ontario, Canada. The university's main campus is located on approximately of land in northe ...

was chartered in 2002. She spearheaded initiatives to improve the city's economy, including convening a panel of area mayors to come up with a plan to save the city's

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plant after staffing cutbacks at the company were announced. She lobbied for improvements to the city's transportation network, including the improvement of

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, the extension of

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and the expansion of the

Oshawa Airport Oshawa Executive Airport is a municipal airport adjacent to the north end of the city of Oshawa, Ontario, Canada. It is the busiest general aviation airport without scheduled airline service in the Greater Toronto Area by aircraft movements and ...

. She also spearheaded the creation of a

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position at Oshawa City Hall, and tried to avoid or minimize municipal tax increases. She was reelected to a second term as mayor in 1994. Priorities during her second term included economic diversification, and the revitalization of the city's struggling downtown core. During this era, she began to attract some controversy for endorsing a plan to amalgamate Oshawa with the neighbouring towns of

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and Courtice, and for her handling of an unconfirmed rumour that the board of the

Canadian Automotive Museum The Canadian Automotive Museum is an List of automobile museums, automobile museum located in Oshawa, Ontario, Canada. The museum features many Canadian-made cars as the automobile industry, specifically the Canadian division of the General Motors ...

was planning to move the facility from Oshawa to

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. Diamond was re-elected to a third term as mayor in the 1997 municipal election, and to a fourth term in the 2000 municipal election. In the 2003 municipal election, Diamond faced allegations that her style as mayor had been abrasive,"Long-time Oshawa mayor Nancy Diamond defeated". ''

'', November 11, 2003. that her management of the city's downtown revitalization program was failing and that her focus on freezing municipal tax rates was no longer serving the city's changing needs. She was defeated by councillor John Gray. Diamond returned to municipal politics in the 2010 municipal election, winning election to a dual Oshawa City Council and

Durham Regional Council Durham Regional Council is the political body for the Regional Municipality of Durham in Ontario, Canada. Created in 1974, it consists of 29 elected representatives, including the Regional Chair. Durham Region is governed by Durham Regional Council, ...

seat, and was reelected in the 2014 municipal election. She died in Toronto on February 12, 2017, at the age of 75 after a brief hospitalization after complaining of feeling unwell."Oshawa councillor and former mayor Nancy Diamond dies"
'' DurhamRegion.com'', February 13, 2017.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Diamond, Nancy 1941 births 2017 deaths Mayors of Oshawa Politicians from Greater Sudbury Women mayors of places in Ontario 20th-century Canadian women politicians 20th-century mayors of places in Ontario 21st-century Canadian women politicians 21st-century mayors of places in Ontario