Portage Mayor rubs shoulders with St. John's NL Mayor over holidays

The Mayor of St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, since 2017, Danny Breen, enjoyed a visit from Portage la Prairie Mayor Sharilyn Knox over the holidays. Knox was with family on The Rock, and Breen recounts their time together and shares how their meeting fared. 

"We have a great chat whenever we travel, whether personal or business," says Breen. "We usually, if we're in the City, try to make contact with the mayor and chat. And it's always interesting to learn what's happening in other places. No matter what the size of the city or the town, the problems are pretty similar. It's just the magnitude of the challenges, sometimes, that's different, depending on the size of the community." 

Breen says they spoke about how things were going, how the economy was moving forward, and the challenges that mayors face.

"She emailed my office just about the week or two prior to that, to let us know she was in town," adds Breen. "So, I met her at City Hall, gave her a tour of City Hall, and had a discussion about things that were happening in this City," continues Breen.

Mayor Knox says it was great to learn about another city. 

"Of course, they're a lot larger than we are, but it's always interesting to hear some of their successes and challenges that may be similar or different than ours," says Knox. "It was very interesting. St. John's is very much connected to two other areas in a City -- Mount Pearl and Paradise. We talked about the partnerships they have there and the services that St. John's provides to them. I found it interesting to hear that about 40 per cent of Mount Pearl's budget goes to pay St. John's for the services that they offer to them."

She notes, overall, St. John's is a beautiful place to visit with no snow at this time of year, which is not always the case there. She says there was some rain, but it's a beautiful place to visit.

"Visiting the mayor was great," adds Knox. "They have a nice City Hall. He was very welcoming, and it was just nice to be able to do that as another municipal official meeting another municipal official. He actually came in on his day off to meet with me, so I was pretty pleased about that."

Knox adds it was a great experience and she looked forward to being back in Portage and getting back to work to accomplish lots of great things for our City in 2023.