LeBlanc to run

Anthony LeBlanc still wants to be part of the deal to buy the financially struggling Phoenix Coyotes, but the Thunder Bay entrepreneur has found something else to occupy his time in the interim – politics.
 
LeBlanc, the CEO of investment company Ice Edge Holdings Inc., on Thursday filed his nomination papers with the Thunder Bay-Superior North Progressive Conservative Riding Association, the first step to becoming a candidate for the upcoming provincial election.

LeBlanc is the first candidate to file his papers for the Conservatives, and is seeking to become the first non-Liberal to take the riding since it was created in 1999.

“I’m at a point now that I think now, provincially, people need an option when they’re going to the ballot box in October,” said LeBlanc, who is running for public office for the first time. “I think it’s important for everybody in the Thunder Bay-Superior North region that there is the potential for a strong candidate and a strong party in that region.”

A former vice-president with Research in Motion, the company that brought the world the Blackberry, LeBlanc says his business background is just what the region needs as it pulls itself out of a recession brought forward by the collapse of the forest industry.

“I think I bring a freshness, a new way of looking at things, and an experience level that I think is important for these types of decisions that need to be made,” LeBlanc said.

LeBlanc, born and raised in Thunder Bay before leaving to seek his fortune, said he has always maintained close ties to his hometown, regardless of where he was living at the moment.

He first came to prominence in the city in 2005, when he raised the possibility of bringing either an American Hockey League or Ontario Hockey League franchise to Thunder Bay.

Those discussions ramped up in recent years, as he and partner Keith McCullough, a fellow Lakehead resident, embarked on a quest to buy the Coyotes, first on their own and of late as a minority partner with investor Matthew Hulsizer.

Bringing jobs to Thunder Bay is his top priority, should he win the nomination, expected to be decided by month’s end.

“Thunder Bay needs better jobs. We need to focus on new industries, while at the same time maintaining these important industries in the forestry sector, for example,” he said Friday, before sitting down for a tete-a-tete with Thunder Bay-Atikokan Progressive Conservative candidate Fred Gilbert to familiarize himself with the process.

“High-tech is my background and this is an area I want to focus on. I think Thunder Bay could be a wonderful spot. And we’re seeing that in some of the new industries as they come forward in a medical field and the knowledged-based (economy), and of course with the law school,” he said.

He knows it won’t be easy electing a Conservative in Thunder Bay, a city that hasn’t gone Tory since 1985, when the late Mickey Hennessey took the Fort William ridings.

Liberal Michael Gravelle has owned the riding since 1995, and as the minister of northern development, mines and forestry, will be tough to unseat.

But it can be done, LeBlanc said.

“The reality is it is going to be a very tough election for any Conservative. If I’m the one who is lucky enough to be chosen as the candidate, it will be a very difficult election campaign, but a worthwhile one,” he said.

“I think we can look at the lessons from the federal election, seeing what happened with the New Democrats. You’ve had powerful ministers, right up to leaders like Gilles Duceppe and Michael Ignatieff losing their seats. Anybody can be beaten on election day.”

Should he win the nomination, LeBlanc would also face a to-be-determined NDP candidate, whose race at present include Jay Stapleton and Cindy Crowe.