The number of Mississauga mayoral candidates in this year’s municipal election is now at seven after another hopeful threw their hat into the political ring this week.

Olivia Gannon officially joined the race on Monday, registering at Mississauga city hall for a chance to become the city’s next mayor.

Prior to the latest entry, the field of candidates for the top elected post in Mississauga had held steady at six since early May. Registration for the 2026 municipal election opened on May 1.

The other half dozen office seekers include the incumbent, Mayor Carolyn Parrish, and one city councillor, Alvin Tedjo, who was runner-up to Parrish in the June 2024 Mississauga mayoral byelection.

Others vying to become mayor of Canada’s seventh-largest city are George Tavares, David Shaw, Mike Matulewicz and Rahul Mehta.

Some familiar names on the ballot 

While not househould names, Tavares and Shaw should be recognizeable to anyone who’s followed recent municipal elections in Mississauga. They were among the field of candidates in the 2024 mayoral byelection and both also ran for the office in the 2022 municipal election.

Shaw placed a distant fifth in the byelection (2,843 votes) while Tavares was eighth, with 962 votes.

In the 2022 bid for the mayor’s seat, Shaw earned 7,202 votes (6.83 per cent) while Tavares garnered 5,613 votes (5.32 per cent) to finish a distant second and third, respectively, to former three-term Mississauga mayor Bonnie Crombie (82,736 votes, 78.47 per cent).

Mehta, meanwhile, ran for the Ward 8 seat on city council in 2022 and Matulewicz was also among the 20 candidates to run in the city’s mayoral byelection nearly two years ago.

Crowded field ran in 2024 mayoral byelection

Parrish won the June 2024 byelection to succeed Crombie after the former mayor left to lead the Ontario Liberals. The current mayor has told INsauga.com on several occasions she’ll run for the post one more term as she still has “a lot to accomplish.”

Tedjo has given up the Ward 2 council seat to make his pitch for the mayor’s post. He was first elected to council in 2022.

Following Parrish (43,494 votes) and Tedjo (35,005 votes) in the June 2024 mayoral byelection were a pair of Mississauga city councillors — Ward 7’s Dipika Damerla (27,119 votes) and Stephen Dasko (22,408 votes), who represents Ward 1.

The 2026 municipal election will be held on Oct. 26. Candidate nominations opened May 1 and continue untl Aug. 21 at 2 p.m.

For more information on who’s running, how to become a candidate and the election in general, visit the city’s election page online.

Other candidates who’ve registered to run for Mississauga city council, as of late Tuesday afternoon (June 2), are:

Stephen Dasko — Ward 1 (incumbent)
Leeann Cole — Ward 2
Chris Fonseca — Ward 3 (incumbent)
Kim Pines — Ward 3
Stjepan Vukovic — Ward 3
John Kovac — Ward 4 (incumbent)
Natalie Hart — Ward 5 (incumbent)
Ismail Bawa — Ward 5
Mandeep Singh Dhaliwal — Ward 5
Aruna Anand — Ward 5
Raghavan Babu Bhogaiah — Ward 5
Joe Horneck — Ward 6 (incumbent)
Joel Binda — Ward 7
Maisa Salhia — Ward 7
Leslie Zurek-Silvestri — Ward 7
Asha Falinski — Ward 7
Matt Mahoney — Ward 8 (incumbent)
Martin Reid — Ward 9 (incumbent)
Ramsha Haq — Ward 9
Anwar Knight — Ward 9
Mohammad Shabbeer — Ward 9
Sue McFadden — Ward 10 (incumbent)
Brad Butt — Ward 11 (incumbent)
Dev Vashi — Ward 11

Following Crombie’s resignation in early 2024, four city councillors at the time — Parrish (Ward 5), Tedjo, Damerla and Dasko — entered the field of 20 candidates to succeed her.

At least two will compete in the 2026 mayor’s race, with Damerla remaining an unknown as of late Tuesday as she had yet to register for the Ward 7 competition.

Dasko, meanwhile, is running to retain his Ward 1 seat.


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