Newly elected Ward 2 City Councillor Senos Timon immigrated to Canada in 2000 from Sudan and he says he didn’t expect, coming from a war torn, third world country, to come to Saskatoon with its abundance of resources, only to find issues of homelessness and poverty.

Timon lives in Meadow Green and while campaigning has visited all nine neighbourhoods and everyone had the same concerns which was homelessness and crime. Timon says the issue of wellness or homeless shelters has been very divisive and no one wants it in their neighbourhood.

“I want to see that residents feel safe in their neighbourhoods, to be able to go to the park, allow children to b go and play, grandkids be able to go, people being able to walk their dog without having concerns of being hurt.”

And while municipal government doesn’t have a whole lot of leverage in terms of addressing the issue of homeless by itself, he says it has a role to play. Timon suggests it includes coming together as a community to get to the root cause of what is causing the issue.

Timon says he never envisioned when getting off the plane in Saskatoon 24 years ago that he’d be putting his name forward for public office and he thanks the citizens of Ward 2 for the opportunity to serve.