City of Calgary hiring staff to handle recall petition

The City of Calgary is hiring 10 elections clerks to help process documents related to a recall petition against Mayor Jyoti Gondek.

The City of Calgary is hiring workers to help process the paperwork associated with an open recall petition targeting Mayor Jyoti Gondek.

At the end of January, Calgary business owner Landon Johnston launched the recall petition with the hope of forcing the mayor out of office.

To do that, he needs to collect more than 514,000 signatures by April 4.

All of those needed to be collected by hand and verified by city staff, so the City of Calgary is looking to hire 10 election clerks to help with the workload.

According to the campaign's most recent update, Johnston has only gathered about 60,000 of the required number of signatures.

He says there should be more, but there are issues with getting the forms returned.

In the meantime, Gondek says the whole thing is taking a toll on her and her family.

"This is truly personal to not have me be mayor even though I was elected," she told CTV News.

"(That's) something that nobody talks about – the fact that I have to witness this as I'm trying to lead the city, the fact that it looks ridiculous to outsiders that there's a petition in place to recall a mayor that hasn't committed any ethical violations."

The city has 45 days to verify all the signatures submitted through the petition.