Drew Dilkens is not quite out the door yet, but a sculpture of him created by Peter Solly was moving on Friday. It was being taken from the Mayor’s office to be delivered to the Dilkens’ home. After 12 years in office, Windsor’s second-longest mayoral tenure comes to an end Saturday. Dilkens says it wasn’t always smooth sailing. “When I think of all the things that we’ve gone through in terms of tornadoes, floods, pandemic, freedom convoys, tariff wars and all the nonsense with Donald Trump, We were still able to carve out and get a lot of important things done for the community.” With construction underway on the new hospital, he says Windsor is in the best financial shape in its history. When it comes to economic successes, he points to NextStar, a major win under the city’s Windsor Works economic plan. “Every time I drive by Nextstar, I’m going to look at Nextstar as a shining example of economic development at its finest where it was three levels of government coming together. The city went all in to try and land this battery factory.” On election night, Dilkens says it took him about five minutes to make peace with his loss and that feeling hasn’t subsided. “You can’t own this job forever,” he told CTV News. “You’re only filling the seat and you try and do the best that you can in the time that you’re here.” Dilkens has already met with Mayor-Elect Fred Francis and stresses the importance of Sandwich South where he envisions an industrial park and thousand of new homes. “Sandwich South is the future growth area of the city of Windsor. There’ll be more than 5-thousand homes built in that area. You have a hospital and health research park that will be constructed in that area.” So what’s next for Dilkens? He is already fielding job offers but says he isn’t ready to jump in right away. “I need a month off. I need a vacation. I need to decompress for a month, and we’ll get back to it very very quickly because I’m not in retirement mode.” As he prepares to walk out of city hall for the last time as mayor, Dilkens says he has no regrets about the job he’s leaving behind. “It’s been the best experience of my life. I don’t regret a moment and then tomorrow when I walk out the door for the final time, there’ll be no tears.”
