# 1977 Edmonton municipal election

The 1977 municipal election was held October 19, 1977 to elect a mayor and twelve aldermen to sit on Edmonton City Council, nine trustees to sit on the public school board, and seven trustees to sit on the separate school board.
This was the first election in which a nine-member public school board was elected instead of the seven member board that had previously existed.
It was also the last election to use only four wards for election of the city councillors. Beginning in 1980, two aldermen were elected from each of six wards.

## Electoral system

Mayor was elected through First past the post.
Councillors were elected three per ward, through Plurality block voting where each voter could cast up to three votes.
School board positions also were filled through Plurality block voting as well.

## Voter turnout

There were 116,525 ballots cast out of 305,342 eligible voters, for a voter turnout of 38.2%.

## Results

(bold indicates elected, italics indicate incumbent)

### Mayor

| Party | Candidate | Votes | % |
| Independent | Cec Purves | 38,720 | 33.92% |
| Independent | Laurence Decore | 29,682 | 26.00% |
| Independent | Terry Cavanagh | 28,941 | 25.36% |
| Independent | Ivor Dent | 13,818 | 12.11% |
| Revolutionary Workers League | Donald Tapscott | 1,395 | 1.22% |
| Independent | Eddie Keehn | 1,108 | 0.97% |
| Independent | John Horobec | 479 | 0.42% |
(William Hawrelak had been elected mayor in the 1974 election, but had died in office. Cavanagh was selected by council to replace him.)

### Aldermen

Guide:
* E.C.G.A = Edmonton Civic Government Association
* E.V.A. = Edmonton Voters Association
* U.R.G.E. = Urban Reform Group Edmonton
| Ward 1 | Ward 1 | Ward 1 | Ward 1 | Ward 2 | Ward 2 | Ward 2 | Ward 2 | Ward 3 | Ward 3 | Ward 3 | Ward 3 | Ward 4 | Ward 4 | Ward 4 | Ward 4 |
| Party | Party | Candidate | Votes | Party | Party | Candidate | Votes | Party | Party | Candidate | Votes | Party | Party | Candidate | Votes |
| | U.R.G.E. | Lois Campbell | 12,958 | | Ind. | Gene Dub | 11,202 | | E.C.G.A | Ron Hayter | 11,425 | | U.R.G.E. | Bettie Hewes | 16,560 |
| | E.C.G.A | Kenneth Newman | 14,619 | | E.C.G.A | Olivia Butti | 10,553 | | Ind. | Ed Leger | 10,760 | | E.C.G.A | William Chmiliar | 14,473 |
| | E.C.G.A | Paul Norris | 12,014 | | Ind. | Percy Wickman | 8,755 | | U.R.G.E. | Edward Kennedy | 9,957 | | E.C.G.A | Buck Olsen | 14,090 |
| | Ind. | Carl Paproski | 11,926 | | U.R.G.E. | Gerry Wright | 6,311 | | Ind. | David Stewart | 6,342 | | Ind. | Sheila McKay | 10,876 |
| | E.C.G.A | Bud Salloum | 10,693 | | Ind. | Bob Caine | 5,304 | | E.V.A. | Walter Doskoch | 4,290 | | E.C.G.A | Darryl Smith | 8,958 |
| | Ind. | Nick Fedorak | 7,440 | | Ind. | Solomon Agronin | 5,153 | | Ind. | Clarence (Chuck) Bolton | 3,408 | | Ind. | Mitchell Wijcik | 6,515 |
| | Ind. | Donald Eastcott | 5,390 | | Ind. | Kenneth Burton | 4,668 | | Ind. | Ernest Whitely | 3,362 | | E.V.A. | Ed Ewasiuk | 6,192 |
| | Ind. | Cal O'Brian | 4,624 | | E.C.G.A | Ed Baxter | 4,138 | | | | | | Ind. | John Lakusta | 3,031 |
| | E.V.A. | Gerry Paschen | 3,983 | | Ind. | Henry Rutkowski | 3,167 | | | | | | | | |
| | Ind. | Johannes Bosch | 2,703 | | E.V.A. | Robert Blakely | 2,867 | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | Ind. | Olga Cylurik | 1,870 | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | E.V.A. | E. J. (Slim) Powell | 1,800 | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | Ind. | Richard Guthrie | 1,171 | | | | | | | | |

### Public school trustees

* Shirley Forbes - 38468
* Mel Binder - 37438
* Ernie Lund - 35406
* Jim Patrick - 33618
* Don Massey - 33444
* Catherine Ford - 33170
* Richard Jamieson - 32371
* James Falconer - 31754
* Elaine Jones - 27494
* Lorne Mowers - 26792
* Vernon Johnson - 25896
* Douglas Sorenson - 24397
* Molly Glass - 21330
* John Mason - 16319
* Clare Brown - 16252

### Separate (Catholic) school trustees

* Leo Floyd - 16438
* Jean McDonald - 15123
* Barry Cavanaugh - 11506
* Phil Gibeau - 11207
* Laurier Picard - 11071
* Raymond Pinkowski - 10342
* Joe Donahue - 9810
* William McNeill - 8664
* Zan Matishank - 8436
* Patrick Murphy - 7873
* Lyle Lavender - 7039
* John Kash - 6506
* Paul Haljan - 4659