County nominates new warden

By Sarah Sobanski 

Hastings County council will have a new warden later this year.

Stirling-Rawdon Mayor Rodney Cooney has been nominated for council's warden. He will succeed current Warden Rick Phillips and be sworn in Dec. 8.

“It's quite an honour. There's 14 of us there. It's nice that they have confidence in me,” said Cooney.

“[Rick] set the bar fairly high. He put Hastings County on the map,” he added, explaining he looked forward to working with Phillips to learn the ropes until he got his feet wet.

Cooney started in politics in the early 2000s. After taking a break, he returned to council and ran for mayor of Stirling-Rawdon council in 2010.

“I've been involved since the community was five or six years old — volunteering, coaching hockey, soccer and baseball over the last four decades,” said Cooney.

Cooney looks forward to future steps to improve Hastings County communities. He said he wanted to continue council's work with the communities to collaborate with each other.

“We can't do it all on our own,” said Cooney. “Department heads need to be reaching out to other department heads. We need to network.”

In December, Cooney will hold the position of mayor, warden and continue with his family's small business Cooney Farms. He manages the apple business with his wife and his parents who started the business 40 years ago this year.

“I try not to sleep too much,” Cooney joked when asked how he will keep up with it all.

“I have a great council,” he said later, suggesting he has a strong team and support system behind him to manage the workload.