Mayoral candidate · Sault Ste. Marie
The Preacher
Blues artist. Sault Ste. Marie neighbour. An independent voice running to serve the city he calls home.
Meet the candidate
Known onstage as The Preacher, Josh McNally is a blues artist from Sault Ste. Marie. He is running for mayor to bring a grounded, independent voice to City Hall.
Josh earned the name “The Preacher” at the famed Buddy Guy’s Legends while studying blues in the heart of Chicago. Learning fingerstyle Chicago blues from friends and mentors helped shape the sound he brings to the stage today.
Music is built on listening: hearing the room, finding the rhythm, and bringing people together. Josh believes local leadership should work the same way—listen first, speak plainly, and stay accountable to the whole city.
Whole notes, without half steps.
Good solutions start by understanding the whole problem. Then we bring the right people together and follow through—without settling for half measures.
Progressive values. Practical local work.
A home you can afford. Work that pays. Care when you need it. A city where everyone belongs. Back local businesses and artists, grow tourism, and strengthen the services that help people build a good life here.
Read the full platform →Give people reasons to visit, stay longer, and come back. Connect music, festivals, food-truck parks, heritage, downtown, and the waterfront—with fair pay for local creators and customers for local businesses. Make tourism work for the people who call the Sault home.
Explore tourism & the creative economy →Everyone deserves housing, care, and dignity. Work toward affordable homes, timely voluntary treatment, and support shaped around each person with the organizations already serving people. Fill gaps, make shared spaces safer, and change what is not working.
Explore housing & social support →Create fair chances for entrepreneurs, inventors, builders, students, and performers to demonstrate their work. Give people an open route to feedback, mentorship, and a next step.
Read this chapter →Make more room for music, film, comedy, stories, heritage, and neighbourhood gatherings across the city. Set up designated places for regular and scheduled busking so artists can earn income and bring public spaces to life.
Read this chapter →Good ideas often start with an ordinary conversation. Make it easy to reach someone, share what you know, and bring neighbours together to make something good happen.
Read this chapter →Start free foundational life-skills learning in existing spaces while carefully exploring a permanent all-ages community centre. Let the learning begin before any property decision is made.
Read this chapter →Policy questions for discussion: Prohibit adult-entertainment establishments citywide—or regulate designated locations? Should the City ask Ontario for a tightly controlled smoking and cannabis-hospitality pilot?
This is home
Sault Ste. Marie is shaped by the water, built by working people, and strengthened by neighbourhoods with their own stories. City Hall should see the whole picture—and never lose sight of the people who live inside it.
Our history, environment, tourism, and future all meet at the waterfront.
Local business, safer streets, and public spaces people are proud to use.
The platform applies across the whole municipality while recognizing that downtown, waterfront, residential, industrial, and rural-edge communities do not all face the same questions in the same way.
One city, every neighbourhood
From the waterfront and downtown to every residential street and rural edge, residents deserve the same thing: to be heard, treated fairly, and kept informed.
Community School for Life
Josh proposes free foundational life-skills classes for all ages and wants to explore an all-ages downtown community centre.
Classes can begin with willing partners in existing spaces while we explore a permanent home. Using the former downtown high school would require an agreement, a building assessment, accessibility and safety work, clear operating responsibility, and a sustainable budget.
Room to think bigger
Josh is interested in exploring larger visions for Sault Ste. Marie, including Mosaic—a project described by Jeremy Hannah that brings together ideas for tourism, economic development, and community life.
Its starting question is simple: what could our streets, waterfront, buildings, and surrounding landscape become if we looked at how they could work together?
Josh sees real promise in that question. Thoughtfully developed, connected destinations could broaden the city’s economy, support more local work, and give residents and investors more confidence in the Sault’s future.
Mosaic fits into a broader vision for tourism and local opportunity.
Gore Street
A destination-street concept built around food, culture, and small enterprise.
02The waterfront
A permanent fairground with attractions, food, performance, and gathering spaces.
03Stay longer
A hotel or resort connected with surrounding experiences.
04Station Mall
A major exhibition and convention centre within part of the mall.
These are connected possibilities for places to visit, businesses to build, events to host, and reasons to spend more time in the city.
Mosaic · The waterfront today
These waterfront views put the Mosaic discussion in its real setting. Across the river behind Josh in the blue-sky photograph is the former proposed Gateway site and fish hatchery area—a connection between the places we know today and the waterfront possibilities being explored.
A look at the waterfront as it is today.
Room for good ideas
Big ideas start with people. Bring together residents, property owners, businesses, community groups, and potential partners to see what we could make happen. Your own ideas belong here too.
Let’s give the strongest ideas the time, care, and local knowledge they need to take shape.
Bring a question or idea → Read the complete platform section →Mosaic concepts are attributed to Jeremy Hannah. These are ideas to explore, not approved or funded projects. Moving forward would mean working with landowners, operators, public bodies, and Indigenous governments and rights holders on feasibility, permissions, and funding.
Explore all four Mosaic conceptsMany hands. A stronger Sault.
Bring an idea, lend a skill, or tell us what would make life better in your neighbourhood. There’s more than one way to help shape what’s next.
Explore our city’s name and story, and what they mean to you.
Review the question →A small improvement or a bigger possibility—start with what you have in mind.
Put your idea into words →Instructor, venue owner, organizer, operator, technical adviser, potential funder, or campaign volunteer.
Email the campaign →Taking part in a discussion or offering help does not sign you up for campaign emails.
Your privacy and choices →Community participation
Our neighbours know this city in all sorts of ways. Bring your stories, questions, and ideas. Here’s one conversation we could have together.
A conversation about our city
A city name carries history, identity, and a sense of home. What does ours mean to you, and what possibilities are worth exploring?
How easy is the present name to say, spell and find online? Have you encountered confusion, and would a different name actually help?
The Ontario city shares its name with Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. Would a different name make our Canadian city’s identity clearer, or is the shared name a connection worth keeping?
Bawating is one name proposed for this discussion. Batchewana First Nation uses the spelling “Bawahting” in its account of the area’s history and identifies it with the rapids. Any serious naming discussion should involve local Anishinaabe governments, language speakers, and knowledge holders, including decisions about spelling, meaning, and pronunciation.
What would be gained or lost? A change would affect local attachment, French-language heritage, signs, businesses, addresses, records, and transition costs. Recognition of more than one name is also an option to examine.
Neighbours helping neighbours
You know your street, your work, and the people around you. Josh wants to hear what’s working, what could be better, and where you see a possibility. A conversation can be the start of something useful.
