Stittsville Councilor Glen Gower’s advice for aspiring candidates in the 2026 Ottawa election: “Just go out and meet people.” My takeaway: incumbents don’t wait — and neither should challengers. His 17 tips for candidates in his Substack newsletter are useful, practical, and a little brutal if you read them honestly. I did, because some readers keep insisting it’s unfair to call Kitchissippi Councilor Jeff Leiper’s pre-campaign lacking in energy when the official campaign doesn’t begin until May 1 and the rules punish anyone who starts “campaigning” for real (spending money). But that misses the point entirely. We live in the age of the permanent campaign. Municipal politics only hides it better because Ontario cities don’t have formal parties. As Joanne Chianello has put it, mayors campaign every day. Mark Sutcliffe certainly has. He has been doing it for three years. Read Gower with that in mind and three tips jump off the page: #2 - the best time to start your unofficial campaign was “yesterday”; #3 – “just go out and meet people”; and #7 – “campaign to win and brace yourself to lose.” That advice is not only for ward hopefuls. It also applies to Sutcliffe’s challengers. And on that measure, Leiper’s campaign looks and feels late to many insiders. All challengers should worry. Municipal incumbency is a stubborn beast. Even an incumbent carrying some baggage usually starts with the edge. Which is why anyone serious about knocking one off should have been introducing themselves to voters at the door in 2025. Starting a campaign – that is, introducing yourself to voters – on May 1 is not only a late start. For some aspiring candidates it may actually turn out to be the date on which they realize that they have already lost the election.