Quick Facts
Biography
Bernadette Clement is a Canadian politician, who was elected mayor of Cornwall, Ontario in the 2018 Ontario municipal elections. A Black Canadian, she is the first woman and first person of colour to serve as mayor of the city, and the first Black Canadian woman to serve as a mayor in Ontario.
Born and raised in Montreal, Quebec as the daughter of a Trinidadian father and a Franco-Manitoban mother, Clement attended the University of Ottawa before moving to Cornwall. A member of the city council since 2006, Clement also worked as executive director of the city's SDG Legal Clinic.
She conducted her mayoral campaign on the themes of developing a more collaborative team-oriented approach to managing the city, as well as seeking a way to advance the city's proposed but long-delayed waterfront redevelopment project.
Clement also ran as a Liberal Party of Canada candidate for the electoral district of Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry in the 2011 Canadian federal election and the 2015 Canadian federal election.