A resident of Owen Sound, Ruth Lovell-Stanners served 16 years on Owen Sound City Council, seven as mayor, in fact she was the first woman to be elected mayor of Owen Sound.

Ruth has also been involved as a volunteer in many community organizations over the years. She served a Board Chair of the Georgian Riding Association for Challenged Equestrians, one of her favourite charities, and has served on the board of R.E.A.C.H.

She was the founding Chair of Chapman House Hospice, and currently is board chair of the Owen Sound Municipal Non-Profit Housing Company, which is presently overseeing the building of 60 badly-needed attainable housing units in the city.

She is also a Past President of the Ontario Association of Police Services Boards.
Ruth joined the CFOS panel three years ago and brings a unique perspective to the table.

Colleen Purdon has worked for over 40 years as a therapist, researcher, administrator, and consultant for the not-for-profit sector.  Her work is focused on furthering equality, equity, safety, justice, and equal opportunities in rural communities and for rural women, children, vulnerable peoples, newcomers, and Indigenous peoples. Grass roots community development, capacity building, identification of community needs, and building action plans with the community are all tools she uses to support individual and systemic change.

Colleen completed a Bachelor of Music at Queen’s University, Kingston and a diploma in Music Therapy at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London England.  She trained a first generation of music therapists as a guest docent at the Mentorenkursmusiktherapie at Herdecke Germany and lived in Germany for seven years.  On returning to Canada, she was the Executive Director of the Women’s Centre Grey Bruce for 8 years.  Since leaving the Women’s Centre she worked on national, provincial, and local projects.  Colleen was the Coordinator of Violence Prevention Grey Bruce, a broad intersector community collaboration to end domestic and sexual violence, for 20 years and worked 3 years with the Building a Bigger Wave provincial network to coordinate violence against women strategies across the province.  She was a city councillor in Owen Sound from 2011 to 2014.

Over the past years, she has worked with many organizations on research and development projects (Rural Women Take Action on Poverty, No Wrong Door: Strategies to Improve Service Coordination for People with Mental Health, Addiction Trauma Issues, Community Report Cards on Sexual Violence and Domestic Violence, Implementation of Early Years Grey Bruce, Workshops and Strategies to address Racism and Discrimination, Increasing Women’s Participation in Municipal Decision Making – a two year national project sponsored by FCM, and as a member of the provincial task force that developed Neighbours, Friends and Families – to recognize and address domestic violence).  Colleen has worked with diverse equity and arts organizations on short- and long-term strategic planning (Women Today of Huron, Victim Services Grey Bruce, Timmins Symphony Orchestra, North Bay Symphony, SweetWater Music Festival, Bluewater Association for Lifelong Learning, and Welcoming Communities Grey Bruce.

Colleen is now retired but continues to be active as a community volunteer and has extensive experience as a board member and chair with groups such as the SweetWater Music Festival, the Grey Bruce One World Festival Committee, Welcoming Communities Grey Bruce, and the Gitche Namewikwedong Reconciliation Garden Committee.

She and her partner Joachim Ostertag raised their four children in Owen Sound and are both now ‘actively’ involved with grandchildren, camping, canoeing and cross-country skiing.