New Zealand mayor
Mark Rex Bell-Booth was Mayor of Palmerston North for one term, from 2001 to 2004.[1]
He became known through his "Save the Avenue" campaign.[2] He is best known for the redevelopment of The Square, which happened during his mayoralty.[3] In the 2004 local elections he lost the mayoralty to Heather Tanguay.[4] He made headlines when it became known that he lent his wife's car to a known gang member. His time at the council was described by a political commentator as being more akin to that of a chief executive than a mayor.[5] He contested the mayoralty again in the 2010 local elections and came a distant second against incumbent Jono Naylor, with 2,229 votes against 16,717.[6][7]
From 2004 to 2008 Bell-Booth was chief executive of Assetta, a software development company. Since then he has been a director of Unlimited Realities, a designer of touchscreen software applications.[4]
References