A second contender has announced her intention to run for Hamilton Mayor in this month's municipal election — former Deputy Mayor Sonia Grant.

Lawyer Miss Grant served on the Corporation of Hamilton for 13 years from 1993 to 2006. She has run unsuccessfully to become Mayor twice before, losing out to Jay Bluck in April 2006 and to the incumbent Sutherland Madeiros in October of the same year.

She told The Royal Gazette last night that her key priority if elected on July 16 would be to launch a petition to stop Government abolishing the corporations of Hamilton and St. George's.

Miss Grant, who was the first woman to serve on the Corporation of Hamilton when she became a common councillor in 1993, would also open City Hall meetings to the public and push for universal adult suffrage in the capital.

She said: "Even before all the controversy broke with the decision of Cabinet to amalgamate the corporations into the various government departments, I had made up my mind that I would run.

"Over the last two-and-a-half years, people have always stopped me in the street and said I should run again, both constituents and non-constituents. That has always been buoyant for me. I feel that I can make a difference."

She added: "I do have a lot of concern for the Corporation. I was born and bred in the City of Hamilton. I know it intimately."

Councillor Kathryn Gibbons is the only other person to have declared an intention to run as Mayor. Mr. Madeiros will not stand again, he has said.