When Ken Seiling first entered the local political scene, he likely never thought he’d end up presiding over a region of more than 500,000 people and tackling issues ranging from rapid transit to intensification to Uber.

It was advocacy for recreational service in Elmira that drew Seiling into politics in the mid-1970s. Before long, he found himself elected to Woolwich Township’s council. Then he was its mayor, which gave him a seat on regional council.

In 1985, Seiling’s fellow regional councillors voted for him to lead them as Waterloo Region’s chair. They made that call three more times. When the position became directly elected by the region’s citizens, they picked Seiling to lead them through six terms in a row.

Wednesday night, the infamously soft-spoken Seiling announced that he does not plan to run in October’s municipal election.

“There comes a time, I think, when you have to decide to move on and open the doors for other people. I think that time came for me,” he told CTV News following the announcement.

Seiling praised the region for having a strong sense of community, and said his political focus had always been on striking a balance between preserving the existing lifestyles of the region’s residents and managing its rapid growth, including the need for cultural activities and social services to support that growth.

Asked about his greatest political accomplishment, Seiling’s thoughts turned to the region’s growth management plan, which he was one of the driving forces behind. Protecting much of the region’s farmland from development, the growth management plan set the stage for subsequent efforts to bring intensification to the cores of the region’s three cities and to develop a rapid transit network.

“We’ve led the province in terms of preserving our community, our land, our rural areas,” he said.

“We’ve done great things in this region. We’ve been very successful.”

On light rail transit – likely the most publicly visible and at times contentious issue of Seiling’s last decade as chair – Seiling said some of its merits would be borne out once the service starts running, while others are already evident by the amount of residential and commercial development happening around the LRT line.

“Many other communities that are similar to ours are looking at us with a great deal of jealousy,” he said.

Messages of praise and support for Seiling poured in after his announcement, with many local leaders paying tribute to his decades of public service.

Coun. Tom Galloway, who has been on regional council with Seiling since 1994, describes him as a mentor who worked hard to ensure no city or township in the region was being overlooked or treated unfairly.

“The main thing is Ken’s quiet leadership behind the scenes in keeping all the disparate partners in the region moving in the same direction,” he said Thursday.

“You don’t replace that overnight.”

Joan Fisk, who has dealt with Seiling from many standpoints including in her current capacity as CEO of the Waterloo Region Communities United Way, describes the outgoing chair as a “true leader” who maintained a steady focus on what he saw as best for the region as a whole.

"He embodies what we think when we think about leadership in the community,” she said.

Seiling had little to say about his future plans, mentioning that he hadn’t given the issue a lot of thought past the ability to spend more time with his five children and nine grandchildren. He will remain in office until the new regional chair is sworn in at the end of the year.

“Ask me in about six months, and I might have an answer,” he said.

Thursday, the day after Seiling’s announcement, one candidate officially entered the race to replace him.

Jan d’Ailly, a former City of Waterloo councillor, says he hopes voters will be attracted to his business and government experience.

A press release announcing d’Ailly registration as a candidate describes him as a voice for fiscal stability and a supporter of arts, culture and environmental protection.

With reporting by Maleeha Sheikh