Ross Smith announced yesterday he is running for Mayor of St. George's with a pledge to bring more democracy to the Old Town.

Mr. Smith will take on Town Crier E. Michael Jones and Alderman Mariea Caisey for the top post, although the deadline for nominations has yet to close.

He came third in 2000 when Henry Hayward was elected and Mr. Jones came second - but yesterday he said he was confident he could win.

Mr. Smith, 59, pledged to campaign to change the Corporation Act - regulating how the Corporation of St. George's is run - to make it mandatory to publish annual audited reports which would bring it into line with the Corporation of Hamilton.

He said Corporation meetings should be open to members of the public, and he would review how resources are spent and raised.

Mr. Smith, who works in the insurance and investment department of Colonial Insurance, said it was unacceptable that in some circumstances, the Mayor and two others could overrule the will of the majority of the nine members of the Corporation.

Both Mr. Jones, who owns coffee shops in the Old Town and Hamilton, and Mrs. Caisey, who works for Bank of Bermuda, have pledged to end double taxation of St. George's residents.

At a Press conference outside the Town Hall yesterday, Mr. Smith said: "I want to make the Corporation more democratic in the way it operates and communicates with the voters and to provide effective leadership."

Mr. Smith said voters had the right to attend Corporation meetings to see how the town was being run, and they should also have the right to an audited statement every year to see how their money was being spent.

But the Corporation Act did not require the Corporation to publish annual audited statements, he said.

Mr. Smith became a common councillor in 1991 and was an alderman from1992 to 2000.

He has represented the Corporation on the St. George's Preservation Authority, Development Applications Board, the Marine and Ports Authority, and was chairman of committees in the Old Town with responsibility for property, loss, parks, and building applications.

Asked to assess his chances of winning, Mr. Smith said: "I think I deserve to win. I probably have as good a chance as anyone else and probably have a little bit of an edge. I have nothing to gain by this exercise and have no vested interest."

He said he had known Mr. Jones for some time, but although the Town Crier was good on the public relations side, he had more experience than him.

He described Mrs. Caisey as a hard worker, but he did not think she could provide as effective leadership as he could.