After being criticized during the municipal election campaign for not being bilingual, George Leblanc has been voted in as mayor of Moncton.

In his second attempt to win the mayor's office, Leblanc beat out one other mayoral candidate, Pierre Michaud, on Monday night.

Leblanc received 12,898 votes while Michaud had 3,868.

The mayor's position was up for grabs after Mayor Lorne Mitton announced last September that he would not be seeking another term because he wanted to retire and spend more time with his family.

Voter turnout in Moncton for the municipal election was 35.37 per cent of the 47,992 eligible voters.

During the election campaign, Leblanc had been criticized for his limited ability to speak French in a city that is widely bilingual.

Leblanc said his language skills were a hurdle but it was something he was working on.

Leblanc insists his lack of French won't hurt his relationship with French-speaking constituents in the city.

The two previous mayors in the city also entered office with only a basic knowledge of French but maintained good relationships with both linguistic groups.

Michaud, a businessman, said he thought his work at the Moncton airport and his bilingualism would have drawn more votes.

"I think they are quite disappointing [results] as far as I'm concerned," Michaud said. "I figured I would be getting more votes than that."

Leblanc said he wants to get to work quickly to implement his vision for the city. His priorities will be to hire a new city manager, look at property taxes and start plans for the development of downtown land, he said.

"I think that there will be some change obviously," Leblanc said. "With the mandate we've been given on a very detailed action and vision plan that I put forward, I believe we have a mandate to go forward on those things and I expect we will have a very active council."

There will be four new faces on city council.

In Ward 1, incumbent Steven Boyce is joined by Paulette Theriault.

In Ward 2, Nancy Hoar will serve with incumbent Merrill Henderson.

In Ward 3, incumbent Brian Hicks will continue to serve as councillor along with newcomer Daniel Bourgeois.

And in Ward 4, incumbent Rene Landry will be joined by Paul Pellerin.

"I think we will have a combination of experience and new faces and I think that's a good thing," Leblanc said.