NORTHWESTERN ONTARIO – The provincial government has been busy trying to figure out a way to cut through the bureaucratic red tape that has been weighing down municipal infrastructure projects.
Enter the Strong Mayors Act, which if passed will grant municipal mayors to move forward on priority projects that are in the best interest of the province.
The Strong Mayors Act would allow mayors to have veto power over council decisions on the construction and maintenance of infrastructure that supports new housing, including transit, roads, and utilities.
When the Strong Mayor Act was first announced by the provincial government, the Act was limited to Toronto and Ottawa. However, after talks with municipal leaders at the Association of Municipal Ontario Conference, the provincial government is looking to extend those powers across the province.
“It’s a tough conversation”, said Wendy Landry, President of the Northern Ontario Municipal Association. “We had a lengthy conversation about it at our AMO board meeting and what the benefit was and some of the mayors on our board spoke of scenarios they had in the past where they may have used that Strong Mayors Bill to basically veto councils’ decision on developing houses, but I like to think I am a strong mayor anyway. I don’t if that’s a great clause to have the Strong Mayors Bill as a title, but it is what it is at this point we just ask the government to consult with us before they move it out to other municipalities. I think there is some time and room for us to have discussions of what that would mean. What does it mean for democracy? What does that mean for council? What does that mean for the relationship with council?”
Landry makes a strong point about the provincial government’s Strong Mayors Bill. If mayors obtain the power to veto municipal council’s decisions, at what is there a need for council in the first place?
The reason for having a select number of council members in a municipality is to have accountability for municipal decisions. Municipal issues like housing and road construction are taken in front of the council to be given serious thought to the feasibility of the project. Indeed, council members don’t always see eye to eye on decisions that will impact their homes. However, councillors provide the council with different perspectives on how projects move forwards or outright should be degraded based on funding. Voting on infostructure projects is a democratic right and responsibility of the councillors the people elect to be their voice. By taking that power away from them, what rights and responsibilities will councillors have left? A leader is only as strong as their support system, and for a mayor, their councillors are that support.
“When you’re a mayor is part of your leadership duties to bring everyone together, have a strong council as a team, and not have one person vetoing everyone on a specific decision,” said Landry. “So, there are certain pros, I guess, the government sees when it comes to housing. So, we’re are just asking for some consolation to see how this relates to housing, how would this increase housing, and how will this lead to the opportunity to develop more housing by putting forward the Strong Mayors Bill.”
At this point, Landry is not convinced that the Strong Mayor’s Bill is appropriate for Northern Ontario based on the wording of the Bill. The bill is meant to ensure that business moves forward.
But as Landry states, “I guess if you have a dysfunctional council or a council that can’t come to a consensus on a certain topic then that’s maybe an alternative that a mayor could use in order to move business forward, but you’d hate to see it come to that. You would like to see that everyone at a council is in agreement.”
