St. Catharines Mayor doesn’t ‘envision’ using new powers granted by Province

St. Catharines Mayor Mat Siscoe responded to having “strong mayor” powers handed to him by the Province by saying he doesn’t envision ever using them.

“While I appreciate the province making the changes today, my time as Mayor has been spent working with my colleagues to build a strong Council,” said Siscoe. “I have always embraced the healthy debate we see in council chambers, and that work will continue to be my focus as we move forward.”

“Today’s announcement (by Steve Clark, Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing) provides another tool in the toolbox, but it is not one that I envision having to use in our Council chamber.”

Siscoe added, “I look forward to continuing to demonstrate leadership by building consensus with my council colleagues in moving our great City forward.”

Ontario’s new strong mayors can use their new powers only to veto and pass bills for the purpose of advancing “provincial priorities.”

Ostensibly for Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservatives, these priorities are to build as much housing as possible, as fast as possible.

However, the “strong mayor” powers, which go into effect July 1, go far beyond the housing issue as they will give mayors the following authority:

• Choosing to appoint the municipality’s chief administrative officer
• Hiring certain municipal department heads, and establishing and re-organizing departments
• Creating committees of council, assigning their functions and appointing the chairs and vice-chairs of committees of council
• Proposing the municipal budget, which would be subject to council amendments and a separate head of council veto and council override process
• Vetoing certain by-laws if the head of council is of the opinion that all or part of the by-law could potentially interfere with a provincial priority
• Bringing forward matters for council consideration if the head of council is of the opinion that considering the matter could potentially advance a provincial priority

As far as housing goes, Siscoe said that St. Catharines is well on it way to creating its target of 11,000 new units in the next decade.

However, as an overall concept, St. Catharines Regional Councillor Laura Ip said the new powers could be quite dangerous in the wrong hands.

“This is wildly unnecessary and potentially dangerous (depending on the person holding these powers),” said Ip. “Further, would voters have voted differently in these 26 municipalities if they’d known the person they were voting for could be handed this kind of power?”