The mayors of Toronto and Ottawa will be given sweeping new powers that will give them sole responsibility for preparing the municipal budget for council approval, as well as the ability to also appoint fire chiefs as they see fit and veto some decisions made by councillors.
The new legislation, titled the Strong Mayors Building Homes Act, was officially introduced at Queen’s Park on Wednesday afternoon.
The proposed changes outlined in the legislation would allow the mayors of Toronto and Ottawa to override council approval of a bylaw when they believe using the veto “would further a provincial priority.”
However, they would have to repeal the bylaw in its entirety and would not be able to choose which specific aspects or amendments to block.
In addition, there is nothing in the legislation that allows empowered mayors to push bylaws without council approval.
The Ford government has not provided a list of items that could qualify as a matter of “provincial priority” at this stage, but a ministry official, speaking amid a technical briefing, said there would be “power to determine regulations’ contained in legislation that would allow the government to ‘prescribe what those provincial priorities are’.
The official said the government’s plan to build 1.5 million homes over the next decade would likely qualify as a provincial priority, as would the need for “critical infrastructure around road transit and things of that nature.”
However, ministry officials say the way the legislation is written will effectively mean the mayor will have to determine whether the bylaw he or she rejects actually interferes with a particular provincial priority.
That veto can then only be overridden by a two-thirds vote in the city council, which must happen within 21 days of its use.
Hiring powers and fire department managers
The introduction of the legislation comes about three weeks after news first broke that the Ford government was considering giving strong, American-style mayoral powers to the chief magistrates of Toronto and Ottawa.
In addition to veto power, the legislation also grants a range of other new and expanded powers to the mayors of Ontario’s two largest cities.
One of the main changes will lead to the transfer of responsibility for the preparation of budgets from the municipal council as a whole to the town hall.
The City Council would still have to approve the budget and could pass amendments, although the mayor would have the ability to use a separate veto to override those amendments.
The changes would also give the mayor sole authority to appoint a chief administrative officer, also appoint fire chiefs and create or reorganize departments.
The ministry says these powers will not, however, apply to statutory appointments such as police chief or medical officer of health.
Speaking to CP24 earlier Wednesday, before details of the legislation were revealed, Toronto Mayor John Tory said that even with expanded powers, his approach to City Hall “will not change” if he is re-elected in October.
“From my perspective, it’s not going to change the way I do my job. My job is to work with every single member of the city council that wants to work with me and I will continue to do that, but ultimately I want to find as many ways as possible to get things done faster, get more housing, built faster and to ensure that the transit plan we agreed upon as governments actually gets built,” he said.
The proposed law, if approved, would go into effect at the start of the council’s next term on November 15.
Premier Doug Ford previously said he was open to extending the expanded mayoral powers to other major cities, but for now it would only apply to Toronto and Ottawa.
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