Asset management is showing that Ontario municipalities are facing similar problems says Centre Wellington councillor Fred Morris.
Commenting on an asset management seminar at last month’s Association of Municipalities of Ontario conference, Morris stated videos were shown of Ganonoque and St. Marys – which both have bridges leading to their downtown cores – and the necessity of the help needed to maintain these structures.
“I think what it did more than anything else was show a common problem throughout Ontario – especially for rural municiplaities such as this.”
Many of these municipalities have structures which move traffic into the heart of their communities, emphasizing how important it is to keep those bridges maintained and open so the communities can continue to prosper.
He noted the presentation included the story of one community which made him thankful and sad at the same time.
The community near the head of Lake Superior has 400 residents and only one bridge.
Morris said that bridge is a wooden structure, “and I tell you folks, as bad as the St. David Street bridge is and may get, it is a 1,000 times better than that wooden bridge.”
Morris said one of the items which stood out was the comment that municipalities are going to have to become more creative in finding new revenue streams.
“That, coupled with a statement by Minister of Municipal Affairs Ted McMeekin that afternoon, I found very interesting.
“One of the questions put before the minister was whether he was going to look at the Municipal Act and allow municipalities to look for alternative streams of revenue other than property taxes.”
Morris said the minister gave a one-word answer and it was the most emphatic answer he’d ever heard from a cabinet minister, and that word was “Yes.”
“I’ll wait to see how he delivers on that promise,” Morris said.
He contended that is the answer needed for municipalities to move forward.
“We need more tools to raise revenues for the challenges ahead.”
Mayor Joanne Ross-Zuj added she was at a presentation regarding communications during the conference.
That seminar highlighted the importance of the municipality having its own communications company within the municipality.
Ross-Zuj was talking with the mayor of Fredericton, New Brunswick which has started up a company similar to one launched in Centre Wellington.
She said that in Fredericton the communications company developed into an economic tool and revenue source “to give life back to Atlantic Canada.”
