May 21, 2025

Letter to Mayor and Grey Highlands Council: Re Strong Mayor Powers

Dear Mayor, Deputy Mayor, and Councillors: The Grey Highlands Climate Action Group has been concerned about the health of local democracy since the Ontario government widely expanded strong mayor powers to 160 mayors. Thus, we applaud your May 7 motion that The Council of Grey Highlands...

• formally opposes the expansion of Strong Mayor Powers to include Grey Highlands; and
• That Council requests that the province amend O. Reg. 530/22 to remove the Municipality of Grey Highlands; and
• That Council requests that the province create a mechanism whereas Councils can request removal from O. Reg. 530/22; and
• That Council direct staff to forward a copy of this resolution to Minister Flack, Premier Ford, MPP Paul Vickers, AMO, AMCTO and all Ontario Municipalities.

We also ask, Mayor McQueen, that you enact a directive or directives to delegate all powers designated as “can be delegated or forfeited” by the updated changes to the Municipal Act back to the Council. We note that Mayor Matrosovs of the Town of Blue Mountains signed relevant directives so that, “Important Town processes related to the annual budget, CAO recruitment, organizational structure and employment matters will remain status quo.”

We understand that you, along with representatives from all nine Grey County municipalities, were addressed on April 17, John Mascarin, a lawyer and municipal affairs expert, who pointed out the drastic quality of the change: “We don’t have majority rules anymore… there will be impacts long-term.” He encouraged local municipalities to have “healthy, good, civil and professional” debates about the changes.

We cite the following reasons to re-assign strong mayor powers back to the Council and CAO:

• Why vote for councillors if they can be overruled? Voters are less likely to bother voting and will disengage.
• Voters experience their right to be heard when they have a choice of several representatives to discuss their concerns with, each of whom has an equal and independent voice.
• The institution of strong mayor powers is an anti-democratic move to centralize and concentrate power in fewer people--a trend of the Ford government that democracy advocates have been tracking.
• The mayor who practices “strong mayor” powers may be more easily subjected to corruption. He or she may also more easily contacted and swayed by lobbyists. After all, it’s easier to get a single individual in your pocket than to win a majority of the city council’s support for your plan.
• The “strong mayor” is more easily seen as a distant authority when he or she does not share the democratic bulwark of the majority decision of his or her council to resist pressures driven by personal benefit rather than the public good.

Therefore, we strongly encourage you to make the requested specific directives and opt for democracy: a broader sharing of power with equal voices around an open and congenial decision-making table. We look forward to receiving your response to our request at greengreycounty@gmail.com. Thanks in advance.

Yours truly,
GHCAG members: Ben Caesar, John Butler, Reid Dennison, Erica Ferguson, Joyce Hall, Judy Halpern, Margaret Hutchison, Dave Meslin, Jeanette Parry, Rob Spackman

 

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