York-Simcoe municipalities get $2M cash injection from province

Georgina, East Gwillimbury, Bradford West Gwillimbury and County of Simcoe receive $2M to help improve service to taxpayers

Yorkregion.com
April 11, 2019
Heidi Riedner

Georgina, East Gwillimbury and Bradford West Gwillimbury are among the 405 of Ontario’s 444 municipalities receiving a one-time, $200M, cash injection from the province to help improve service to taxpayers.

The purpose of the funding is "to improve service delivery by finding smarter, more efficient ways to help those who need it most while respecting taxpayer dollars,” York-Simcoe MPP Caroline Mulroney said during the local funding announcement reflecting over $2 million for the riding at her Holland Landing constituency office April 5.

”We are supporting growth in our communities and improving front-line services,” she added.

While the money is "unconditional", it is intended to help modernize service delivery and reduce future costs and therefore fund things like service delivery reviews, shared service agreements or IT solutions, Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, Steve Clark, said when he made the announcement last month in Innisfil.

He added the province has been clear that it expects its partners, including municipalities, to take action in order to become more efficient in light of the province’s line-by-line review of its own expenditures.

Georgina Mayor Margaret Quirk was happy to receive the money, but questioned why Georgina’s injection of cash was “significantly less” than what she considered comparable municipalities in both York Region and Simcoe County, but particularly Whitchurch-Stouffville, which has a similar population and urban/rural split.

“There are some that got substantially more than us,” Quirk said.

That includes $725,000 to East Gwillimbury and $535,004 to BWG in the riding, as well as $676,935 to Innisfil, $725,000 to Brock Township, $520,308 to the City of Orillia and $725,000 to the County of Simcoe.

Mulroney responded funding was allocated based on the number of households in a municipality and whether the municipality is urban or rural to ensure investments are targeted to where they are needed most.

Georgina will decide what to do with the money as part of the 2020 budget process.
“We can only spend it once, so we need to make the best decision we can with these funds,” Quirk said, adding the town will review how the funds could potentially assist with implementation of its recent service delivery review or other initiatives to the greatest benefit of residents.

“As a rapidly growing municipality, we have a duty to our residents and business owners to provide robust and modern services, and we are appreciative of the support of the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing that will help us find innovative ways to do so while continuing to keep property tax increases to a bare minimum,” BWG Mayor Rob Keffer said.

East Gwillimbury Mayor Virginia Hackson said the $725,000 for her town “makes a huge difference.”

“We are rural, and we are small,” she said. “It can make tremendous difference in modernizing a lot of our opportunities that we have”.

She added the town will take the funding to its budget committee to see how it could be used to “leverage other projects that are going on” and how quickly.