'Most complicated times, ever': Newmarket and York University forge partnership to tackle today's big issues

Yorkregion.com
Sept. 19, 2022

How can Newmarket tackle today's big issues?

Climate change, housing affordability and homelessness, economic pressures, diversity, and even something like access for residents wanting to visit the ambitious future Mulock Park where parking on the site will be limited are issues to be solved.

Coming up with answers can be daunting.

But the Town of Newmarket and York University have signed a five-year formal partnership that will see the two come together to advance shared goals and create positive change in Newmarket.

Mayor John Taylor and university president Rhonda Lenton signed the memorandum of understanding (MOU) in the council chambers on Sept. 14.

It strengthens an informal relationship between the town and York University and puts in place a framework to work on big ideas.

Which ideas will be tackled still need to be determined.

The partnership is even expected to save taxpayers money as it will make the town less reliant on consultants, knowing that it has York University experts at its fingertips, Taylor told The Era and yorkregion.com after the ceremony.

“It’s about partnerships and it’s about recognizing an ongoing partnership. York University has been engaged with the Town of Newmarket in so many ways, I couldn’t name them all,” Taylor said during the event.

“For all of you who have read the newspapers over the last year or two, we’re living in some of the most complicated times, ever. So, the need to renew and to remind ourselves that York University is there for us as a partner and we’re there for York University as a partner, I think is more important now than ever. Newmarket, I will say any municipality, any city, is not going to meet the challenges and the opportunities that lie in front of us in the coming years and decade (without partnerships) because they’re going to be very complicated. I think we’re in for some complicated economic times, geopolitical, social and health-related complications, and we’re going to meet those only through partnerships and innovation … We’ll be looking to York University, hopefully, to help us gather some of the data we need to make really good decisions. We can’t afford to get decisions somewhat right as we face some of the challenges.”

Lenton called the MOU a “transformative partnership,” adding community engagement is “in York’s bones.”

“You can accomplish so much more when the sectors are collaborating together and bringing combined expertise and experience and research and also sometimes resources to bear on what really are very complex problems, globally, but that have local impact,” she said.

“We’ve been working with Newmarket for a very long time but we are very committed to extending and strengthening the collaboration to see what we can do together.”

The MOU highlights three main areas of focus:

• Exploring new opportunities for Newmarket to host York University programs and/or to develop programming.

• Experiential learning opportunities at the town for York students in areas of importance like public policy administration, urban planning, environmental studies, law, technology and more.

• Collaboration on research, capstone projects, professional development and/or community education opportunities between the town and university faculty.