Vaughan slips to C grade in best places to live report

Yorkregion.com
Sept. 24, 2014
By Adam Martin-Robbins

Vaughan has some serious work to do if it hopes to succeed in attracting new residents, especially skilled and creative workers, according to a report released last Thursday.

The Conference Board of Canada handed Vaughan a C grade in its ranking of the best places in the country to live and work.

That puts it behind the neighbouring municipalities of Richmond Hill, which scored an A and Markham, which earned a B.

The report, dubbed City Magnets III: Benchmarking the Attractiveness of 50 Canadian Cities, compared cities across the country on 43 indicators that make a community attractive to live in.

Those indicators were grouped into seven categories: society, health, economy, environment, education, innovation and housing.

Vaughan is one of 17 cities included in the survey to receive a middling grade.

Montreal, Guelph, London, Kitchener and Burlington, among others, garnered the same ranking.

“Overall the ‘C’-rated cities have poor outcomes on either economy or society, and in a few instances both,” the report said. “Cities in this class should strive to do better to boost their appeal to newcomers.”

Data for the report is based on the 2011 Canadian census and National Household Survey.

Richmond Hill, Waterloo, Calgary, Ottawa, Vancouver and St. John’s ranked among the most attractive cities to live in.

Those six were also top performers in the previous City Magnets report, released in 2010.

Vaughan, meanwhile, slipped from the B grade it earned four years ago.

The half-dozen cities to earn an A grade received high marks in at least two categories and each has attributes that draw people to its community, such as a strong economy, a culture of innovation, or a high quality of life, according to the report.

Cities offering centres of innovation are valued the most when choosing where to live, the report said.

“Attracting skilled workers is crucial to Canada’s competitiveness,” Alan Arcand, associate director of the board’s Centre for Municipal Studies Centre for Municipal Studies, said in a news release. “Cities that fail to attract new people will struggle to stay prosperous and vibrant.”

Mayor Maurizio Bevilacqua said he respects the Conference Board and will read the report to see if there’s anything to be learned from it, but he’s confident the city is “going in the right direction”.

“I see our job (growth) numbers and our attraction of 20,000 new residents in Vaughan in the past four years as a positive signal,” Bevilacqua said. “With these studies, of course, it’s all the details and the methodology that they use. ...But you have to be respectful of organizations. You have to look at what they offer the city. If there’s any advice that we can follow that would benefit the city, of course, we would move toward achieving positive results.”