On April 9, 2025, the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing announced Ontario's proposal to amend O. Reg. 530/22 under the Municipal Act, 2001 to expand strong mayor powers to the heads of council (HOC) in 169 additional municipalities, effective on May 1, 2025.
The Strong Mayors, Building Homes Act, 2022, the Better Municipal Governance Act, 2022, and associated regulations give HOC of certain municipalities strong mayor powers and duties. Initially, strong mayor powers were only granted to Toronto and Ottawa, but were later increased to 47 municipalities. For past alerts on this topic, please see Part 3: Shovels in the ground for Ontario – Bill 23 receives Royal Assent, the province announces the Better Municipal Governance Act, 2022, and the Stronger Mayors, Building Homes Act comes into force, and Opportunities to come with Ontario launching the CA$1.2 Billion Building Faster Fund for municipalities to build more homes by 2031.
The proposal is to expand strong mayor powers to include certain single-tier and lower-tier municipalities with a council composition size of six members or more. The goal is to streamline local governance and encourage the approval of new housing and constructing and maintaining infrastructure to support housing, including roads and transit.
Strong mayor powers include:
- Proposing certain municipal by-laws if the HOC is of the opinion that the proposed by-law could potentially advance a provincial priority identified in regulation;
- Vetoing certain by-laws if the HOC is of the opinion that all or part of the by-law could potentially interfere with a provincial priority; and
- Proposing the municipal budget, with the power to veto city council's amendments to the proposed budget.
Rob Flack, the Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing, stated: "By extending strong mayor powers to these additional municipalities, we are providing mayors every tool at our disposal to empower them to get homes and infrastructure built faster. Mayors know their municipalities best, and we support them in taking bold actions for their communities."
Critics of the strong mayor powers, including some city councillors and mayors themselves, are concerned that concentrating power in mayors' offices may weaken local government and erode democracy. For example, Kieran McKenzie, a city councillor in the City of Windsor, has advocated against such powers, including introducing a motion at a council meeting to remove Windsor from its list of municipalities governed by strong mayor powers.
Comments on the proposed regulation to expand strong mayor powers are open until April 16, 2025.
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