UTTRI associated faculty Dr. Enid Slack, Director, Institute on Municipal Finance and Governance (IMFG), has co-authored an opinion piece published in the Globe and Mail January 24, 2020. “Ontario’s relationships with its cities are ill-fitting and illogical. That must change” was co-written with Gabriel Eidelman, Director, Urban Policy Lab, and Tomas Hachard, Manager of Programs and Research, IMFG.
The article is based on their policy paper for the Ontario 360 Project at the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy entitled “In It Together: Clarifying Provincial-Municipal Responsibilities in Ontario” a summary of which appears below.
Summary
Local governments across Ontario collectively spend more than $64 billion every year on public services. However, municipalities deliver few of those services alone. The provincial government is involved in every aspect of local service delivery, through cost-sharing, policy setting, and regulation.
This report from Ontario 360, the Institute on Municipal Finance and Governance, and the Urban Policy Lab explores the relationship between the Province and Ontario’s 444 municipalities – how it has become so intertwined and why the time has come for a reassessment that ensures Ontarians receive the highest quality, most effective, and most efficient services from their governments.
The report examines the current state of cost-sharing between the Province and municipalities across 15 service areas. It concludes by making six recommendations to ensure a productive review of provincial and municipal responsibilities in Ontario:
1. Take a collaborative approach.
2. Follow the pay-for-say principle and avoid unfunded mandates.
3. Consider local revenue capacity.
4. Respect local and regional differences.
5. Look forward, not backward.
6. Start with health and social services.
In a new policy brief for Ontario 360 – an independent, non-partisan and fact-based project of the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy to determine evidence-based public policy ideas for the Ontario government – we found that the provincial government is involved in every aspect of local service delivery.
Links
- Ontario’s relationships with its cities are ill-fitting and illogical. That must change Globe and Mail, January 24, 2020
- In It Together: Clarifying Provincial-Municipal Responsibilities in Ontario Ontario 360 Project, January 23, 2020