A new paper penned by Senior Advisor Michael Fenn explores a measure that could potentially help Canadian municipalities fund critical infrastructure projects amid rising interest rates. The impact of rising interest rates, and in turn higher borrowing costs, on municipal debentures could lead to fewer infrastructure projects,… Continue Reading More Affordable Infrastructure: Tax-Free Municipal Bonds
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Canada’s municipalities play a unique role in the delivery of services and have an outsized place when it comes to being part of the solution on issues like housing availability. More than ever, the municipal level of government is closest to citizens, yet sometimes has the hardest… Continue Reading Municipalities and Fiscal Federalism: What’s Next Post-Budget 2022?
Read more →Since 2016, StrategyCorp has conducted an annual survey of municipal Chief Administrative Officers (CAOs) and City Managers from across Ontario, seeking their opinions on the most pressing issues in the municipal sector. Here are our findings from 2022. We interviewed CAOs from municipalities of all sizes across… Continue Reading CAO Survey 2022
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On March 30, 2022 the Province announced the More Homes for Everyone Act, 2022. Key policy objectives of Ontario’s More Homes for Everyone Plan include: Red tape reduction to enable the construction of more homes; Making community housing construction easier; and Protecting homebuyers, homeowners, and renters. A… Continue Reading Ontario Doubles Down on Increasing Housing Supply with New Legislation
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For all federal political parties, the road to electoral success runs through the urban and suburban neighbourhoods of Canada’s nine largest metropolises. In these ridings, close multi-party election races are common and small swings in voter preferences can be decisive. The parties know that weakly-aligned voters in… Continue Reading The Federal Election and the Municipal Agenda
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This piece is part of StrategyCorp’s Groundswell series on grassroots advocacy. Autonomous vehicles (AV) are already remaking the transportation landscape in North America. At this point, few would be surprised to hear it. Deployment of AV technology has rapidly moved from theoretical to reality. We’ve already seen… Continue Reading A bumpy ride: How autonomous transportation may change land use planning policy
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COVID-19 has accelerated the impact of disruptive technologies and artificial intelligence (AI) on almost all sectors of society, including municipalities. What does this mean for the future of our communities? What should municipal leaders be doing to leverage this change as we recover from the pandemic? What… Continue Reading Artificial Intelligence & Municipal Disruption White Paper
Read more →As part of the Province of Ontario’s drive to help Municipalities deliver services in more efficient ways, Service Delivery Reviews, or SDRs, have become common in the municipal sector. Given the ongoing support the Province is providing to municipalities to continue studying ways of improving service delivery,… Continue Reading The Path Forward for Ontario’s Municipalities
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By Michael Fenn and John Matheson, StrategyCorp Municipal Practice In municipal circles, among the urban media, and within the academic community there is a widespread and growing consensus that there should be more recognition by the Canadian and provincial governments of the crucial role of cities, especially… Continue Reading What ever happened to the New Deal for cities? A view from the Throne
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The coronavirus pandemic has thrown into relief a range of health, social, and economic challenges for municipalities in the Greater Toronto region. These challenges – such as lack of affordable housing, income inequality, the need to spur economic development, and the impact of climate change – all… Continue Reading A Playbook for Voluntary Regional Governance in Greater Toronto
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