Council set to discuss “Strong Mayor Powers”

An update to the Municipal Act will be before council Monday night, broken into two parts.

The first will be a report from staff on the amendments to the act regarding “Strong Mayor Powers” which will provide new duties and powers for the head of council.

There are multiple abilities included for a “Strong Mayor” including:

• Establish or dissolve Committees
• Appoint the Chairs and Vice-Chairs of Committees
• Assign functions to Committees
• Appoint and dismiss the Chief Administrative Officer and to assign duties to them
• Hire or dismiss a”head of any division or the head of any other part of the organizational structure”
• Determine the City’s organizational structure
• Request staff to undertake research and provide advice to Mayor and council on policies and programs, as well as direct staff to carry out duties and implement decisions of the mayor where they relate to the exercise of strong mayor powers
• Introduce new matters without notice to a Council meeting in order to advance a provincial priority
• Bring by-laws to advance prescribe provincial priorities and require council to vote on the proposed by-law at a meeting, despite any rules in the procedural by-law
• Veto certain by-laws

The full report with expanded abilities can be found here.

Part of the mayor being granted the powers centres around the provincial directive to increase housing stock, which the city has been assigned to have 2,200 new homes built by 2031.

Additionally the head of council, Mayor Ken Boshcoff, will be presenting a memorandum requesting support from council to recommend his letter to Municipal Affairs and Housing Minister Paul Calandra.

Upon receipt of the commitment to those housing numbers the powers would come into effect on October 31st of this year.

Other items on tonight’s agenda include an amendment to the nuisance animal bylaw which will define what constitutes a nuisance animal, consultation results and a motion for the sign bylaw regarding mobile signs, as well a request for deferral will be before the municipal body on the Downtown Fort William Strategic Renewal Plan’s Implementation.

That request is to allow for additional time for consultations within administration, other agencies and parties on preferred implementation plans and structures.