Stop me if you’ve heard this one before, but it might be time for Bradford West Gwillimbury and Innisfil to tell the County of Simcoe to start seeing other people.
Or maybe even each other.
The largest municipalities in the county, by population – nearly 100,000 between the two of them – seem to be constantly fighting to get their fair share from the regional government. And, in some cases, rather than working to make right, the county seems to want to fight back. (Barrie and Orillia are separated cities and do not fall under county government, although the upper-tier municipality does provide some local services, such as land ambulance.)
At the behest of the province of Ontario, the county undertook a regional governance review. Perhaps the best efficiency county council could have proposed would be to cut its numbers in half, bringing only one representative per municipality, if not a council comprised through representation by population. Instead, it went after the libraries.
Last week, Bradford West Gwillimbury Coun. Jonathan Scott was a guest on CBC Radio’s Ontario Morning to discuss the changes to the library system in Simcoe County from Bradford West Gwillimbury’s point of view. Allan Greenwood, the county's director of public affairs, was on to counter Scott’s argument.
Scott reiterated the same talking points that have been coming up at the council meetings for both Bradford West Gwillimbury and Innisfil – and each municipality’s library board – during his portion of the segment: this move from the county, under the guise of efficiency and cost savings, is a download to lower-tier municipalities and one that will disproportionately affect new Canadians and other users of multi-lingual services.
Given that Bradford West Gwillimbury and Innisfil are among the most diverse municipalities in Simcoe County, they’re the ones who will suffer most. The councils and library boards of those towns have a duty to serve all residents as best as they possibly can. If the county won’t help, the towns will have to step up.
But that responsibility comes with a cost, one currently being borne by the county portion of the property tax bill residents pay each year. While representatives from both Bradford West Gwillimbury and Innisfil have said their libraries can "weather the storm" and that it's the smaller community libraries that will struggle most, county taxes aren’t expected to decrease with this move, and municipal taxes are almost certainly going to go up to make up the difference.
Even if the county’s argument of modernizing the library system is to be accepted, allowing that perhaps there is merit in the argument that Bradford West Gwillimbury and Innisfil are overreacting, it is entirely problematic that a member of county staff was brought in to defend this change.
As Greenwood told the CBC, this was a decision of the county council that the mayor and deputy mayor of Bradford West Gwillimbury sit on. The members of that council who supported this move need to be the ones to own it, especially on such a large stage as the CBC, starting at the top with Simcoe County Warden George Cornell.
And if he wasn’t available, Deputy Warden Lynn Dollin should have been called in.
Of course, there’s just one problem with that. Dollin, as mayor of Innisfil, was one of the four members of county council who voted against the overhaul of the library system.
However, the library isn’t the only example of unfair treatment on Dollin's radar.
At a recent Innisfil council meeting, Dollin brought up the Simcoe County transit system, which has been gradually bringing more routes into service over the past few years. While Innisfil residents are paying for this service through county taxation, they’ve yet to see any tangible benefit as not a single Simcoe County LINX route enters the municipal boundary.
The only communities that are really benefiting from the bus system, she argued, are Barrie and Orillia, neither of which are actually part of Simcoe County.
This is not to say that Innisfil – or Bradford West Gwillimbury, for that matter – is inadequately serviced by public transportation. GO bus frequency through Innisfil continues to improve and when the Orbit is constructed, a proper train station will be in the municipality for the first time in generations.
But the GO bus doesn’t serve Innisfil’s two largest retail destinations: downtown Alcona and Tanger Outlets Cookstown. If you can’t provide public transit to places where people need to go, then why are you providing public transit at all?
It’s also unfair to say Bradford West Gwillimbury and Innisfil are being entirely neglected by the county. One only has to look as far as the $50 million affordable housing development on Simcoe Road as an example to show otherwise.
However, these are two urban municipalities that are at the whim of a consortium of largely rural interests, and if that continues their residents will suffer.
Bradford West Gwillimbury and Innisfil as separated cities, a la Barrie and Orillia, likely wouldn’t work. But together, they just might be able to accommodate the ever-evolving needs of those who live here today and the tens of thousands of more set to arrive in the next 30 years.
Patrick Bales is a reporter covering municipal council for BradfordToday and InnisfilToday
