Mayor Ann Lawlor's 2022 Halton Hills Chamber of Commerce Speech

Thank you for the kind introduction and what a pleasure it is to be welcomed by Halton Hills Chamber of Commerce board members, staff, special guests, luncheon sponsors and all of you here today.  I have attended this event many times in the past but let me tell you, I am excited to be here for the first time as a speaker on the program and as your new Mayor! That said, my words could be short on wisdom compared with those that could be offered by retired Mayor Rick Bonnette or Canada’s longest serving mayor Gord Krantz, who also happens to be my new seatmate and coach when we together attend at Halton Regional Council.

I’m kinda wondering if perhaps you two are checking up on me that I don’t wreck the place in the first month of my tenure! Rick, we’ll have a cup of tea or maybe something stronger over the holidays and you can pass on your tips. Gord, you come as well and we'll have a party.

A mayor is our community spokesperson and leads the 10 members of Halton Hills council who operate as the Town’s board of directors. It’s a team effort. I hope that many of you will have occasion to reach out to the councillors who represent you where you live or who share your business or recreational interests and community affairs would also like to introduce members of our new Council –most of whom are here today:

Councillors - please stand when I mention your name.

First off, Acton and the countryside Regional Councillor Clark Somerville. Clark lives in Acton and has been a councillor since 1997 and all of his colleagues are jealous since he has been acclaimed a record five times!

Clark’s compatriots in Ward one, Acton are Mike Albano and Alex Hilson. Mike retired from IT with one of the school boards and is now serving his third term as well as being busy chairing the Acton food bank and more. Alex is newly elected this fall and his background is with the Acton BIA, a music teacher, youth worker and active community volunteer.

Our brand new ward two councillors represent Esquesing Township- Glen Williams, Limehouse, Norval, Stewarttown, Hornby and the rural areas in between. Let me introduce Jason Brass, who is no stranger to many of you Chamber members, is the owner of Terra Cotta Foods and a member of the Bennett Health Centre board.

Joseph Racinsky, who is the youngest individual ever elected to our council, took the seat by following the first rule of electioneering – the number of votes you get is directly related to the number of doors you knock on. He started campaigning in May for the October election.

Wards three and four, which is all of Georgetown, is represented at the Region by Jane Fogal. Jane was unable to be here today, but many of you know her as a veteran who was also elected in 1997. Jane has been a champion, among other causes, for cycling infrastructure, climate change action and now the stop sprawl campaign.

Jane’s new partners representing “old” Georgetown are Ron Norris and Chantal Garneau. Both were elected for the first time this fall, Ron is a senior sales executive in the food industry and has been active with service clubs and his faith community. Chantal is a wellness professional, has supported the work of the BIA and local markets and has been active in environmental causes for many years.

Finally, I’d like to recognize the ward four councillors who cover the southern area of Delrex Boulevard and south Georgetown. My former wardmate Bob Inglis is another council veteran who has served since 1997 and when he wasn’t cutting stone, trouble shooting computer systems or bee keeping, he served on just about every town committee going, from the library to seniors services.

D'Arcy Keene who is the last of our newly elected councillors, joins Bob representing ward four. D’Arcy owns a small business that supplies the home building and renovation industry.

I am excited about the mix on our new Council and the diversity of opinion that I know will yield the best decisions for our community. Ladies and gentlemen, this is your new town council for the years 2022 to 2026.

I would also like to identify our Chief Administrative Officer Chris Mills who has been setting up our new Town Council for success. We are fortunate to have him at the helm given his lengthy career with the Town.  Damian Szybalski, our Commissioner of Business, Innovation and Culture is here as well, along with our Director of Communications, Alex Fuller.

Our responsibility as a local government is to create an environment where people thrive – a place that is realized though a healthy, prosperous, diverse, welcoming and equitable community.

The current Town of Halton Hills strategic plan builds on a vision of Halton Hills that supports a sustainable community noted for its cultural, economic, environmental and social health and vibrancy.  

I am very proud of our Council work over the 12 years that I have been a member – of our investments in this Town, in our residents, our businesses and all the different sectors from arts to sports to the myriad  organizations that keep this place, Halton Hills, the just-about-perfect small Canadian town and a place where you want to do business.

That said, I know you are particularly interested in the Town’s efforts to promote business development and where we are in terms of economic growth. Business investments not only make a vital contribution to our community by creating local jobs, but they also generate non-residential assessment. This assessment is key to the Town’s ability to provide the services that our residents and businesses rely on every day. Our Town is actively providing the advice and supports to local business so they will stay and thrive in Halton Hills; and that we actively seek new business investment.

On the small business front, in response to the pandemic, we have seen businesses pivot and adapt. Many shifted entirely online, while others diversified their offerings by adding e-commerce.  The Town supported local businesses in this change through the Digital Main Street Program providing personalized, one-on-one digital support to businesses looking to launch and/or expand their e-commerce capabilities to expand revenue or to create new revenue streams.  The Town received a third round of funding for the program and it will continue to the end of 2023. I am very pleased to say, that the Digital Main Street Program has connected with over 400 businesses, (some returning), and secured about $200,000 in grants directly for our local small businesses to strengthen their e-commerce capacity. If there are any small business owners in the room who have yet to take advantage of this program, I encourage you to contact our Economic Development staff. 

We also collaborate with the Acton and Georgetown Business Improvement Areas (BIAs) to ensure that our downtowns are vibrant and flourishing locations for residents and visitors to stop, shop and dine.  Similarly, Main Street in Glen Williams was packed with shoppers last weekend as festive market booths, Glen retailers and the Mill artisans offered holiday wares. The Glen Town Hall board worked with town staff to create the environment for a great day.

In another small business initiative, the Town partnered with the Chamber of Commerce for the Shop Local campaign. 

We know that the last couple of years have been very challenging for our restaurants so the Al Fresco in the Hills Patio Program allowed eligible establishments to offer supplementary outdoor dining space.  Also in support of this sector, the Town partnered with the Culinary Tourism Alliance to help grow food tourism across Halton Hills and over 20 local restaurants were featured in the Great Taste of Ontario passport.

For other businesses, one of the ways that we continue to provide assistance is through the Community Improvement Plan (CIP). Many of you know that this plan supports private sector investment and revitalization by providing financial incentives for certain projects. Thus far, the program has generated about $1.4 million in CIP-related investments. This includes some of the great new storefront facades that you see downtown Acton or Georgetown, or the development that you may see when an idle and unproductive brownfield site is redeveloped.  The program supports key town priorities, including:

• Storefront Revitalization & Business Support
• Business Accessibility
• Climate Change/Energy Efficiency
• Affordable Housing
• Brownfields
• Agri-business and
• Heritage

Transportation infrastructure is important for all business operations and in September, the Town launched a key step in our transit system/master plan that sees a Milton bus travel along the Steeles Avenue corridor. This new main employment area will see the vast majority of our job growth.  Our initial foray into transit beyond the Activan will assist Halton Hills’ existing and new businesses in this employment corridor with securing and retaining employees.  As business leaders and owners you know that employee attraction and retention is a major challenge.

The Steeles route has been an immediate success and we are very pleased with the first phase.  Consider too, that by using Milton buses and drivers, we don’t manage that investment. We only pay a set amount to Milton to extend their route through Halton Hills.  Thank you Mayor Krantz, for supporting that partnership.

Another corporate initiative, the Town’s Business Concierge Program launched in March 2021.  As you may know, the concierge program is a white-glove, individually-focused approach to encouraging and managing identified high value non-residential projects.

As we sit here today, there are about 4 million square feet of development proceeding through the development review process or actually under construction.  These projects represent about $900 million in investment and over 2000 local jobs.  Much, much more is in the ‘Business Concierge investment pipeline’.

2023 will see movement in major development projects in:

A waterpark, entertainment complex and hotel, and conference rooms on Eight Line and across from TPO near Steeles. A Recommendation Report is targeted for mid 2023. Construction will follow after planning studies are completed.

Conestoga Cold Storage at Steeles and 10^th Line south will build a state of the art cold storage facility with the first of possibly six phases providing high tech jobs for several dozen people. Site plan is under review and construction is hoped to begin in 2023.

Also in Steeles, Premier Gateway corridor - Enbridge, our sponsor today is looking to consolidate office operations in a multi-story building.  The site plan is being reviewed and construction is anticipated in 2023.

Additional Logistics and warehousing sites are also planned for the Steeles corridor.

On the residential front, old papermill site near the Go and train station – two residential condominium buildings of 640 units, one 8 storeys and one 12 storeys are proposed.  A public meeting is scheduled for first quarter, 2023. To bring you up to date on the McGibbon site – Removal of the existing buildings is almost complete and the target is spring of 2023 to see construction underway. Construction will take from 18-24 months for this 10 storey building. And the Memorial arena lands in Georgetown – Building one, which is 6 storeys will be completed by the summer of 2023. Building two is 14 townhouse units and building 3 is a five storey condominium which is 114 units. Construction on the latter two buildings is targeted for sometime in 2023.

As you can tell, the Town has a robust economic development workplan. But, as we continue to position Halton Hills as a prime investment destination, we are not just thinking of the economy of today. We are very much thinking into the future and making critical connections…

We know that the economy of the future should be a greener, less carbon-intensive one. One that recognizes and responds to the climate change emergency that we face. Because of this, our economic development strategies and actions include a focus on attracting innovative businesses that will help a Clean Technology cluster right here in Halton Hills. I would like Halton Hills to be a hub for these types of businesses. Not only will they create the jobs of the future, but also help us capture as much of the research and development, and the resulting products and services needed to shift to a low-carbon economy right here in Halton Hills. 

So, Halton Hills is open to business. 

While our long-term economic development prospects are robust, there are some challenges that I see in the shorter-term, I am confident that council will address them with wisdom and sensitivity.

One challenge is financial pressures on our upcoming budget due to inflation and non-discretionary cost increases. We will need to stay the course to ensure our house and finances continue to be in order as we manage through fiscal challenges- many of which are beyond our control.

One example is insurance - you will recall that last year we established a special levy for insurance, which represented 0.67% of the total 4.57% overall annual levy increase for the 2022 tax year.  This was to mitigate in part the fact that the annual costs related to liability insurance had grown by $1 million over a five-year period. This year, we are once again facing further annual increases relating to liability insurance – anticipated to rise by a further $993K in 2023 alone.

As businesspeople you might be experiencing similar challenges.  I’m sure you can appreciate the difficulties in managing expenditures beyond your control. I can tell you that Council will be spending a lot of time over the next few weeks, reviewing the numbers and understanding the economic and fiscal challenges so that a thorough analysis of the risks and benefits of any proposed tax rate increase can be carried out before the 2023 budget is brought forward to Town Council early next year.

A second hurdle is upheaval due to new and unfolding regulations dictated by the Province. These will affect our core community vision, our planning and operations and add even more financial stress.

Several pieces of new legislation, including the so-called More Homes Built Faster Act, threatens citizen participation, years of planning processes, natural heritage protection, climate action and heritage preservation.

Funding which has come from development charges for planning, infrastructure, community facilities and parks is being withdrawn. The shortfall, particularly for growing communities such as Halton Hills could be very significant. As it stands, the existing property tax base is the only source of funds available to fund that growth infrastructure. This budget year, challenging though it is, could be a cake walk compared with next year and the next.

There is near universal response from municipal leaders that Bill 23, proclaimed with virtually no time for consultation, will benefit development industry profits to the detriment of prudent municipal management and property taxpayers.

In addition, the Province has significantly revised the Halton Region Official Plan and the Halton Hills’ urban boundary, by 2051, will shift significantly south to include several thousand more acres. This huge expansion of the urban area sprawling into farmland does not jive with our current vision of an urban/rural mix and compact, walkable neighbourhoods. While I do not expect the design of Vision Georgetown land to be affected, our long-term planning forecasts will be quite different than our council planned.

We will be working with our municipal partners to raise our concerns about the impacts of this legislation.

The economic prosperity of our community is a key Council priority. Your success is our success. And I want, and your council wants, to be enablers, ambassadors and cheerleaders for small, medium and big business in Halton Hills.  If you think the town couId help you and your business grow, I invite you to call me directly. Our town is small enough that you can do that. We will connect you with the right resources either in the Town or in the Region who can help.

Please think of us as partners- each with resources and the goal of prosperity for all in our corner of the GTA.  As a council and staff, we look forward to working with you and fellow Chamber members in making Halton Hills the best place to live, work, play and invest.

And I’d like to close today with a thank you and a request.

Thank you for being present, for showing up, for being involved. The pandemic has challenged us from gathering together and we are only gradually emerging from cocoons, but I am thinking of more than that. There are several businesses represented here today who are posters for community involvement. They participate on committees associated with non-profit causes, or schools or our sports teams or for environmental initiatives. They sponsor floats or fancy cars carrying the new mayor in the Santa Claus parade, they lead a United Way campaign or plant trees together. They give according to their talents. They have taken the time to find out about community need.

We know it’s good pr and good for business to be seen and involved in the community, but it can also deliver a profound personal kick. You will have fun, grow, become more aware and make new friends.

And that’s the essence of small town living at its best. The tag line that says it all about Halton Hills and the community that I am passionate about nurturing and growing and I hope you feel the same way.

Don’t forget to shop local and I wish you Happy Holidays and may you have a wonderful Christmas Season with family and friends.

Thank you.