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On Behalf of the City of Thunder Bay, It Is My Pleasure to Welcome

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On Behalf of the City of Thunder Bay, It Is My Pleasure to Welcome 2014 Inaugural Address – 46th City Council Mayor Keith Hobbs Monday, Dec. 1, 6:30 pm, Council Chambers Side by Side for a Better Future [Check against delivery] Good evening and Boozhoo, and welcome to this inaugural meeting of the forty-sixth Thunder Bay City Council. Greetings on behalf of the City of Thunder Bay, which resides in the Robinson Superior Treaty and has been built on the traditional lands of the Ojibwa people of Fort William First Nation. I would also like to recognize the contributions made to our community by Métis people of Ontario. [Mayor recognizes dignitaries present.] I am joined tonight by your newly-elected City Council. I am pleased to see many returning faces here in Council Chambers – fine councillors who have served their City well over the last term. To each of you, congratulations on your re-election. I would also like to thank all those who stood as candidates in the recent election. Thank you for caring about your City and putting your names forward.My thanks also goes to the Office of the City Clerk for overseeing the 2014 election. On a personal note, I would to take a moment to recognize former City Councillor Joe Vanderwees, who recently passed away. Joe was a dedicated and passionate representative who did many great things for our City and he is an inspiration to us as we move forward with our work over the next four years. Tonight, this Council is joined by two new members – Northwood Councillor Shelby Ch’ng and At-Large Councillor Frank Pullia. 1 2014 Inaugural Address – 46th City Council Mayor Keith Hobbs Monday, Dec. 1, 6:30 pm, Council Chambers Councillor Ch’ng, welcome, and congratulations. Your obvious passion for Thunder Bay and your success as an entrepreneur here in our City will no doubt allow you to make significant contributions. We look forward to working with you. Councillor Pullia, you are no stranger to these chambers, and we are pleased to welcome you back. Your experience as a councillor and businessperson, as well as your knowledge of Thunder Bay, will be great assets during this term. Unfortunately, we cannot welcome new councillors without saying goodbye to others. Tonight, we recognize Ken Boshcoff and Mark Bentz. Both have served our City as members of this council for many years, and each has contributed greatly to the success of Thunder Bay. Ken’s long service to this community has included a remarkable 26 years on this Council. His network of relationships has served this Council, and this City, extraordinarily well. Mark too was a dedicated member of Council, overseeing often-difficult budget deliberations, leading the development of our award-winning waterfront, and offering a pragmatic approach to issues. On behalf of the citizens of Thunder Bay, we thank them both for their contributions, and wish them the very best in their future endeavours. They have much to be proud of, as do all the returning councillors here. Over the last four years, we saw some major projects and initiatives come to fruition. Our award-winning waterfront at Prince Arthur’s Landing is one example, and I am excited to see where phase two of that project takes us. 2 2014 Inaugural Address – 46th City Council Mayor Keith Hobbs Monday, Dec. 1, 6:30 pm, Council Chambers We’ve continued to address our City’s infrastructure needs. During the previous term, I often referred to my colleagues as the “infrastructure council.” I stand by that – in the last term of council, we dedicated $252 million to infrastructure. We will continue with this critical investment in our City over the next four years. Our credit rating has increased, and we’ve seen a record number of building permits issued. Our unemployment rate is low. Our city’s economy, meanwhile, continues to diversify, and through that, Thunder Bay is positioning itself to seize future opportunities, such as those in the mining and knowledge-based sectors. When it comes to the economy, we work hard for everything that we get – and we will continue to work hard. One just needs to drive around our city to see the progress. New buildings are going up. New businesses are opening their doors. Our infrastructure is being renewed and rebuilt. Further, should we get the funding in place, we will continue to work toward the construction of a new event and convention centre that will further strengthen the ongoing revitalization of the downtown north core. We expect to hear about that funding by the end of March 2015. If all goes well, we fully anticipate construction to begin next summer. We are, in short, on solid footing as we move forward into a new term, and we have a strong Council in place to act as a guide. Around this table is a great deal of experience, as well as some fresh eyes that will offer new perspectives on our City’s ongoing projects and initiatives, as well as new ideas that will guide our path forward. 3 2014 Inaugural Address – 46th City Council Mayor Keith Hobbs Monday, Dec. 1, 6:30 pm, Council Chambers These next four years will surely present their own challenges, but they are full of potential and opportunity, as well. Our Official Plan update is nearing completion. We are also well on our way to completing new master plans that will govern how our City handles climate change adaptation, and storm water management. Both of these documents will prove important to Thunder Bay’s future as we deal with increasing numbers of extreme weather events. We must turn our focus to revitalizing our City’s historic south core. One of the first reports this new Council will deal with, in fact, is a safety audit of the South Core. That is due to be presented here on December 15. I firmly believe we, as a Council, should focus our energy on this area of our City, and I look forward to hearing my fellow Councillors’ ideas on how we can turn the area into a thriving hub by 2018. Many of our residents have also expressed concern over property taxes. We’ve heard you. We have reduced business taxes by an average of nine per cent in the past few years and, while seventy-five per cent of our City’s tax increases have gone toward needed infrastructure renewal, it is time we examined how we can lighten the load on our homeowners. This is not going to be easy. Thunder Bay is faced with a challenging budget in 2015, brought on in large part by harsher winters that are expected to continue to result in higher winter maintenance and operating costs. In addition, we must contend with MPAC’s systematic and adverse reassessments of industrial properties including, most recently, grain elevators. City Council will be faced with some tough decisions at budget time as we work to reduce costs. 4 2014 Inaugural Address – 46th City Council Mayor Keith Hobbs Monday, Dec. 1, 6:30 pm, Council Chambers To be successful, we must focus on building our assessment base by attracting new business and retaining existing businesses. We will continue to work with the Thunder Bay Chamber of Commerce, SHIFT, our City’s young professionals network, and the Community Economic Development Commission, or CEDC, to support our City’s business sector. We must continue to be great partners with Lakehead University, Confederation College, the Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre and the Thunder Bay Regional Research Institute to name a few, all economic drivers in their own right. I wish to acknowledge the CEDC here tonight, not only for the great work they’ve done for our City, but also for their leadership and initiative. Under the guidance of CEO Doug Murray, the CEDC recently completed a new three-year Strategic Action Plan. Titled Transitioning to Growth, this new and comprehensive plan is divided into seven themes: 1. Entrepreneurship 2. Innovative manufacturing 3. Training and education 4. Logistics and supply hub 5. Social enterprise, ICT (information, communications and technology), regional food, and film 6. Mining readiness 7. Business retention, expansion and succession planning These are the areas the CEDC will be focusing on over the next three years. As a community we have worked hard to recoup employment lost from forestry through diversification. That focus has paid off with a 77 per cent increase in employment from manufacturing from 2011 to 2013. 5 2014 Inaugural Address – 46th City Council Mayor Keith Hobbs Monday, Dec. 1, 6:30 pm, Council Chambers The strategic plan is very thorough, and I look forward to seeing it produce some very exciting results for our City. Much has been done and there is much more to do to support continued economic growth in Thunder Bay and Region. The last point on the CEDC list – succession planning – is a particularly interesting one. As our city’s population ages, and our entrepreneurial residents reach retirement age, they seek to sell their businesses to new owners. However, many have had trouble finding suitable people to take over those businesses. Alongside the CEDC, we will work to attract new entrepreneurs to our City who can take over these established local businesses and keep them prospering. We must also continue to take a regional approach to our economy, working with regional partners like the Northwestern Ontario Municipal Association and the Thunder Bay District Municipal League. I have said it many times, and I will say it again – what is good for the Region is good for Thunder Bay and what is good for Thunder Bay is good for the Region.
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