Mayor Brian McMullan

Size: px

Start display at page:

Download "Mayor Brian McMullan"

Allison Melton
6 years ago
Views:

1 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY Mayor Brian McMullan State of the City of St. Catharines Holiday Inn & Suites Conference Centre Friday, January 31, 2014 I m pleased to be here with you today to share our accomplishments and talk about the exciting future for our city. First, I would like to thank the Greater Niagara Chamber of Commerce for hosting this event and welcome members and special guests to this State of the City address. I want to take a moment to recognize the St. Catharines City Councillors and staff in attendance: City Councillors: Dawn Dodge, Matt Harris, Peter Secord, Bill Phillips, Jennie Stevens and Mark Elliott. City staff: Dan Carnegie, Mark Mehlenbacher, Dave Oakes, Ron Tripp, Nicole Auty, Rick Lane, Shelley Chemnitz, Jim Riddell, Jeanette Pillitteri and Steve Solski. Today, I am also joined by some of family. Before I begin, I would like to play our new City of St. Catharines promotional video which highlights a number of our achievements and some of the private investments we are seeing in our community. 1

2 This video was created by Image Propeller Studios, a local business and the newest tenant to join Generator@one. Sandra & Harry Tournemille founded the studio after relocating to Ontario from Vancouver B.C. They settled in the Garden City as a result of Niagara s beauty along with St. Catharines' strong sense of community. (Play Video) Thank you to Image Propeller Studios and your team for your efforts to promote St. Catharines, encourage local investments and highlight the talent that can be found, right here in our community. ******************* City Council has been committed to investing in our community, our people and in our future. Our priority is job creation and the economy. As you all know, jobs and a strong economy is not created by the public sector. The role of municipal government is to help create an environment which spurs private investment. To encourage growth, we had the wisdom, and the foresight, to take advantage of stimulus funding and 2

3 government programs designed to generate economic activity. We made the tough decisions. We took the necessary steps to strengthen our city s foundation. We set the stage for a prosperous and vibrant future for our residents and the generations to follow. Already we are beginning to see some tangible results from our decisions. Intended to map out our civic investments, our Creative Cluster Master Plan gave us a clear direction for Council. In this term of Council, many milestones have been achieved. We have opened our new Kiwanis Artificial Turf Field; Carlisle Street Parking Garage; Kiwanis Aquatic Centre; and have started building our new Meridian Centre spectator facility and Performing Arts Centre. The unprecedented investments in our community have altered our landscape and changed the face, and the very heart, of our city. There is a renewed confidence in our future, a sense of pride and a growing wave of excitement. ******************* 3

4 It is a historic time in St. Catharines and in 2013 we accomplished much. We have seen more than $1 billion in combined investments in the public and private sectors that have either been completed or started in Recently, we opened the doors to our new St. Catharines Fire Hall in Merritton. When every second counts, it is vital that we ensure our emergency personnel have the most up-to-date equipment and communications facilities to promptly respond to fires, medical calls, and car accidents. To improve the way in which we deliver services and communicate with our taxpayers, we have also renewed our focus on customer service. We want the process of doing business with the city to be easy. Yes, I said to be easy. To that end, the City of St. Catharines has updated our Official Plan. We also completed a major review of 11 zoning bylaws, totalling 5,000 pages of documents, to develop a 160- page citywide comprehensive zoning bylaw. 4

5 Zoning across the city is now consistent with our Garden City Plan and our goals to encourage greening, intensify residential development and spur redevelopment. We re also simplifying the process for private investment with AMANDA a new software program which helps to reduce red tape and allows people to file online development applications. Also, to improve service delivery, we have reorganized our staff at City Hall to centralize our services. In April, following extensive training, we will have a new onsite customer service desk. Through a single window people will be able to access services in a timely, efficient manner. We also intend to have extended hours for our customer service operations to better serve you: our residents, business leaders and taxpayers. In 2013, we also started offering a new service to our community: civic wedding ceremonies. We re pleased that have seen more than 100 weddings at City Hall which allowed us to discover a new revenue generator as well as to help our residents celebrate their vows. 5

6 They are actually coming into City Hall, not just to pay taxes or water bills, they are coming into City Hall with smiles on their faces. While our efforts have been focused on making City Hall more welcoming, we also wanted to make our downtown more inviting. As part of our commitment to be more pedestrian-friendly, this past summer we staged a Civic Square on James Street. In conjunction with our Civic Square, we also started hosting an evening Farmer s Market at Market Square, which increased exposure of our local vendors. It was extremely well-received. Our businesses also took the opportunity to establish new pop-up patios which converted asphalt into outdoor seating and green space in the Garden City. Our long-term goals are to be a more sustainable, environmentally-friendly, walkable community. These initiatives are innovative ways to achieve our goals and encourage buy-in from businesses, residents and visitors. 6

7 Last year, we also had the pleasure of seeing the opening of our New Niagara Health System s $900 million Health- Care Complex and Walker Family Cancer Centre. The complex brings one million square feet of health care to our community and Niagara. While it replaced our aging St. Catharines General and Ontario Street sites it also offers new vital regional services closer to home. This new facility aids our efforts to recruit physicians by attracting medical students, family physicians and specialists to this area. To further boost our plans to create a cluster in bioscience and medicine, we saw the opening of: Brock University s $112-million Cairns Bioscience Centre; the McMaster Niagara Family Health Centre and Clinical Teaching Unit and; Michael G. DeGroote School of Medicine Niagara campus at Brock University. I am also pleased to report, that in 2013, we also witnessed overwhelming support from our business community. 7

8 With a commitment of more than $5 million from Meridian, we exceeded our fundraising target for our new $50- million spectator facility. The newly named Meridian Centre is on time and on budget. While it is a permanent home for our OHL team, the Niagara IceDogs, the facility will host concerts, conventions, family shows and other sporting events. It has the capacity for 6,000 people for concerts and up to 5,000 fans for hockey games. During our suite sales, we sold out in just a couple of days. The puck will drop in time for the 2014 hockey season and SMG is busy scheduling other entertainment and events for this fall. For the new $60-million Performing Arts Centre we have also seen the community rally behind our efforts to support, promote and encourage growth in the arts and culture sector. Peter Partridge Sr. and family donated $1 million; Cogeco Canada has provided $410,000 in monetary and in-kind support; Algoma Central Corporation donated $250,000; and Edward Kendall and Marian Gordon contributed $75,000. 8

9 Our PAC will be further complemented by the relocation of Brock University s Marilyn I Walker School of Fine and Performing Arts to our downtown core. Once open, in 2015, we are confident it will truly put our city centre stage. These investments will keep local dollars right here in St. Catharines and draw more people to our restaurants, hotels and shops. St. Catharines has world-class facilities and it s no longer Niagara s best kept secret. In fact, our Royal Canadian Henley Rowing Centre is rated as one of the world s best rowing courses and it drew the attention of organizers of the 2015 Pan Am Games. The Henley is a perfect showcase of what our city has to offer as a sports tourism destination and we re pleased that Canada s best rowers will be in our community competing and going for the gold. Along with this amazing news comes further investment as we rebuild the bridge connecting to the Island, and complete other upgrades to make this event truly spectacular. The reality is that all of us, including all the individuals in this room, play a vital role in our community s future. 9

10 You are all leaders helping to move our city forward into better times ahead. Our business community shares Council s vision and you all make important investments in your businesses which support our city. ******************* With respect to private investments, in the last year, our Small Business Enterprise Centre, which assists business start-up and growth fielded 4,400 general business inquires and had 460 client consultations. With a renewed confidence in our city, we are seeing more private investments in our city, some of which I would like to highlight today. These investments demonstrate a renewed commitment to the future of our community. We ve seen government investments like FedDev Ontario providing anti-cancer drug producer, Biolyse Pharma Corporation, with a repayable contribution of up to $2.9 million to complete an expansion project. It is expected to create up to 59 full-time jobs and introduce up to 15 additional generic chemotherapy drugs. 10

11 Companies are investing in technology, like St. Catharines based International Internet Exchange (IIX) Corp. which invested more than $600,000, with the help of the Federal Government, to allow users to send large amounts of information more directly and at lower costs than traditional Internet traffic. We are also seeing business renovate and enhance their facilities like: Mortimers Fine Foods, a manufacturer of frozen entrees, which purchased and renovated a 42,000 square foot manufacturing facility; Ed Learn Ford invested $6 million to revamp its dealership; and Pen Centre and Target invested $23 million in the shopping centre. To help our thriving creative community live artfully, a new project called The Community Works will provide multi-use live/work space on Queen Street. Trenergy Inc., one of the largest pressure vessel manufacturers in Canada, has purchased more than 14 acres for the company s continued reinvestment in our City s industrial landscape. With green energy, Bullfrog Power, in partnership with Solarshare, launched a new 572 panel solar array which will produce enough clean energy to power more than 14 homes annually. 11

12 In health services, Pathstone Mental Health is building a new $8-million treatment facility near the new Niagara Health System hospital site. For the first time in 20 years, GM which has invested more than $1.7 billion in its St. Catharines Powertrain Operations added 50 production workers. St. Catharines truly is a Cadillac City and we should be proud of it. We re starting to see more residential development in our city s core with Mountainview/Walker and its partner Diversicare investing up to $35 million at the former Hotel Dieu site while Penn Terra Group Ltd. is investing more than $40 million in its projects in the downtown. Both of these projects qualified for our 90-day fast tracking program to expedite development in our community. With the City s contribution to the PAC and Meridian Centre of approximately $65 million - we re already seeing more than a 100% return on our investments with these two projects alone. Downtown revitalization is at the intersection of today and the future. 12

13 The planning sessions and proposals of the past have paved the way for construction crews, façade improvements, new storefronts and groundbreaking ceremonies. In terms of sense of place, the city s core offers many essential building blocks with its rich heritage, a thriving creative culture, and healthy mix of uses. From busy cafés to the bustling farmers market, there s a new sense of excitement among our residents, our business owners and economic development stakeholders about the potential of our downtown. We re seeing existing businesses renovate and expand, new shops opening and more residential developments. In fact, I have an additional list of about 30 businesses that have invested in our city s core. There is a renewed sense of pride in this community. Our downtown has attracted such notables as Keyframe Digital Productions, Form & Affect Digital Design, the Quartek Group, The Works Gourmet Burger Bistro, Open Concept Films and Niagara College which plans to expand its downtown location. Change is indeed a beautiful thing. 13

14 The window into the heart of a city is its downtown. All of you, and your contributions, make our community a better place to live, work and play. The City of St. Catharines is doing all it can to help business retention and expansion. In fact, we have committed more than $9 million in investments to Community Improvement Plan (or CIP) since When all of these projects are complete the result will be the redevelopment of nine brownfield properties, improvement of 26 facades and the creation of more than 900 residential units. Properties that have been successful under the City s tax increment programs are expected to reach a total assessment increase of approximately $150 million as a result of building improvements. This increased assessment will benefit all St. Catharines residents by reducing the property tax burden on individual property owners and improve and redevelop properties that would otherwise be underutilized. ******************* Looking forward we must ensure that we continue to focus our attention on job growth and the local economy, while also remaining committed to fiscal responsibility. 14

15 When it comes to the economy, we need to create the right environment and ensure the proper policies and incentives are in place to encourage private sector investments. While we re seeing a shift to more knowledge-based industry we haven t given up on manufacturing. While manufacturing jobs are not as plentiful, companies that thrive, and there are many, are demonstrating the ability to be innovative, creative and make use of new technology and research. We must ensure we continue to provide our support for this vital sector. The City continues to work with industry leaders, as well as the St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corporation to further industrial opportunities at what is commonly known as Port Weller Dry Docks and along the Welland Canal. St. Catharines is not alone in these challenges we have faced. We have seen a lot of support from our provincial and federal representatives including Minister Jim Bradley, MP Rick Dykstra, MP Malcolm Allen and MPP Cindy Forster. We want to continue to strengthen our relationship with upper levels of government. 15

16 To retain and encourage business we need the provincial and federal governments to provide incentives and make strategic investments, like their American counter parts, that help businesses to thrive. It is also vital that the Region be an advocate at the provincial and federal levels with the aim of strengthening economic development efforts and infrastructure investment. With a united voice, we must increase our push for year round GO Rail services in Niagara which would benefit us all. Together, with Niagara municipalities and the Region, we have launched a campaign to advocate for permanent GO expansion. To ensure its success, we need your support. We want to thank the Greater Niagara Chamber of Commerce for support of this campaign. We would appreciate it if you, and your neighbours, would write letters to our provincial government and make sure GO Rail is a not only a priority for us, but the provincial government as well. To further strengthen our Region, St. Catharines will take the lead to bring key stakeholders, business and labour leaders together. 16

17 If we can identify challenges and find solutions we need to bring those to our provincial and federal partners. To that end, I plan to host an economic summit this spring so we can create further positive action and concrete steps to move our economy forward. Moving forward, we must remain focused and build upon our successes. We must also be mindful of the taxpayers ability to pay, how we spend finances, and achieve additional cost savings. As such, we will review $3 million of potential cost savings which may be realized through asset management, process improvements and attrition at City Hall. By continuing to make City Hall more efficient, we can reduce costs and ensure our residents continue to receive good value for their taxpayers dollars. We also have an opportunity to repatriate some hydro funds to the City. Currently the budget committee is reviewing the hydro reserves, as St. Catharines Hydro is a wholly owned subsidiary of the City of St. Catharines. 17

18 As part of the review we will determine how much we must invest in Shickluna, as required by Infrastructure Ontario, as well as establish an effective dividend policy. We re also hopeful that this year our Shickluna project will finally move forward. This shovel-ready, green energy project just needs a green light and we expect an announcement by the end of February. We anticipate start of construction in 2015 and I would like to thank Minister Jim Bradley for his support. We are seeing a real transformation in our community. Our major investments are spurring economic activity and will continue to encourage private sector investment in our city. When private investors see the activity happening in our community, they explore new potential opportunities. Together, we need to encourage entrepreneurs to open business right here in the great city of St. Catharines. To rebuild, revitalize and renew our community, takes time. But we are a city on the move. St. Catharines aims to reverse the brain drain; keep and attract young talent and ensure we have good paying jobs for all our citizens. 18

19 Our young people must have the right opportunities, education and training in the areas of greatest demand. We need to support the development of incubators like those that are part of Innovate Niagara, formerly ngen, to encourage growth in the new knowledge-based economy. In the words of Martin Luther King Jr., as I stated last year, which still rings true: We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, there is such a thing as being too late. This is no time for apathy or complacency. This is a time for vigorous and positive action. Can we do it? Yes, we can. In St. Catharines, we make things happen is going to be an exciting year for our city. Because of the decisions and steps we are taking today, I m confident our best years are yet truly to come. May God bless the great, great City of St. Catharines. 19

Mayor Brian McMullan State of the City of St. Catharines Friday, January 25, 2013

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY Mayor Brian McMullan State of the City of St. Catharines Friday, January 25, 2013 Thank you for the introduction. I m pleased to be here with you today to update