By Pepper Parr
February 20th, 2026
BURLINGTON, ON
Mayor Meed Ward was given Strong Mayor Powers on July 1st, 2023 when Council undertook to facilitate the building of 29,000 by 2031.
The Province of Ontario announced it will be extending strong mayor powers, effective July 1, 2023, to every municipality that has adopted a housing pledge, including Burlington
Given that the target hasn’t a hope of ever being met by 2031, does that mean the Strong Mayors Powers the Mayor has are null and void?
It will be interesting to see if any of the City Council members who are opposed to the mayor having those Powers, never mind her using them.
The occasion when Mayor Meed Ward used the Strong Mayor Powers: all she did was confuse an already confused situation.
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A Very good question.
Many of us thought that the 29,000 was an impossible Ford number, and it has proven to be. But MMW took the power bait with the condition the City had to deliver, or lose the powers, as Pepper stated, they would be null and void.
Trouble is, power grasping for big money has sticky fingers. However, MMW and Ford have still not faced this fact, and scrapped this parade of fools errand, trying to make pigs fly. Developers will never go out of business as it was promised.
But anyways, giving political power to MMW was enough to get her to commit to this impossibility (so are some Councilors committed as talking points to support themselves and developer friends).
But giving MMW this power, without the conditions that were impossible from the start, is really just a phony con-job deal right off.
This is now proven by the facts – the price is too high to meet.
It was really Power for free. So after the fact, the deal was a lie.
Is our Mayor and Council telling us that City Taxpayers have to pay the developers for their investment decisions, and residents have to live this lie?
That is a very good question.
Burlington residents need to ask their councillors about this.
Is the reason this “freeze on development charges” is being pushed forward in an attempt to keep the “Strong Mayor” designation?
Most residents are not in favour of the strong mayor designation.
In fact, the elimination of this designation as an election campaign promise could result in a new mayor in the 2026 Municipal election.
Mayor My Way has used the SMP’s on more than one occasion.
This time it she just can’t hide the abuse of the democratic process.
She had the option to vote for more information at committee.