Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Evolution Of Municipal Asset Management Maturity In Canada: Surveying Mid-Sized Cities And Evaluating Federal And Provincial Policies To Spur Municipal Asset Management Practice, Dan Ditaranto

MPA Major Research Papers

In today’s global economy, Canada’s cities play a key role in the country’s economic growth and prosperity. They must build and maintain significant amounts of public infrastructure. However, the large and ever-growing national infrastructure deficit threatens to undermine the country’s competitiveness and quality of life. Since the turn of the century, the federal and provincial governments have increased reinvestment in infrastructure and employed several policy approaches to spur municipalities towards formalized asset management (AM) practice, which is widely recognized as the optimal means for determining long-term maintenance and funding requirements. Given the varied policy approaches, the state of municipal AM …

Conditional Grants In Ontario: A Case Study Of The Municipal Modernization Program, Elizabeth Reimer

MPA Major Research Papers

The intent of the 2019 Regional Government Review (Review) was to find ways to expand service delivery and reduce costs in 82 Ontario municipalities. However, no changes resulted. Instead, the Province allocated significant funding to the existing Municipal Modernization Program (MMP) for municipalities to utilize in hopes of achieving the same results the Review had. Accordingly, this paper looks at whether the MMP, a provincial conditional grant, is effectively achieving its stated intended purposes. It is clear that intergovernmental relations as they pertain to grants is a much-researched topic, with a vast collection of research to draw upon spanning much …

Examining Connected And Automated Vehicle (Cav) Policy In Ontario: A Modified Multiple Streams Framework Analysis, James Scott

MPA Major Research Papers

This research paper utilizes Kingdon’s (1984) Multiple Streams Framework to systematically analyze influential agenda-setting variables in the policy domain of connected and automated vehicles (CAV) in Ontario, Canada. The paper also leverages the Five Stream Confluence Model, a model which builds on the Multiple Streams Framework and is designed by Howlett et al. (2015) to analyze policy formation. The two foundational research questions that will guide the overall direction of this paper are: (1) What influenced Ontario to be the first province in Canada to legislate connected and automated vehicles (CAVs) in 2015? (2) Have influential agenda-setting variables translated through …

Ontario Municipal Voters’ List Reform Project, Paul Wilton

MPA Major Research Papers

Voter turnout has been declining in Canadian elections at all three levels of government, raising questions about the quality of Canadian democracy. This trend is believed to be pronounced at the municipal level, but some academics, local governments, and professional organizations believe its true extent is unknown because municipal voters’ lists in Ontario may not be as accurate as provincial and federal lists This research paper assesses this claim and provides recommendations for reform. The literature review examines the potential implications of inaccurate voters’ lists. First, inaccurate voters’ lists may pose threats to municipal clerks’ ability to conduct free and …

An Assessment Of Service And Program Support For Government Assisted Refugees (Gars) In A Multi-Level Policy Delivery System: A Case Of Selected Ontario Municipalities, Henry Gyeketey Awere

MPA Major Research Papers

Since the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA) came into effect in 2002, Canada has stopped placing so much emphasis in the selection process on refugee skills and ability to integrate. Rather, emphasis is placed on resettling refugees who need protection. As a result, post-IRPA Government Assisted Refugees (GARs) arriving in Canada are younger and have higher needs than previous groups of GARs. In Canada the Resettlement Assistance Program (RAP) is responsible for providing GAR’s with their immediate needs. RAP came into effect in 1998. A key component of RAP saw a change in the service delivery method, with a …

Municipal Associations, Membership Composition, And Interest Representation In Local-Provincial Relations, Alison Katherine Shott

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Municipal associations carry out two core functions – advocacy and providing member services. How associations prioritize and perform these functions is largely unclear. This dissertation explores how membership composition affects their activities. Canada’s 18 provincial level municipal associations all provide advocacy and services for their members, but there are considerable differences within their memberships. Some associations represent all municipalities within a province while others are divided along linguistic, regional, or rural/urban lines. In addition, the municipalities they represent can vary by size, legal type, region, ethnicity/language, and rural/urban character. Two measures of membership composition are employed: rural/urban dominance and population …

Authority Migration And Accountability In Canadian Type Ii Multilevel Governance, Robert W. Waterman

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

In advanced industrial democracies, including Canada, elections act as important mechanisms of democratic accountability. However, the migration of public decision-making responsibility away from elected representatives and toward new governance models may alter accountability relationships. As authority is dispersed horizontally to new governance actors that exist beyond the reach of the ballot box, questions of public input and accountability within the democratic governance process arise.

The objectives of the dissertation are: 1) to evaluate the extent to which Canadian provinces have opted to migrate decision-making authority horizontally in response to policy issues and why; and 2) to evaluate the existence and …

Structural Variation And Local Service Delivery: Comparing Municipal Governments And Special Purpose Bodies, Joseph R. Lyons

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

In the debate over the governance of metropolitan areas, consolidationists favour single, area-wide, general purpose jurisdictions, while polycentrists make arguments in support of multiple, scale-specific, specialized jurisdictions. This dissertation contributes to this debate through comparisons of municipal and specialized service delivery in two Ontario cities. The cities of London and Hamilton represent positions along a continuum of fragmentation and consolidation, with London being more fragmented and Hamilton more consolidated. Comparisons are undertaken for three local government services: public health, economic development, and watershed management. In London, independent special purpose bodies deliver all three of these services, while in Hamilton the …