Human Resources Legislative Update
Municipalities Take Note: Ontario Proposing to Expand Strong Mayor Powers to 169 Additional Municipalities
Date: April 21, 2025
On April 9, 2025, the Ontario government announced a proposal to expand strong mayor powers (SMPs) to the heads of council in 169 municipalities effective May 1, 2025, bringing the total to 216.
The proposed expansion would be facilitated by amending Ontario Regulation 530/22 under the Municipal Act, 2001. As we reported in our previous Human Resources Legislative Update, the province originally granted the SMPs to the mayors of Toronto and Ottawa in 2022 with the passing of the Strong Mayors, Building Homes Act, 2022 (Bill 3) on September 8, 2022 – that list has since grown to include 47 municipalities.
The purpose of the proposed expansion is to include certain single-tier and lower-tier municipalities with a council composition size of six members or more, to help these municipalities move forward on shared provincial-municipal priorities.
The SMPs and duties include:
- Choosing to appoint the municipality’s chief administrative officer.
- Hiring certain municipal department heads and establishing and re-organizing departments.
- Creating committees of council, assigning their functions and appointing the chairs and vice-chairs of committees of council.
- Proposing the municipal budget, which would be subject to council amendments and a separate head of council veto and council override process.
- Proposing certain municipal by-laws if the mayor is of the opinion that the proposed by-law could potentially advance a provincial priority identified in regulation. Council can pass these by-laws if more than one-third of all council members vote in favour.
- Vetoing certain by-laws if the head of council is of the opinion that all or part of the by-law could potentially interfere with a provincial priority.
- Bringing forward matters for council consideration if the head of council is of the opinion that considering the matter could potentially advance a provincial priority.
Should you have any questions or require more information about how these changes may impact your municipality, please contact your regular Hicks Morley lawyer.
