Mayor Al McDonald, members of council and senior staff have joined some 2,000 participants at the Association of Municipalities of Ontario (AMO) 2019 Conference in Ottawa this week.
McDonald said the delegation has identified “a couple of priorities,” including the state of “mental health and addictions,” issues, as well as discussions on changes coming to health units.
For more than a century, Ontario’s largest municipal conference has brought together municipal, provincial and federal officials to work collectively to overcome municipal challenges and plan for the future.
Ontario’s Premier, Minister of Municipal Affairs, and the three party leaders are featured speakers and several additional provincial ministers will participate in the conference.
The annual conference is a chance for municipal officials to discuss and move forward on shared challenges, to learn, and to create new opportunities that can benefit their communities. In addition to the conference program, municipal staff and officials will take part in municipal delegation meetings with provincial and federal ministries.
That includes meetings with Health Minister Christine Elliott and Finance Minister Rod Phillips. City officials will also take part in roundtable discussions with Greg Rickford, Indigenous Affairs and Northern Development and Mines Minister, and Prabmeet Singh Sarkaria, Associate Minister of the Environment, Conservation and Parks.
Key session topics include cyber security, cannabis legalization, local economies in transition, changes to the health care system, recycling and the rise of plastics, affordable housing, municipal policing, rural economic development, climate change, addressing social and health problems facing our communities.
For AMO Conference program information, click here.
AMO is a non-profit organization representing almost all of Ontario’s 444 municipal governments. AMO says it supports strong and effective municipal government in Ontario and promotes the value of municipal government as a vital and essential component of Ontario and Canada’s political system.
