By late Monday evening, we will have in place the Thunder Bay City Council for the next four years and they will need to grapple with an assortment of issues not least of which will be trying to promote the City’s economic development. As was noted in a report released last week, Thunder Bay’s economy has rebounded from the pandemic but still faces strong headwinds. As the accompanying figure shows, while the employment declines of the COVID-19 pandemic were the steepest in over a decade, the recovery appears to have settled us at employment totals that are pretty much close to the long-term trend of flat long-term performance.
Indeed, Thunder Bay’s rebound in both employment and income has lagged that of the rest of the province. Moreover, given that the economy as a whole is facing higher interest rates and the probability of a recession, the New Year may not be exceptionally buoyant. Economic growth and expansion of the city’s tax base is crucial if Thunder Bay is to avoid large tax increases as it seeks to deal with an assortment of social issues - not least of which is policing - that may indeed prove costly to the city’s budget.
As a result, it is surprising that there was relatively little discussion of the economy in this election campaign but perhaps that is because the local economy is still rather flush with stimulus money from assorted government initiatives while the City of Thunder Bay enjoyed substantial government grant revenues and pandemic savings. This will not last forever especially given that the economy may be moving into recession. While much of what happens economically is due to external forces and beyond the direct purview of the City of Thunder Bay, there are steps City Council can take to prepare the city to take advantage of opportunity when it presents itself to help foster economic development and strengthen the local economy.
First, City Council needs to ensure the City of Thunder Bay develops a reputation for efficient and effective delivery of public services and infrastructure projects based on outcomes rather than wishful thinking. While a problem before the pandemic, at present projects are taking even longer to complete than necessary and are very disruptive to local businesses and residents. For any businesses considering coming to Thunder Bay, nimbleness on the part of City projects and services is a positive feature.
Second, City Council will need to be more competitive on the tax front and that will require providing its existing basket of services with fewer employees in order to hold the line on taxes. This may indeed prove to be the most serious immediate challenge the new council faces given that inflation is high, and wage and cost pressures are immense. Nevertheless, the temptation to simply pass these costs onto local business and residential ratepayers should be resisted. As part of the process of becoming more competitive, City Council also needs to cut red tape and facilitate quicker approval for building and business projects.
Third, the social challenges facing Thunder Bay are an economic as well as a social issue given that they create an environment that does not put the City’s best face forward when trying to attract new economic activity. City Council with the help of Federal, Provincial, and Indigenous governments needs to effectively tackle issues that are currently not conducive to attracting business to the City and these issues include poverty, homelessness, and crime. Despite some of the rhetoric that has been going on in this election campaign, there is no easy solution to these problems, but the first step is to recognize that the problem requires a team effort by all levels of government.
Fourth, there are some bright spots in the City’s economy that go beyond the stabilization provided by a broader public sector that employs over 30 percent of workers in Thunder Bay mainly in health and education. City economic development marketing strategies should focus on sectors with the most growth potential and these include tourism, mining, and transportation. The recent success of cruise ship visits to the city while not a panacea is nevertheless an optimistic development. Mining support and supply is also a source of future opportunities and with the trend towards "own-shoring" more economic activity domestically, our transportation sector – in particular the Port – stands to benefit from increased activity. As a start, this fall is expected to see a bumper crop of wheat on the Prairies and given the disruption in global grain markets, Thunder Bay’s Port should see increased activity.
And finally, looking ahead towards the future, another looming economic iceberg is the potential for a new out migration wave which may not be the young but the senior population. People in the 50 to 65 age range are currently thinking about where and when they will retire and looking forward many may indeed decide that Thunder Bay is not the place to live out their golden years. There are many in this age range whose children have moved away to southern Ontario or further afield, and they thus face the choice of remaining here in retirement or relocating closer to children. While much is made of the fact that housing costs a lot in other cities, it is likely going to become more affordable as prices decline over the next 6 to 12 months.
Wealth and income rise with age and the loss of the purchasing power of people with substantial assets will not help the local economy. Weighing in on decisions to stay or go are the need to downsize accommodation but there is a lack of affordable and quality apartment and condo housing in Thunder Bay. Cheap and poor design is indeed an issue given Thunder Bay’s winter climate as there is a surprising lack of indoor parking in many existing condos in Thunder Bay. Then, there are the types of services that become more important as one ages especially if you choose to remain in your own home and here there is relatively poor performance on things like municipal snow removal.
Massive municipal windrows in your driveway after a storm aside, the oft-heard mantra that you can retire and stay in your home and get affordable services as you age is aspirational in Thunder Bay given that residential services take second place to government contracts and large business projects for many providers resulting in relatively high-cost services. No one likes a small residential contract when there are bountiful government and institutional contracts available. This has only grown worse in the post pandemic labour shortage/inflationary world – for example, the average quote for getting the exterior of your house painted has literally tripled over the last ten years. This is well above and beyond where inflation has been over the last decade even with the pandemic.
As expensive as some think life in other cities in the rest of Canada is compared to Thunder Bay, there is still a lot more competition elsewhere that keeps prices and quotes for services in check as well as a better stock of well-designed housing options for all demographic groups. True, City Council cannot be expected to single-handedly address Thunder Bay’s business culture and less competitive monopoly environment. After all, Thunder Bay has always been a sort of monopoly company town with large employers such as pulp mills or railways and their economic spinoffs serving as milch cows for local business - not to mention municipal taxes. We are now a government town, but City Council can stop adding fuel to the fire by insisting on better value for money when it comes to the services it purchases.