I periodically hear the comment that Fort Erie is Niagara’s best kept secret. Newly arrived residents or businesses, tourists and property developers are drawn to Fort Erie by its enticing location on the Canada-United States border, the 46 kilometres of Niagara River and Lake Erie waterfront, the ever-present wildlife, the stunning natural heritage features and the friendly people. Fort Erie also boasts great schools (both public and private), an abundance of parks (passive, sports fields, urban forests and recreational) and playgrounds and a variety of programs and activities for those of all ages.
I am frequently astonished by the lack of knowledge about Fort Erie by those who live in the northern part of Niagara: the breadth of our history, the significance of Indigenous presence, the population diversity, the recent growth, the vitality of the business community and the people. I sense that many in Niagara regard Fort Erie as an outlier when it comes to region-based initiatives and institutions. In fact, it is. And that stems from the lack of understanding of Fort Erie, its people and its economy.
Fort Erie is home to a number of national and international corporate giants: Airbus, Fleet Canada (de Havilland Aircraft of Canada), Abatement Technologies, Sumitomo Bakelite, Aerosafe, Livingstone International, Siltech, Rich Products, Holland Power, Barbican, for example. A vast array of additional manufacturers, retail enterprises and service entities provide employment, business diversity and potential for growth in a variety of economic sectors. In fact, a number of our manufacturers are expanding or planning for expansion, even as Canada is engaged in a climate of tariff uncertainty with our largest trading partner. That speaks well of the resilience, ingenuity, resourcefulness and persistence of business leaders and the workforce in our community.
The Town of Fort Erie, as a municipal administration, has an important role in setting a tone and providing opportunities for residents and businesses to prosper and grow. Our strategic plan for 2023-2026 establishes six core objectives: sustainable and reliable access to health care, quality of life and community well-being, sustainable and managed growth, economic prosperity and diversity, environmental and climate change resiliency and comprehensive housing options. These provide the focus for municipal action and budget allocations. Each of these pillars is championed by the mayor and a member of Council. Progress is charted regularly and reported to the community.
During the past year, the Town of Fort Erie has created and advocated for a number of initiatives designed to meet growth and prosperity objectives. Reimagining Douglas Memorial will ensure the long-term access to the health care needs of our residents while improving health care outcomes across Niagara, helping Niagara Health to become more efficient, reduce Emergency Department wait times and ambulance off-load delays, all of which will save taxpayers, the health system and the Province money. Fort Erie, in conjunction with eight other Niagara municipalities, has created and advocated with the Province for a program that will establish housing targets for those municipalities and provide a clear, reliable formula for distributing infrastructure funding to facilitate the construction of more housing units. Fort Erie received recognition recently from the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Cities Initiative for a program that eliminates ground water from our sanitary sewer system, thus reducing the potential for sewer overflow incidents that result in effluent flowing into Lake Erie and the Niagara River. Our Asset Management Plan, the bane of virtually every municipality in Ontario, was in 2022 likely the only municipality in the province that had fully funded the identified long-term costs of maintaining our infrastructure. Inflation and construction cost increases arising from the Covid pandemic have caused a setback in that, but the Town is now charting alternatives to get back to full funding.
These are just a sampling of the initiatives, programs and strategies that Fort Erie is engaged in to address the needs of our residents, attract new businesses and investment and resolve challenges to growth and prosperity.
