Municipalities across the province are crying foul over the criteria to apply for provincial infrastructure funding.
The Towns of Tecumseh, Essex and Lakeshore have all been rejected for grants from various programs and say it's because they keep their financial house in order.
They're not alone.
Lakeshore's manager of communications and strategic initiatives recently told BlackburnNews.com the town lost out on a $7.3-million grant to rehabilitate its wastewater treatment plant in Stoney Point. The $25.7-million project is now on hold.
A similar narrative is playing out in Tecumseh where town Councillor Andrew Dowie says the council has been rejected for two sanitary sewer projects: the Southwest Truck Sanitary Sewer project in an industrial park in Oldcastle, and sanitary sewer rehabilitation which would have prevented flooding through an estimated 5,000 private connections.
Dowie says those projects will go ahead, but the lack of provincial grants means other projects will have to wait.
"That's the real benefit of the grant program. It allows us to achieve our town's goals sooner rather than later," he says.
Residential flooding in Essex. (Photo courtesy Glen Mills)
In Essex,Director of Corporate Services and Treasurer Donna Hunter expresses frustration after the province said it wouldn't help pay for flooding mitigation in its urban wards, and Erie St. rehabilitation in Harrow.
"I don't have the money sitting in a magic resource somewhere to accommodate this kind of expenditure," says Hunter. "It's forcing the community into long-term debt financing because these projects need to be done."
A front end loader mixes a new type of pot hole filling asphalt being made and sold at Pebbles Gravel and Topsoil. (Photo by Mike James)
However, Leamington's manager of corporate services has a different take on the issue. Ramona Nordemann says municipalities can't rely on provincial grants to fund infrastructure.
"I think you have to consider that the province is assessing provincial limited resources against priorities across the province, not just in Windsor-Essex," she says. "There might be municipalities with more pressing needs."
A resolution by the Town of Carleton Place in eastern Ontario calls on the province to discontinue scoring indicators in funding programs.
"Municipalities that have significant debt and few reserves have not planned to maintain their infrastructure. Awarding a high score to a municipality with a low net financial asset per household just encourages continued poor planning."
"I think they should just change it to 'per-capita,'" says LaSalle Deputy Mayor Marc Bondy. "We have to be fair."
LaSalle town councillor Jeff Renaud says the public can help too.
"Talk to your MPP, your MP," says Renaud. "We need help."