Municipal Politics

[Snark]

Originally Posted by manny_santos

I don't recall the entire story, but I know that a large number of industrial developments were locating in Westminster by the 1980s. I know that some industrial properties in Westminster gained access to City of London services in the late 1980s. Perhaps the City of London decided they would be better off having those lands within city limits to gain tax assessment from land they were servicing anyway.

Why they annexed everything up to the Elgin County line is beyond me though.

That's pretty much the story. By the 80's parts of London had grown out to the city limits, and growth was starting to spill over into Westminster in a serious way. Additionally, the township naturally had lower tax rates as it provided a rural level of service - which didn't matter much to commercial and industrial developments - making it attractive for businesses to set up on the other side of the city limits. In the 80's the township started to aggressively market itself to developers as an alternative to the City in an effort to increase assessment. The township was banking on the Province requiring London to extend hard services into Westminster in order to allow for orderly and proper intensification of the township. Naturally, London resented this, as it would only derive indirect benefit from the development in a neighboring municipality it would be forced to service.

Eventually in the late 80's things came to a head, with London wanting to annex the developed areas of Westminster arguing that it was sucking off of London's teat, and Westminster changing it's municipal and corporate status from that of township to town to better shield itself from it's larger neighbour. One must keep in mind that London's previous large annexation of 1961 seriously hurt Westminster then, and it was going to fight a similar "land grab" by the City this time around. Westminster then went a step further and proposed Regional Government be established as a counter proposal to London's annexation request (the new government would presumably be called the "Regional Municipality Of Middlesex"). Under such a scheme this would make London and Westminster equals politically, and cede operations and control of overall regional planning, roads, water, and wastewater to the new Regional Government. The Regional Government would then provide such services to whatever lower-tier municipality within the Region had the most demand for them. This is key, because the provision of hard services such as water and wastewater are the essentials that allow for significant urban development - all other factors are secondary.

Under such a scheme, Westminster would grow rapidly. By now it would possibly even have City status. London would get nothing but stagnant assessment growth and diluted control over any future growth it did get. Obviously the City wasn't going to stand by and watch such a thing happen and vowed to battle any such attempts. Eventually the Province stepped in and appointed John Brant to head up an arbitration tribunal to examine the situation and make recommendations to the province on what to decide on. The process went on for a year or so, and the when the results were released London was a bigger winner that anyone had imagined. The findings were that the Regional Government model was entirely inappropriate for the situation: London was still the very central dominant municipality in the area and it would be best if things remained that way. Westminster's attempt to portray the area as similar to Waterloo Region rang hollow. The arbitrator also determined that if London was allowed to annex areas of immediate interest (401/402 corridor, Lambeth, Exeter Road), the remaining rump of Westminster would be financially unsustainable - hence the remainder being ceded to London as well. That's how it got to Elgin County. It's also why London is still the largest single-tier municipality in North America.