Grey County Warden Selwyn Hicks will join around 2,000 participants at the annual Association of Municipalities of Ontario’s (AMO) 2019 Conference in Ottawa from August 18 to 21.
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. Grey County is participating in five meetings.
Grey County’s first meeting is on August 19 where delegates will ask the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities to support Georgian College’s request to expand their programs in Owen Sound. The next meeting is with the Ministry of Long-Term Care to discuss operating funding and new long-term care beds. The third meeting is with the Ministry of Education to discuss impacts of funding changes to children’s services.
On August 20 Grey County will meet with the Ministry of Children, Community and Social Services to talk about changes to Ontario Works funding. Grey County’s final meeting is with the Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks to discuss the impacts of proposed changes to the Conservation Authorities Act.
When not in delegations, Grey County representatives will be busy learning more about key conference topics, including cyber security, cannabis legalization, local economies in transition, changes to the health care system, recycling and plastics, affordable housing, municipal policing, rural economic development, climate change, addressing social and health problems facing our communities and much more.
Program information is available at www.amo.on.ca (link is external).
Conference news releases, fact sheets and presentations from a number of key speakers will be posted on AMO’s website throughout the duration of the conference at www.amo.on.ca (link is external).
AMO is a non-profit organization representing almost all of Ontario’s 444 municipal governments. AMO 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.
source:media release
