Great Lakes mayors oppose trade war

It took less than an hour for the meeting of hundreds of Great Lakes mayors to orbit two words. Trade war.

Ostensibly, the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Cities Initiatives focused on restoring and protecting the health of the Great Lakes basin, but at a Thursday meeting in Ajax, the 125 mayors who comprise the group were more focused on tariffs and trade than ecology.

“The economy impacts the environment,” said St. Catharines Mayor Walter Sendzik, an initiative board member. “Because if we are focused on the economy and a trade war, then our priority is not on the environment.”

Sendzik said it took less than 60 minutes for the mayors’ attention to turn from freshwater protection to the trade war between Canada and the U.S. sparked by steel and aluminium tariffs imposed by U.S. President Donald

Trump.

The president, claiming trade deals with Canada are unfair, used a national security justification to impose tariffs on Canadian imports. In response, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says reciprocal tariffs will be imposed on American goods and some Canadian cities have begun to boycott American products.

Trump took to Twitter to call Trudeau dishonest and weak.

By Thursday afternoon, the mayors issued a joint statement warning against “isolationist trade policies.”

Although the statement does not mention the U.S. president by name, its message is in stark contrast to the rhetoric of Trump.

“The mayors of the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence region are keepers of the flame of our special cross-border relationship,” said Niagara Falls, N.Y., mayor Paul Dyster in the statement. “American mayors of the cities initiative stand shoulder to shoulder with our Canadian cousins in the face of escalating rhetoric that threatens to damage 200 years of peace and economic prosperity in the region.”

Sendzik said a trade war threatens the economic stability of the communities of the Great Lakes region, but municipalities lack the legislative firepower to fight tariffs.

However, he said, mayors, because of their prominent position in their communities, are “best suited to tell the story” of the negative economic impacts of Trump’s trade war.

“I’ve already been talking to local companies (about the impacts of tariffs),” Sendzik said. “They are all very concerned.”

He said by talking to business, the public and the press, mayors can boost general awareness of what a trade war will cost in terms of jobs and lost economic activity on both sides of the border.

The environment was not entirely forgotten at Thursday’s meeting.

Sendzik said his American counterparts are deeply concerned about $300 million in planned cuts to Great Lakes restoration funding by Washington, D.C.

Sendzik said the mayors remain united on pushing forward efforts to protect and preserve the region’s freshwater resources.