Metrolinx’s commitment called into question
Labour groups upset after land donation offer was withdrawn
In the wake of Metrolinx’s controversial decision to drop plans to donate land for a community centre in the JaneFinch neighbourhood, community and labour groups are questioning the agency’s commitment to another program designed to secure jobs for local residents on new transit projects.
Metrolinx, the provincial transit agency for the GTHA, helped pioneer the so-called community-benefits agreement program in Ontario, when it announced a deal, in 2016, guaranteeing work for marginalized community members on the $5.3-billion Eglinton Crosstown LRT.
Under the agreement, 10 per cent of the work hours for construction of the project would go to equity-seeking groups such as young people, women and minority workers.
Civil society organizations and charities had hoped the agreement, which had strong support from the Ontario Liberal government of the day, would serve as a template to ensure historically disadvantaged residents would be direct beneficiaries of expensive transit lines being built through their neighbourhoods.
But with the Ontario PC government embarking on a massive $28.5-billion transit expansion in the GTA over the next few years, Metrolinx has yet to make a clear commitment around community benefit agreements in its procurement of new lines, said Rosemarie Powell, executive director of the Toronto Community Benefits Network (TBCN).
“TCBN has yet to receive any information from Metrolinx or the Provincial government as it relates to community benefits agreements for future transit projects,” such as the Ontario Line and Scarborough subway extension, said Powell, whose organization helped craft the Crosstown agreement.
“Our network and community members near these projects have raised this multiple times with Metrolinx, who have yet to confirm any process to ensure that local community benefits are leveraged from the billions of dollars that will be invested over the next decade.”
Powell said she has “strong concerns” benefit agreements won’t be included in the new projects.
Her apprehension follows news Metrolinx won’t donate a 32-metre strip of land near a maintenance and storage facility for the Finch West LRT for use as the site of a new JaneFinch community hub.
While the hub wasn’t a part of any formal community-benefits agreement, local leaders and elected officials say Metrolinx had provided assurances the agency would make the land available in part as compensation for locating the rail garage in the heart of the historically disadvantaged neighbourhood.
After uproar over Metrolinx’s decision, the agency said this week that, while it intends to sell off the property near the storage facility, it will work with the city and community leaders to ensure the hub is built, possibly as part of a private development on the site. The city has estimated the value of the land at between $7 million and $9 million.
In a statement Friday, Metrolinx spokesperson Anne Marie Aikins said the organization is “absolutely taking a community benefits approach” to delivering the four projects that make up Premier Doug Ford’s expansion plan, which, in addition the Ontario Line and Scarborough subway extension, include the Eglinton West LRT and Yonge north extension.
Aikins said “apprenticeship and employment opportunity stipulations (will be) embedded directly into all of the project agreements,” but provided no firm targets for how much work would be allocated to disadvantaged groups.
According to a March 2020 report from Crosslinx, the consortium building the Crosstown LRT, the community benefits agreement for that project has delivered results. By the first quarter of this year, Crosslinx had hired 162 apprentices or journeypersons, and more than 200 professional, administrative and technical staff, from equity-seeking groups. By the end of last year, it had also spent more than $7.5 million supporting local businesses.
Metrolinx has also signed a framework community benefits agreement with Mosaic, the consortium building the Finch West LRT. Powell said the TCBN is monitoring its implementation.
Mike Yorke, president of the Carpenters’ District Council of Ontario, which has worked with TCBN on the Crosstown project, said the agreement for Eglinton has “a good track record.”
He said community benefits agreements not only support local residents, but help replenish the pool of talent for construction trades, which risks drying up as older workers retire. According to Yorke, providing pathways into the sector for youth, women and minorities will be critical if new infrastructure projects are going to help drive the region’s post-COVID economic recovery.
“We need to share that recovery in as wide a way as possible, because it can’t just all be white Anglo guys that are involved in the construction industry,” he said.
He urged Metrolinx to firm up community benefits agreements for new transit projects, “the sooner the better.”
Organizations and charities had hoped the agreement in the Jane-Finch area would serve as a template to ensure historically disadvantaged residents would be direct beneficiaries of expensive transit lines