A new survey conducted by Probe Research for the Association of Manitoba Municipalities (AMM) and the Association of Manitoba Bilingual Municipalities (AMBM) shows overwhelming support for federal funding to help communities build and upgrade water and wastewater infrastructure.
Eighty-three per cent of Manitobans strongly agree or somewhat agree that Ottawa must step in to support projects such as treatment plants, sewer pipes, and sewage lagoons.
AMM president Kathy Valentino says the findings confirm what municipalities have been saying for years.
“We have a huge deficit in the province of Manitoba for municipalities with water and wastewater projects that are shovel-ready,” says Valentino. “Through the Manitoba Water Services Board, there are actually 346 funding requests. So we have been advocating and the survey that we had done by Probe Research clearly shows that 83 per cent of Manitobans strongly agree that we need Ottawa or the federal government to help with these municipalities and fund some water and wastewater projects. And that includes treatment plants, sewer pipes, sewage lagoons.”
Linking infrastructure to housing
The federal government has announced its Build Canada Home initiative, which aims to create 500,000 new homes. Valentino says housing plans cannot succeed unless municipalities receive support for basic infrastructure.
“At AMM, we’ve been lobbying and we totally support the federal government’s Build Canada Home initiative,” she notes. “But in order to build the 500,000 homes, in order to build our economy, we have to have water and wastewater infrastructure funding plan in place. Because we can’t build homes, we can’t build businesses if municipalities don’t have the infrastructure in the ground for water and wastewater.”
She adds that municipalities need a dedicated funding stream they can access directly to move projects forward.
One size does not fit all
The survey also found that seven in ten Manitobans believe federal housing and infrastructure policies must be flexible enough to meet the needs of different-sized communities.
When more homes and living spaces are planned to be developed, it should be taken for granted that water infrastructure must also be included in such plans.
“Exactly true,” Valentino says. “That’s why we need to ensure that we have a strong voice at the table because they have to understand or we want there to be awareness that to tackle this housing crisis, they have to invest in vital water and wastewater infrastructure and that it can’t be a one-size-fits-all approach.”
AMBM president Yvan Normandeau echoed that message, noting that small, rural, and bilingual municipalities face different infrastructure challenges than large urban centres.
Building pressure in Ottawa
The survey of 1,000 Manitobans was conducted between July 24 and August 11. Valentino says its release was timed to coincide with Parliament’s return to session.
“No, just that we did the survey in order to get data, in order to strengthen our case so that we can hope that the federal government will pay attention to this,” she adds. “We wanted our news releases to go out this week to go hand in hand with Parliament going back into session next week in Ottawa.”
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