REGINA – Mayor Chad Bachynski is back in Regina after heading to Ottawa last week for a meeting with the Feds alongside Canada’s other Big-city Mayors.
The focus of the meetings, he posted on Facebook, was to “push for faster federal infrastructure funding so housing and key projects can move ahead,” with concerns expressed from cities that delays could “slow building, increase costs, and undermine national housing and economic goals.”
Bachynski said they met with Prime Minister Mark Carney to “highlight the steps municipalities are already taking to speed up approvals and reduce barriers to construction. Mayors emphasized that current federal programs don’t match the scale or urgency of the work happening on the ground. They pointed to the community stream (formerly the Canada Community‑Building Fund) as a proven tool that delivers predictable, direct funding to cities without long approval processes.”
“Strengthening this stream, developing a long‑term national infrastructure plan, improving supports for vulnerable residents, and modernizing joint funding partnerships were among the key recommendations.”
Public safety was also a major topic, Bachynski posted, including support for Bill C‑14 to address violent repeat offenders and to tackle emerging issues like extortion.
“I appreciate the Prime Minister’s sense of urgency, and seriousness from his team, in advancing this very important work.”
Speaking to reporters in Regina on Monday, Bachynski pointed to infrastructure being the major issue discussed in Ottawa. He called it a “massive challenge for not just new infrastructure to grow and to achieve goals in terms of housing requirements, but also the maintenance of existing infrastructure that has been put in,” noting that in Regina they have infrastructure that is more than 100 years old.
One good part of that conversation in Ottawa, Bachynski said, was that Minister of Infrastructure Gregor Robertson was in the meetings with Prime Minister Carney and “at the conclusion of that conversation there was actually a pretty clear direction from the Prime Minister to the Minister to look at how we can get that funding that was announced from the federal government out to municipalities quickly. And, you know, he literally used a timeline of the next eight weeks.”
“And so, the next day we actually heard back from the Minister’s office and now there’s conversations ongoing between the Minister’s office and the municipalities to see what projects can we move forward on, what projects are, quote, shovel ready that we can move forward on. So, in that context it was a very productive trip and I believe the Prime Minister heard the concerns loud and clear.”
As for what projects Regina might apply for, Bachynski did not provide details but did say the dialogue in Ottawa was “around what can we do.”
“We’ve talked about speed is of the essence right now. Time is of the essence. And so, there may be projects that are already planned to go this year that are technically funded through our budget process. But we might be able to get funding and that unlocks our capacity to be able to build more and catch up faster on our deficit.”
