Advocacy Update – Bill 218 and Ontario Fall 2020 Budget

Bill 218: Supporting Ontario's Recovery and Municipal Elections Act, 2020

On Monday, November 9, Bill 218 went through at the Standing Committee on Justice Policy. In consideration of Schedule 2 of the Bill (that amends the Municipal Elections Act, 1996), as expected, much of the attention was on clauses that remove municipal authority to choose to use Ranked Ballot Voting (RBV).

While there were at least three proposed amendments brought forward by Opposition members to the Rank Ballot sections of the Bill, they were all defeated. While AMCTO did not take a position on these specific changes, we did raise our concerns over the proposed changes to move nomination day.

With regard to nomination day, AMCTO expressed to the Government that changing the date to the “second Friday in September from the fourth Friday in July," would have significant impacts on our members’ ability to deliver effective election services. We have advocated this position numerous times – first by second by making a submission to the Standing Committee, and finally by having ongoing conversations with ministry staff.

In recognition of these proposed impacts to our members, the Government introduced an amendment at Standing Committee which was carried: nomination day is now proposed to move to the 3rd Friday in August. While AMCTO maintains that the new proposed nomination date still puts undue pressure on election administrators, this amendment does provide a few more weeks time to deliver election services. Given the time allocation motion currently applied to the Bill, it is expected that the Bill will move to Legislature for Third Reading on November 16.

As we all look towards the 2022 municipal election cycle, based on what we're hearing from members, we expect that clerks’ departments may incur additional costs in order to carry out election activities, particularly those related to using alternative voting methods (telephone, internet,