Cities need a strong voice when consequential decisions are being made that affect their citizens. Yet they often lack the means to deal with issues that are global in scale but local in impact.
As that advisory committee wraps up its work and reports back to Guterres on Thursday, it will recommend that the UN accord permanent and official status to cities. Given their critical role at the forefront of the planet’s most urgent problems, this is a worthy proposal for several reasons.
Cities thus need a strong voice when consequential decisions are being made that affect their interests and those of their citizens. Yet cities often lack the clout, money and authority to deal with issues that are global in scale but local in impact.
This is particularly true in Canada where, constitutionally speaking, municipalities are “creatures of the province” — and often treated as such.
Montreal is a case in point. The city accounts for roughly a quarter of Quebec’s population, and the wider Montreal region for half, but its needs are often dismissed or ignored by the province.
Part of this is politics. Differing styles, priorities, ideologies and support bases can widen cleavages, as is the case with the Plante and Legault administrations. But at the root is a power and fiscal imbalance between cities and provinces. Sometimes the federal government steps in to help cities directly. However, funding from Ottawa is often filtered through the provincial government.
The streets of Montreal are the scene of a worsening humanitarian catastrophe, with homelessness, drug addiction and mental illness increasingly visible. Police often have to respond to the fallout, even though this is actually a health and social services matter. But provincial health budgets don’t match the scope of the problems, leaving charitable organizations to care for the most vulnerable.
Cities also have to contend with other phenomena beyond their control, like the crunch in housing affordability and availability, as well as increasing numbers of permanent and non-permanent immigrants who tend to flock to urban areas.
A modern country like Canada should consider empowering cities so they have financial and political might to match their economic and social heft. But it seems unlikely the federal government will pick a constitutional fight with the provinces any time soon.
Giving status to cities at the UN probably won’t change much for Montreal (or Toronto or Vancouver or Edmonton, for that matter), but it might be a step, however symbolic, toward according them more respect, recognition and representation.