CEO eGlance
September 3, 2020
CEO is Seeking a Volunteer with Finance Experience
Do you have practical expertise in financial matters? Are you looking to expand your business network and share your experience to give back to the industry?

CEO has a vacancy available for our Finance and Audit Committee. If you have financial experience and want to make an impact supporting CEO’s exciting new strategic plan, we would like to hear from you!

FAC meets virtually approximately 6 times per year, 2 hours per meeting.
Click here for the job description or contact Laura Korneluk at lkorneluk@ceo.on.ca for further details.
Construction director and officer liability from COVID-19 workplace exposure
COVID-19 was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization (“WHO”) on March 11, 2020. Many Canadian provinces, including Ontario, declared a state of emergency under the Emergency Management and Civil Protection Act (“EMCPA”) on March 17, 2020. The federal government did not invoke its emergency management legislation. The COVID-19 pandemic has been highly disruptive of socio-economic activity in Canada, and around the world. This has given rise to governance and leadership challenges, and decisions regarding the state of the workplace, and exposure to workers, as well as clients/customers/patients in many businesses, workplaces and organizations across Canada. COVID-19 has also raised a number of questions about emergency preparedness, business continuity, and pandemic planning by governance experts and Boards of Directors (“Board(s)”) of public and private corporations and organizations.

Construction companies have a number of risks associated with COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic has also taken a toll on the provincial and federal economies and the gross domestic product. Canada is now and for the foreseeable future resulted in an economic recession. The pandemic has been, and continues to be a difficult challenge for public health, political and policy decision makers as well as the Boards of organizations. Read article.

CEO is Thrilled to Announce our First Virtual AGM
CEO is thrilled to announce our first ever virtual AGM on September 15th commencing at 9 AM. The AGM will begin with a timely and engaging presentation by our premier sponsor, AXA XL. We will continue on to CEO’s AGM after a short break, concluding with a virtual networking opportunity named a “coffee room chat”. There is no cost to this event, we invite everyone to attend, members, stakeholders, and interested industry observers.
The Canadian Consulting Engineering Awards go virtual!
ACEC Canada will celebrate our industry with a virtual awards celebration, which will be aired on Thursday, October 29th at 7pm ET. 

Stay tuned as details regarding the virtual celebration are announced.
Can the Tories’ new Growth Plan pull Ontario out of its COVID-19 recession?
The Growth Plan is planning for growth. This may sound like government by tautology, but it’s also the most succinct explanation of the government’s latest amendments to Places to Grow, the latest version of the Growth Plan for the Greater Golden Horseshoe. The Growth Plan, a document enshrined in provincial planning law by the Liberals in the mid-2000s, is intended to conserve natural areas and direct jobs and population growth to places with existing infrastructure.

Now, according to Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing Steve Clark, the Growth Plan will help pull the province out of the recession induced by COVID-19 and expand housing supply in the economic core of the province. Read more.
There’s More to Microtransit than Meets the Eye
Public transit is one big compromise. When it works, it’s because individuals make small choices and concessions to achieve a greater collective efficiency. Our willingness to wait for a bus, transfer, and share our time and space with other people, as well as our choice of where and how we live, are all things that impact how well a transit system works. In return, we get a sustainable, efficient way to move around.

In the suburbs, and to a certain extent in smaller towns, these trade-offs become less efficient. Curvy roads, parking lots, spaced-out single-family homes, and expressways all degrade transit’s ability to deliver efficient and cost-effective transit. In these areas, municipalities have turned to demand-responsive transit as a potential alternative to a traditional fixed-route transit service to connect residents with the rest of the city. Read full article.
ICI Investment Reached an All-Time High in Ontario in June
Recent data from Statistics Canada has shown that ICI investment reached an all-time high in Ontario in June. For the year so far (January-June), all three ICI sectors are up compared to the same period in 2019. The same can be said for 13 of Ontario’s 16 metro areas. 
 
BuildForce released a new report recently, updating its construction and maintenance investment forecast. It is expected that non-residential investment will be down by about 3% this year, but rebound in 2021 with an increase of about 6%.
 
Click here to see the full OCS Economic Update bulletin with detailed analysis.
Ontario Supporting Frontline Correctional Officers in Eastern Ontario
Ontario is making strategic investments in public safety and strengthening justice services by modernizing the adult correctional system across Eastern Ontario. New construction and building upgrades will update facilities, address issues of overcrowding, and create new spaces for the delivery of mental health services, inmate programming and staff training.
Details were provided today by Premier Doug Ford, Solicitor General Sylvia Jones, and Steve Clark, MPP for Leeds—Grenville—Thousand Islands and Rideau Lakes.

"Our frontline correctional staff have been absolute champions throughout the pandemic, putting their communities first and keeping all of us safe," said Premier Ford. "By making these important investments in Eastern Ontario, we will upgrade our corrections infrastructure, better protect our correctional officers, and contribute to our economic recovery through these new construction projects." Read full release.
Public input lets GO Expansion proceed full steam ahead
Metrolinx’s GO Expansion program is the largest transit project in the history of Ontario and Canada. But it can’t happen without the input of the communities and industry partners that will build and use the system.

As the population of the Greater Toronto and Hamilton area continues to boom, the case for expanding GO Transit service is clear.

The project known as “GO Expansion” will turn what was originally a commuter train service into an all-day two-way transit network. In the process, it will bring significant benefits to transit users, drivers, and the region as a whole.

The first step in the process of building this unprecedented project, is consulting with the public on the impacts of the project. Read more.
Summer Release of the Road Builder Magazine
Hot off the press! Road Builder magazine is the official voice of the transportation infrastructure industry in Ontario and brought to you by the ORBA. Click here to read the summer 2020 edition.
Does your firm have an interesting article or news that you want the Ontario Engineering world to now about? Please have 'your people' talk to 'our people", email us at mwest@ceo.on.ca.
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