April 27, 2020

Milton, Burlington, Halton Hills, and Oakville form Halton Mayors Recovery Coordination Group

The Mayors of Halton’s four municipalities of Burlington, Halton Hills, Milton and Oakville have joined together to form the Halton Mayors Recovery Coordination Group. 

Over the coming weeks, they will coordinate and work together to prepare for a successful transition to a post-COVID19 emergency, reopening and recovery, and living with the changes it has brought. 

As the response to the COVID-19 pandemic continues, all four communities are maintaining the delivery of critical and essential services while also planning for recovery. While this does not mean that emergency measures put in place by the province, the region or individual cities and towns to slow the spread of COVID-19 are expected to be lifted in the near-term, it is prudent to begin to look ahead so that our plans can be ready to execute when the time comes. 

The final phases of the pandemic response include the potential reopening of municipal facilities and the implementation of recovery efforts over the balance of the year. The dates of when recovery might begin are contingent on the continued slowing of the spread of the virus and the province lifting its emergency orders and restrictions, including those related to businesses and physical distancing. 

“Plans will be set in motion to move towards the recovery plan. Working together as a Region is important to ensure people can get back to work, businesses can reopen & life returning to where it should be. As always, public health is vitally important! ” said Halton Region Councillor Mike Cluett

All four Mayors have made the commitment to keep each other apprised of decisions being considered in each respective municipality, share best practices, and coordinate when it comes to the recovery planning. They will also ensure a continued close linkage with Halton Region, with the chair Gary Carr as an invited guest to our group when his schedule permits.

Earlier today, Premier Ford and his government announced a road map to getting the Ontario economy back as we get through the COVID19 situation.

While it seems frustrating to many that the plan for reopening the province and in fact the Halton Region having so many broad strokes and generalitites, its important to ensure a phased in approached based on the numbers and direction we get from all the Medical Officers of Health (federal, provincial & local) There isn’t anyone who doesn’t want our country and our region back to work. We all want our restaurants to re-open – getting people back to work – our children back to school and for life to return to what many of us refer to as “normal”

If we go back too quickly and raise the restrictions currently in place – those restrictions that have got us to where we are today – we could easily find ourselves back to stage one. The starting point from over 7 weeks ago is not where we want to be, and if we do make hasty decisions, we could easily find ourselves back there again. The hard work and dedication of Milton and Halton residents, our business owners, our teachers, our volunteers and the heroes on the front line – the police, the fire fighters, the EMS, the doctors, the nurses, the custodians in our hospitals – will be all for nothing. I for one do NOT want to go back to day one. It must be done responsibly and carefully.

It continues to be imperative that we all follow the instructions our Medical Officer of Health gave us from the beginning:

• stay home as much as possible, only going out for essentials;
• if you must go out in public, practice physical distancing (social distancing) by maintaining a 2M (6 foot) distance from others;
• stay home if you are ill;
• cover coughs and sneezes with a tissue or sleeve;
• wash hands frequently with soap and water or with alcohol-based hand rub;
• clean and disinfect frequently touched objects and surfaces;
• avoid all non-essential travel until further notice; and
• if you have travelled, it is now mandatory to self-isolate for 14 days from when you return home.

As the weather begins to improve, it will be very tempting to say things like – things are better I can do this or that. It may be tempting to say to yourself, I want to be part of this event over here where there are more people. I urge you to not do this. We still hear stories of people jumping into other cars to take part in events . God Bless you for the intent of wanting to support the healthcare workers, but while these gestures are appreciated, we hear from many front line workers, its BEST to just stay home.

Make your noise every night and ring your bells and cheer from your driveways, but lets do what we need to do and stop this COVID19 virus from spreading any more than it is. Its putting everyone at risk, especially our seniors and vulnerable citizens and the more this is done, the longer it will take to get back to the “normal” we all want so desperately.

As our Halton group works together with the province of Ontario and Government of Canada on a plan to get people back to work, rebooting our economy and more importantly allowing us to show everyone how great our community really is, you will be updated. As it gets closer to the starting point, there will be a plan in place. Lets keep doing what we’re doing, be safe and I’ll be the first one in line to start Milton’s group hug when we can.