EDITORIAL: Which Lane Should Municipalities Stay In?

Over the past several weeks, one phrase has echoed through media soundbites, political speeches, and even local campaign trails: “Municipalities need to stay in their lane.”

It’s a message that’s coming from all directions. We’ve heard it from provincial ministers, from high-profile think tanks, and even from some candidates running for municipal office. Full disclosure: I echoed the sentiment myself not too long ago in a column about the push for a zero percent tax increase.

But here’s the thing: I’ve been thinking about that article — and the broader idea of municipalities sticking to their designated “lanes” — a lot over the past month. And the more I reflect on it, the more I realize that this perspective, while neat in theory, doesn’t hold up in the messy, pothole-ridden reality of modern governance.

Let’s be honest. Municipalities are no longer traveling down a quiet two-lane road of traditional responsibilities. They’ve been thrust onto a jam-packed highway where local governments are forced to navigate around provincial inaction, federal delays, and a general political traffic jam. The romantic idea that municipalities should only worry about sidewalks, snowplows, and sewage pipes is a relic of a time that simply doesn’t exist anymore.

There’s a quote I keep coming back to — one I’ve borrowed from Scott Pearce, former president of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM): “Municipalities are the government of proximity.” And he’s absolutely right.

Municipal governments are where the rubber hits the road — literally and figuratively. They are the ones fixing your potholes, managing your water systems, clearing your snow, and maintaining your parks. They’re the first line of government many of us deal with, and they’re the ones we notice when something breaks down. If your municipality shut its doors tomorrow, most residents would feel the impact within hours — if not minutes.

But this proximity cuts both ways.

When things go wrong — even when those things are well outside municipal jurisdiction — who gets the blame? You guessed it: the mayor, the councillors, the local government.

Is your emergency room closed due to a province-wide shortage of doctors? Blame the mayor. Is homelessness on the rise in your neighbourhood? Blame city council. Are your property taxes going up because of increases in education levies? Again, blame local government. It’s easy — and often politically convenient — to pin systemic, higher-level issues on the people who are closest to the voters.

Gerald Aalbers, Mayor of Lloydminster — a city straddling the Alberta-Saskatchewan border — summed it up best in a recent social media post: “What do we do with the unhoused if the other levels of government don’t accept their responsibilities?”

It’s a sobering and honest question. What are municipalities supposed to do when the provincial or federal governments drop the ball?

Too often, local governments are left holding the bag on issues they were never structurally or financially designed to manage. Social services, addiction supports, housing strategies, even healthcare partnerships — these are all outside the traditional “lane” of municipal governance, yet municipalities are being forced to step in because no one else will.

And once they do, once they dare to veer into these overgrown shoulders and neglected intersections, they’re met with a barrage of criticism for “not staying in their lane.”

But what choice do they have?

The provinces are stalling in the parking lot. The federal government is stuck in neutral. Someone has to get out and push.

The lane metaphor is popular in political discourse because it simplifies the complex world of governance. Municipalities maintain roads and collect garbage. Provinces run healthcare and education. The federal government handles defence, immigration, and the economy. Nice, clean divisions.

But that’s not how the world works anymore.

We live in a time of intergovernmental dependency. Public health crises, affordable housing shortages, climate change, and mental health epidemics are not bound neatly by jurisdictional fences. These are shared challenges that demand shared solutions.

And yet, the burden consistently falls to the lowest level of government — the one with the fewest tools, the least constitutional authority, and the most direct accountability to voters.

Municipalities are at a crossroads. Their work no longer fits neatly into traditional boxes like infrastructure, recreation, and bylaw enforcement. Their lane has become a multi-lane highway, complete with detours, overpasses, and increasingly blurred lines between who does what.

And guess what? The traffic is getting worse.

Let’s be clear: no mayor or councillor wants to take on the provincial government’s job. They’re not clamouring to solve the healthcare staffing crisis or build addiction recovery programs from scratch. They’re doing it because they have to. Because the people they serve demand action, not excuses.

If the province won’t step up to address a shortage of family doctors, then yes — the city may have to contribute to a local recruitment effort.

If federal housing dollars are delayed or inadequate, then yes — municipalities may have to start building supportive housing units themselves, even if that stretches their budget to the breaking point.

These actions aren’t taken lightly, nor are they cheap. But when your residents are suffering, and the higher levels of government are MIA, what are you supposed to do? Just ignore the problem and hope someone else steps in?

That’s not leadership. That’s abandonment.

Let’s imagine for a moment that municipalities really did stay in their lane. That they stopped funding social programs, that they halted partnerships on health initiatives, that they refused to deal with housing, mental health, or addiction services.

What would happen? The answer is simple: chaos.

The issues wouldn’t disappear. They would escalate. Encampments would grow. Emergency rooms would become more overcrowded. Social disorder would increase. And residents — rightfully frustrated — would turn to their local leaders and ask: “Why aren’t you doing something?”

Because again, proximity. People don't write letters to federal ministers when their local park is unsafe or their neighbour is unhoused. They call their councillor. They show up at city hall. They demand answers. And if those answers don’t come, they vote accordingly.

So municipalities step in. They expand their lane — not because they want to, but because no one else is driving.

Here’s a message for everyone demanding municipalities “stay in their lane”: start holding the other levels of government accountable.

If you don’t want your city dealing with homelessness, then pressure your province to increase supportive housing and mental health care.

If you’re frustrated that local governments are partnering on healthcare initiatives, then demand that your MLA, MPP, MHA, or MP fix the doctor shortage.

If you want municipalities to focus exclusively on infrastructure, roads, sewers, and recreation then insist that the senior levels of government do their part so the local government can focus on those things.

But if you stay silent while higher levels of government stall, deflect, and underfund essential services, then you have no right to complain when municipalities are forced to pick up the slack.

Because someone has to.

There’s a hard truth about municipal government: it doesn’t have anyone to pass the buck to. When councillors face a difficult issue — whether it’s housing, crime, public health, or anything else — they can’t kick the can upstairs. They either deal with it or deal with the fallout.

Mayors, reeves, wardens, councillors — they’re on the front lines. And when they don’t act, it’s their communities that suffer. There’s no buffer, no protective layer of bureaucracy. Just voters and their local representatives, face to face.

So let’s stop pretending that municipalities are choosing to go rogue. Let’s stop acting like they’re overreaching when in reality, they’re reaching out — because no one else will.

And let’s start demanding better from the governments that actually do have the constitutional authority, the revenue tools, and the scale to make a real difference.

Because if they don’t start driving in their own lanes, then we’re going to keep crashing into the same problems, over and over again — with municipalities forced to pick up the pieces.

Whether you live in a village of 500 people or a city of half a million, the local government you elect isn’t just patching potholes anymore. They’re being asked to solve housing crises, deliver public safety, provide social supports, and even fill gaps in healthcare.

They’re not driving a quiet country road — they’re navigating a complex, chaotic, multi-lane highway with no clear rules and little cooperation.

So before you criticize your local council for veering outside their lane, ask yourself: Who else was going to step in?

And if the answer is no one, then maybe they were right to change lanes.