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A group of communities on Newfoundland’s Northern Peninsula have banded together to tackle shrinking populations, aging workforces and a tightening tax base.
Roddickton-Bide Arm, Englee, Main Brook and Conche are still independent municipalities, but the mayors have joined forces to tackle common issues as a joint council.
Added together, the population of the four communities is less than 2,000.
The joint council serves as a place to collaborate, network, and come up with creative ways to bring prosperity back to a region deflated by a declining population.
Main Brook Mayor Ian Brenton said the whole reason he got involved in municipal politics is a commitment to keeping his town alive, and he says with the help of his neighbours, there’s a chance for that.
“I got tired of seeing the slow decline of our communities — of our entire region,” Brenton said in an interview with CBC Radio’s The Signal.
“I want to do something to help. And that’s really what it boils down to. We all have to work together, or we’re going to face this slow decline and eventually our region is going to die.”
Della DeMoss, mayor of Roddickton-Bide Arm, said the communities are aiming to recruit an economic development officer,”because that will bring another level of expertise to the table.”
But paying for that kind of resource costs more money than any of the communities can afford on their own.
“It’s something that our one town by itself would not be able to afford or to keep up,” said Stephanie Fillier, mayor of Englee. “But if our four towns can get together and do it, it’s success in numbers. More people, more help. We work together.”
People in these communities noticed a decline in the economy since in 2018, when the local Scotiabank closed.
The ripple effects of that closure turned out to be wide.
“Unfortunately, when you see people having to go for the bank and it’s a day trip, they’re going to make the day of it, they’re going to take their business elsewhere,” Fillier said.
“The business is going to go to the restaurant, the food, the shops. [It] is all going to go for another community, not for ours.”
The mayors are focusing on generating interest in bringing new business to the area, such as attracting some of the proposed wind and hydrogen energy projects to the region, or reigniting the fishery or the logging industry.
“Our communities are small enough that if we get that one industry back in our area, we’ll employ our four little communities, “Fillier said.
“And you’ll see an economic boom, because there’s only less than 2,000 people it doesn’t take much to see an increase.”
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