Big city Canadian mayors call for more federal funding to address housing, infrastructure needs

Mayors from all across Canada are calling on the federal government to do more to strengthen downtowns. CTV News Edmonton's Evan Kenny has the story.

Canada’s big-city mayors are asking the federal government to spend more and do more to help them deal with homelessness.

The 19 members of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities’ big city mayors’ caucus, who are meeting this week in Edmonton, are collectively asking Ottawa to spend $3.5 billion per year to help reduce chronic homelessness in their cities by 50 per cent in four years.

They’re also calling on the governing Liberals to restore funding to a federal transit fund to the tune of $30 billion over the next decade and to double another fund for building and maintaining infrastructure.

“These initiatives are not just about serving the local needs of our cities, they contribute to a stronger Canada, whether it’s by shaping trade routes, enabling businesses and their workforces to thrive, or developing infrastructure that makes it possible for people to build homes,” Josh Morgan, the chairman of the caucus and mayor of London, Ont., told media on Thursday at downtown’s JW Marriott hotel.

And he says the homelessness crisis is most apparent in all big cities’ downtowns, the place “where businesses take root, where talent is drawn (and) where investment lands first” that has become “a refuge for the most vulnerable, for those struggling with mental health and addictions, encampments can be seen on many corners, and in the winter, things get worse.”

“When downtowns are strong, Canada follows, attracting new industries, new investments, new partners (and) new opportunities,” Morgan said.

Edmonton is the host city of the federation’s annual conference and trade show, which started Thursday at the Convention Centre and runs through Sunday.

Edmonton Mayor Andrew Knack said his and his colleagues’ pleas for more funding from Ottawa “is not uploading” responsibilities onto the feds, it’s asking them to take the lead on better addressing the issues they’ve identified.

“It’s just asking for the federal government to do what they used to do long ago: to work in partnership with provincial governments, to work in partnership with municipalities, (and) to take leadership on an issue that needs a coordinated response between all three orders of government,” Knack said.

The federal office of the minister of housing and infrastructure said the Canadian government “will continue to work in close collaboration with provinces and territories on a regular basis to address the housing crisis in Canada.”

“Federal, provincial and territorial ministers responsible for housing are committed to renewing intergovernmental partnerships to ensure continued support for affordable housing, as noted at the Federal-Provincial-Territorial Forum on Housing in September 2025,” Mohammad Hussain, a spokesperson for the Office of the Minister of Housing and Infrastructure, said in a statement.

The office of Alberta’s minister of municipal affairs said in a statement that, under the Provincial Priorities Act it passed two years ago, it must review any federal funding for municipalities that fall under provincial jurisdiction “to ensure they align with Alberta’s priorities and protect provincial authority.”

“The Act doesn’t block federal funding; it ensures funding from the federal government respects provincial jurisdiction while maintaining federal collaboration,” Jack Alaire, the press secretary for the minister, said in a statement to CTV News Edmonton.

With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Evan Kenny