Chamber of Commerce honours top local businesses at gala
Sudbury's business elite gathered at the Caruso Club on Thursday, dressed to impress, to celebrate the Chamber of Commerce's top honourees — including Best Place to Work, Business Start-up, Company of the Year and Entrepreneur of the Year — recognizing outstanding community contributions.
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CBC
28 minutes ago
- CBC
Cottage owners pull rentals as new licensing rules affect Ontario
Gabriel Leclerc owns two cottages in Calabogie, Ont. with his family. He's taking them off Airbnb after the township introduced short-term rental licensing rules in 2024. He and some other cottage owners say between fees and a complex administrative process, it's no longer worth renting out their vacation properties. "We were frankly not surprised because we knew that a lot of different municipalities and communities were looking at those types of licensing," he says. "But when we started going through it ... the rules and the intrusiveness of the process just became more excessive." Short-term rental licensing rules are becoming a popular way for municipalities to regulate vacation homes in Ontario's cottage country. But the new rules are causing frustrations among property owners, some of whom are pulling homes off the rental market rather than complying. Leclerc says he already pays for insurance, cleaning and property maintenance. He's frustrated by the added cost, and the fact that he's required to provide documents to the township he says they already have. His family is now planning on selling both their properties. "We had plans on renting them for a while, and then as the kids get older, using them for ourselves," he says. "And now ... that extra work and burden of licensing just doesn't make it worth it anymore." How do the rules work? It's up to each municipality in Ontario whether to regulate short-term rentals or require a landlord to obtain a short-term rental (STR) or short-term accommodation (STA) license for properties being rented out for a certain number of days each year. In Greater Madawaska, which includes Calabogie, short-term accommodation licensing costs homeowners $300 annually and covers the city's administration costs. Property owners must provide a map of their septic system and the property layout, among other requirements, if they plan to rent their cottage or home for fewer than 28 consecutive days. Currently, it's the only municipality in Renfrew County with the fee. Other areas of the province have adopted similar policies. Both Prince Edward County and the City of Ottawa have had policies in place since 2021. Municipalities in Haliburton County have had their own policies in place since 2024. According to the Township of Greater Madawaska's website, the bylaws are in place to ensure safety standards are met and "preserve the character" of the community. By registering a rental, a municipality can ensure fire codes, maximum occupancy rules, and noise bylaws are being followed. Other municipalities say the provincial housing crisis has created a need to regulate the number of short-term rentals. But some cottage owners say the policies aren't having the desired effect. 'Not worth renting' Kelly Percival-Green has owned her three-bedroom cottage, just steps away from Calabogie Peaks Resort, for more than four years. Her family bought it with the intention of using it as a winter ski cabin, and in the summer, renting it out occasionally to cover the cost of maintenance. But now, she says, she's been forced to pull it from the rental market because of STA regulations. She and her husband live two hours away. In order to comply with the bylaw, they would need to hire someone on-call who could respond to emergencies within an hour, and who could check the carbon monoxide and smoke detectors after every stay. "It just became so that it was not worth renting anymore," she says. "I'm all about safety, but that was a little bit overkill in my opinion." When she retires in a few years, she says she'll have to re-evaluate ownership. "It was very helpful to be able to rent it and see the bills partially paid. Now we're just paying the bills and we're cringing a little bit because it hurts financially." 'Level playing field' Not everyone is frustrated with the new rules. Meghan James, general manager of the Somewhere Inn in Calabogie, says the boutique motel already pays licensing and business registration fees. She says it's only fair that other STRs pay them too. "Change is always hard. But if you're running your home or your second home or cottage as a business, I think there's fees that are associated with that. So if you're generating revenue from that, you should budget in those licensing fees as well," she says. "I think it puts everybody kind of on a level playing field." She says regulation is important, not only for managing noise to respect neighbours who live in the area year-round, but for safety as well. "These guests … deserve that peace of mind. Knowing that if something happens, everything is taken care of, their water's being tested, they've got smoke alarms," she says. "You should have these things up to par just like any other accommodator would have to." But STR licenses haven't been applied evenly, according to J.T. Lowes, the owner of All Season Cottage Rentals in Haliburton County, which manages privately owned properties and helps to rent them out. Differences in application between municipalities mean some owners are paying more than others, and need to follow different rules, he says. There is no uniform definition of an STR and different municipalities charge licensing fees at varying rates. The cost of a short-term rental license in Minden Hills is about $500, compared to a host permit in Ottawa, which costs about $116 every two years. "It's predominantly impacting owners that only rent a handful of weeks each year," he says. "Investment owners that you see on Airbnb that are trying to maximize their rentals and income — this is just another ... expense to running a business — at the end of the day, it's not impacting them as much. "It's leading to a big black market of rentals," he says. "They're they're still renting, but they're doing it quietly underground, you know, friends and family ... to avoid having to license." The regulations are hurting Ontario tourism, he believes. Since the municipalities in Haliburton County enacted STR bylaws in October 2024, he says he's lost half his business. He's had to lay off one full-time employee, and estimates at least 20 cleaning jobs have been lost. "Really we're not against rentals rental licensing, there is a need for that," he says. "But the devil's in the details." Minden Hills Councillor Pam Sayne says because the rules are so new, it will take time to work out the kinks. Her township has its own policy, and she says municipalities in Haliburton County are working to find a balance between supporting jobs in tourism and managing the number of short-term rentals taking up valuable housing space. "The short-term rentals are a big industry here providing lots of jobs for cleaning," she says. "But we also need places for those people to live." Provincial oversight Sayne says fine-tuning the bylaw would be faster with support from the province. "I think that for every municipality to have to go through this process with all of our staff time and all of our legal time going into providing these short-term rental agreements and and how to operate this — that's something that could have been incorporated and done more at the provincial level," she says. CBC reached out to the ministry of tourism but did not hear back. Leclerc in Calabogie doesn't mind the regulations, but would like them simplified. "It just became this overbearing overreach that just doesn't make it worth it to continue," he says. Greater Madawaska did not respond to requests for comment. But Sayne says what the township does next will inform how similar policies are implemented across the province.
CBC
28 minutes ago
- CBC
Canada is running out of runway for its F-35 review
Social Sharing There was an interesting — albeit brief — recent eruption of clarity in the ongoing saga of whether Canada intends to proceed with the full order of American-made F-35 fighters. It was courtesy of the U.S. ambassador to Canada, Pete Hoekstra, who perhaps spoke the quiet part out loud last week in an interview with Canadian independent podcaster Jasmin Laine. Hoekstra, a no-nonsense Republican from Michigan, was asked about the Liberal government's review of the $27.7-billion purchase of stealth fighters and the possibility that after delivery of the first tranche of jets, Canada could decide to fill the rest of its order with another type of aircraft. "You can't afford two fighters, two different fighter jet programs," said Hoekstra. "Canada should just decide what they want. Do they want F-35s? Do they want some other product? That's your decision to make, but you can't afford both of them." But then, he added that the ongoing review is "an irritant that makes it harder to get to a [trade] agreement." It's not much of a stretch to suggest that few Canadian tears would be shed over the notion that the Trump administration is irritated by the uncertainty. But the fact he's said so publicly is significant and it represents an interesting escalation from earlier remarks that suggested not buying the F-35s would endanger NORAD, the binational defence pact with the United States. What's even more potentially entertaining is the lengths to which everyone on the Canadian side has twisted themselves into pretzels to downplay the notion that the fighter jet program is being used as a significant piece of leverage in negotiations with Washington. Speaking on CBC Radio's The House last weekend, the country's top military commander, Gen. Jennie Carignan portrayed the review as a prudent, business-as-usual, due diligence exercise. "With the new government coming into place, it's perfectly normal," Carignan said. "There's a request to ensure that our processes are still valid, that we are getting what we need." With any other major defence purchase, that might be a reasonable argument. But the F-35 has been — over 15 years of political drama — the subject of enormous study. Parliamentary watchdogs, an independent panel and a legion of experts have lined up to analyze, slice, dice and dissect the plan. One wonders what more can be said that couldn't be found in a ministerial transition briefing book. The review has been going on since the early spring and with so much information already at their fingertips, the question of what the political impact might be only gets larger as time goes on. Retired vice-admiral Mark Norman, also speaking on The House last weekend, said there's obvious "trepidation" and consideration of "what kind of blowback reaction" there could be in Washington should Canada opt to shop elsewhere. Others argue that the tantrums of Trump and the irritation of his administration shouldn't dictate Canadian defence policy. "I think the Trump administration will decide if they wish to punish us or not based on whatever current thought of the moment is in the heads of the president and his key advisers," said Wendy Gilmour, a Canadian former assistant secretary general for defence investment at NATO. "I think Canada needs to make the best decisions it can for our own interests." And that's what makes the specifics of what, precisely, the Department of National Defence has been told to review so crucial. When you ask for the terms of reference or even the obstacles and costs of running two fleets of fighters, more often than not, you get boilerplate responses about spending wisely and the scope of the enormous investment. "The nature of aerial combat, the nature of warfare, the nature of our responsibilities, the scale of our investment — all of those elements have changed over the course of recent years," Prime Minister Mark Carney said a couple of weeks ago, while announcing a military pay increase. "We also need the appropriate air capabilities for the Arctic, for the runways in the Arctic, for the threats that we're faced in the Arctic … is the F-35 best suited for that?" The security risks for Canada The contract to buy the F-35 was announced in January 2023 and one would hope the debate about Arctic operations would have been long settled before that. It's important considering, as the Ottawa Citizen reported last month, construction of new hangar and infrastructure facilities to house the F-35s is about to get underway at the military's principal fighter bases in Cold Lake, Alta., and Bagotville, Que. Interestingly, the one non-political aspect of the F-35 deal that would provide an important, logical rationale for a review is the one nobody wants to discuss publicly: the potential national security risks to Canada. Buying the F-35 makes the Canadian air force dependent on the U.S. for software and repair, which has the potential to create delays in deployment and affect operational readiness. It was an issue that raised its head briefly after U.S. President Donald Trump returned to office last winter and suggested allies could end up with less capable versions of the aircraft. It could also be argued that the escalating costs (with the purchase estimate for 88 aircraft, including weapons and training, going from $19 billion to $27 billion), would justify an urgent review. Defence Minister David McGuinty, however, suggested last week the government would take its "lead from the experts that performed the review, both in the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces." WATCH | Cost of F-35 program balloons: F-35 costs skyrocketing, not enough pilots to fly them: AG report 2 months ago A new Auditor General's report finds the cost of buying U.S.-made F-35 stealth fighter jets has ballooned almost 50 per cent from an estimated $19 billion to $27.7 billion — and that's without the additional cost of weapons and infrastructure. The program is also facing a shortage of trained pilots. As if there was any doubt about where the military stands, there was a pretty clear indication with a recent report by Reuters, based upon sources, which said the air force was recommending sticking with the F-35. Carney was clear that no decision had been made and that it would be sometime in the late summer or early fall before the review would be considered. Playing politics with defence purchases is nothing new in Canada, but Norman argues that given the state of the world, the military can't afford games and uncertainty, especially with the current CF-18s rapidly approaching the end of their useful life. "What we need to be careful of is that we don't inadvertently — or perhaps for superficial political reasons — make what I would characterize as dumb decision," Norman said.
CBC
28 minutes ago
- CBC
Students caught in limbo as LaSalle College scrambles to comply with Quebec quotas
Less than a month before the start of classes, dozens of students attending LaSalle College in Montreal were abruptly shifted from full-time to part-time status as the school scrambles to comply with Quebec's language reform. Alex Abraham, 33, who was about to enter the second and final year of his network management program, says the last-minute change is a devastating blow to his plans of building a career in Quebec. "I was shocked," he said of his reaction to last week's email notifying him of the change. "We all came here with lots of expectations and dreams." Part-time students are not eligible for Canada's post-graduation work permit and cannot work off-campus while they're studying unless they meet certain conditions. The new status would mean Abraham would effectively have to leave the factory job that he was counting on to stay afloat. "How can I meet my expenses?" he said. "So suddenly if they change my enrolment into part time, that's obviously going to affect me very badly so, I'm concerned." In a statement, the private college says the measure affects about 90 students and concerns only the fall semester. Spokesperson Caroline Gervais writes the measures "are specifically to ensure that we remain fully compliant for Fall 2025 with the requirements of the Charte de la langue française and the government-imposed quotas on English-language AEC programs," which are a type of vocational post-secondary diploma. In the email sent to Abraham last week and reviewed by CBC, the college said it had the capacity and resources to accommodate him as a full-time student, but couldn't due to the government cap. "We understand that such changes can be stressful and disruptive — especially for those whose graduation timelines, financial aid, or immigration status may be affected," a statement sent by Gervais over the weekend reads. During the 2024-25 academic year, the number of students enrolled in the college's English-language programs exceeded the quota by 1,066, resulting in a $21,113,864 fine by the Quebec government. That amount was in addition to the $8.7 million fine it had already accrued the year earlier for the same infraction, bringing its total debt to the government to nearly $30 million. The college is challenging the fines in a civil suit in Quebec's Superior Court. According to that lawsuit, 70 per cent of students enrolled in English-language AEC programs are international students, like Abraham. He learned about the college through an agency while living in India. "The standard of living is good here in Canada compared to India," he said. "We are all putting the effort to learn the [French] language and also we are trying to build a career here. We like the Quebec culture, that's why we are here." 'I am not the reason for the fine' Abraham says he was aware of the college's sizable fine, but thought the school would be able to find a solution. That it would unilaterally change his course load was not something he saw coming. Gervais explains that factors beyond the school's control, such as student failures and altered academic pathways, affect the availability of certain classes in September. She says those factors played a role in the students' status changes. "This does not mean that LaSalle College exceeded its overall AEC quota. Instead, it reflects the constraints of the respective capacity of AEC and DEC programs within those quotas, combined with scheduling realities," says Gervais. A spokesperson for the office of Higher Education Minister Pascale Déry said it wouldn't comment so as to not harm the judicial process. LaSalle College says that many of the students affected had either failed multiple classes or deviated from their original pathway in some way, but neither of those two scenarios apply to Abraham. The college let him know over email that in his case, the change is not due to his academic performance. That he ended up among the group of affected students feels random, he says. The college set up a meeting for the students with Immigration Canada and a college representative Tuesday afternoon and Abraham says he hopes it will provide him with some answers. "I have the right to know the reason," he said, adding that he'll be dissatisfied if it's merely the college's way of avoiding more fines. "I am not the reason for the fine. They did the wrong thing, they violated the rule," he said.
