From the very beginning of settlement, Greater Winnipeg has constituted a single economic unit, despite the fragmentation of its geographical are into a number of independent municipalities. Their physical proximity and fundamental community of interest have frequently impelled these separate political jurisdiction carry out jointly major undertakings of general benefit, and to administer jointly matters of common concern. Each joint undertaking or administration has been individually arranged for, however, and handled under the terms of its own specific agreement. Eleven different inter-municipal boards exist today, seven of which administer projects which concern the Greater Winnipeg area as a whole, while the other four deal with matters which affect only a segment of the metropolitan area, and include representatives of only the participating municipalities. The seven boards which administer projects of area-wide concern are the following:
The four boards which administer matters only "regional" concern are the following:
The responsibilities and composition of each board may be briefly described.
During the early years of the twentieth century it became apparent that Winnipeg would be obliged to develop a major water supply; the city's water was drawn at the time from artesian wells, and these were inadequate for the needs of the rapidly growing population. In 1913, the City's ratepayers overwhelmingly approved a large scale project which involved the construction of a reinforced concrete aqueduct 94 miles long, from Shoal Lake (an arm of the Lake of the Woods) to Winnipeg; it was estimated that the new supply would serve the needs of a population of 850,000. The project was completed in 1919, having cost in excess of $13,000,000. The Greater Winnipeg Water District was organized, comprised of the City of Winnipeg and those contiguous portions of adjoining municipalities which were to be served by the new water supply.
An administrative board was established for the District, comprised of five members of the Winnipeg City Council, the Mayor and one other Councillor of St. Boniface, and one each from the other seven members — Transcona, Fort Garry, St. Vital, St. James, West Kildonan, East Kildonan and Tuxedo. The intermediate supervision of the District's General Manager is performed by a three-man Board of Commissioners, which includes Winnipeg City Engineer and City Treasurer.
The District derives revenue from two sources — the sale of water, and a levy on all land included in the District. (1) This levy is designed to cover Sinking Fund and interest charges, the price charged for water sales being set to cover only operating and maintenance charges. (2) The District does not deal with individual consumers, but sells on a "wholesale" basis to municipalities; the latter in turn supply consumers.
Until 1917 all municipalities in the Greater Winnipeg area disposed of their sewage by discharge into the Red or Assiniboine River, giving rise to serious pollution and objectionable odors, particularly during periods of low water flow. In 1935 the Federal and Provincial Governments agreed to give financial assistance (40% and 20% of the cost respectively) toward the construction of a sewage treatment plant and large interceptor sewers which would carry sewage from municipal collection systems to the plant; Winnipeg and the other participating municipalities were to contribute the other 40% of the construction cost. The project (completed in 1937) was intended as an unemployment relief work; and the majority of persons employed were taken from relief roles.
The Sanitary District was originally comprised of only four municipalities -- Winnipeg, St. Boniface, East Kildonan and West Kildonan. By agreement, the municipal portion of the construction cost was divided among them in accordance with the proportion contributed by each to the total volume of sewage handled. St. Vital and Transcona subsequently entered the District, and in 1955, St. James, Fort Garry and Tuxedo also joined. The Administration Board of the Sanitary District is now composed of exactly the same personnel as the Board of the Water District.
This body was created in 1953 to take over and operate the pubic transportation system of the former Winnipeg Electric Company, which served the entire Greater Winnipeg are. (3) The Commission is a five-man body, three of whom are named by the Winnipeg City Council, with the other two selected by the Provincial Government from a list submitted by the suburban municipalities. The Commission paid a seat mile tax of one-thirtieth of a cent per seat mile, the proceeds being divided as follows: 65% to the City of Winnipeg, and the other 35% being distributed among the other municipalities in proportion to their population at the last Federal census, but this tax has been removed by common consent. The Commission, however, pays the usual property taxes on all real property it owns. Any loses suffered by the Commission are borne as follows: 65% by the City of Winnipeg and the remaining 35% by the other municipalities, in proportion to their population.
The Winnipeg Airport (Stevenson Field) originated on land (160 acres) leased from the municipality of St. James in 1929 by the Winnipeg Flying Club. With the aid of financial grants from the City of Winnipeg, the Club maintained the field, and equipped it with a modern flood-lighting system.
A combination of circumstances occurring in 1937 led to a major expansion of the airfield, and a corresponding change in its administration. In that year the Strathcona estate, which included large land holdings in St. James, offered the City of Winnipeg 175 acres adjoining the existing airfield, on condition that the land be used as an airport. In that year as well, the Federal Government commenced to make preparations for its operation of the Trans-Canada Airlines, and began arranging for suitably located and equipped airfields. Intending to use Stevenson Field as a key TCA base, the Department of Transport specified the facilities which would be required if the field were to be used as a major commercial airport.
The Winnipeg Flying Club decided it was unequal to the task of bringing the airfield up to the Department's standards, and accordingly assigned the remainder of ts leases (13 years) to the City of Winnipeg. A three-way agreement between Winnipeg, St. James and the Federal Government provided for the necessary expansion and improvement of the airfield. Winnipeg contributed the land it had received from the Strathcona estate, plus $20,000 worth of labor, and various improvements which it had financed during the tenure of the Winnipeg Flying Club; St. James contributed 800 acres of additional land; the Federal Government contributed approximately $130,000 in cash.
Winnipeg and St. James then vested their rights in the airfield in the St. James-Winnipeg Airport Commission, a seven-man body comprised of two Councillors from Winnipeg, two from St. James, and three citizen members. The Commission managed the airport from 1937 till shortly after the outbreak of World War II. The Federal Department of Transport took over the operation of the field in 1940, and has continued to operate it ever since. The St. James-Winnipeg Airport Commission accordingly is now merely an administrative body, its only responsibilities being to collect rent from companies occupying space at the airport.
The Metropolitan Planning Commission came into being in 1949 by Act of the Manitoba Legislature; it superceded the Metropolitan Planning Committee which had been established five years previously, and had constituted the first metropolitan planning organization in the Greater Winnipeg area. The Commission consists of four representatives of the City of Winnipeg, two representatives of St. Boniface, and one each from Tuxedo, Assiniboia, Charleswood, East Kildonan, East St. Paul, Fort Garry, North Kildonan, Old Kildonan, St. Vital, and since 1956, St. James.
The commission employs a Director and staff whose duties are to advise member municipalities on their individual zoning and planning problems, and to prepare comprehensive plans for the metropolitan area as a whole. Between 1945 and 1948 the Commission published a series of nine reports, which dealt with major aspects of planning for the Greater Winnipeg area as a whole. The Commission is purely an advisory body, however, having no power to compel member municipalities to abide by its recommendations. The Commission is financed by a levy on all member municipalities, based on their respective populations.
This body was created in 1951 by Act of the Provincial Legislature. Its chief responsibility is to deal with any civil or military disaster in Greater Winnipeg. For the purpose of civil defence the metropolitan area is considered to be comprised of the following municipalities:
| Winnipeg | St. James | St. Boniface |
| St. Vital | Tuxedo | East Kildonan |
| North Kildonan | Assiniboia | Old Kildonan |
| Charleswood | Rosser | Fort Garry |
| East St. Paul | Springfield | West St. Paul |
The Board consists of four persons appointed by Winnipeg, two appointed by St. Boniface, and one appointed by each of the other municipalities.
The Young Men's Section of the Winnipeg Board of Trade organized the first attempt to control the local mosquito menace. The work was originally financed from the proceeds of an annual Tag Day conducted in the City of Winnipeg. Shortly after the conclusion of World War II, the Winnipeg City Council agreed to make a grant of $10,000 annually for the work, while the other municipalities of Greater Winnipeg together contributed another $2,000.
In 1954, the provincial statute, the Greater Winnipeg Mosquito Abatement District was created, comprised of the following fifteen municipalities:
| Brooklands | St. James | Charleswood |
| St. Vital | East Kildonan | Transcona |
| East St. Paul | Tuxedo | Fort Garry |
| West Kildonan | North Kildonan | West St. Paul |
| Old Kildonan | Winnipeg | St. Boniface |
The District is administered by a Board which is empowered to make a per capita levy on all member municipalities.
By long-standing agreement the City of St. Boniface maintains the Provencher and Norwood bridges which cross the Red River, linking Winnipeg to St. Boniface, and bills Winnipeg for one-third of the cost. (1) The agreement is administrated by the Winnipeg-St. Boniface Joint Bridge Committee, a permanent body composed of representatives of the councils of the two cities.
This body was created by the Federal Government in 1912 to regulate and control navigation on the Red River within the boundary limits of Winnipeg, St. Boniface, East and West Kildonan. The Commission's responsibilities include the supervision of wharf facilities, and the provision of such shore installations as may be required by vessels in service on the river. Its membership is composed of representatives of the four municipalities.
This body was created by the Provincial Government in 1934, the legislation stipulating that its personnel be the same as that of the Winnipeg and St. Boniface Harbor Commission. The Board's responsibilities include the framing of regulations for the use of the rivers and their banks for non-navigational purposes such as swimming pools, skating rinks, toboggan slides, ski jumps, etc. It is also responsible for taking measures to ensure the safe-crossing of the river by pedestrians and traffic in the winter time.
This body was created by the Provincial Government in 1940 to ensure that no obstructions of any kind hampered the flow of the Red River and Assiniboine River within the boundaries of the Authority. The member municipalities are Winnipeg, St. Boniface, East Kildonan, West Kildonan, St. Vital and Fort Garry.
The eleven inter-municipal boards described above are all permanent bodies in addition there have existed in the past inter-municipal organizations of a temporary character created to deal with a particular matter and dissolved once that matter was disposed of. The most recent, and probably the most important of such organizations was the Greater Winnipeg Flood Protection Committee.
No single permanent authority has ever been established to assume responsibility for the protection of the Greater Winnipeg area against a flood. In 1950, the individual municipalities menaced by the rising rivers carried out their protective measures independently, each being concerned only with its segment of river bank. Co-ordination of individual efforts was only achieved when the Army was called in to take charge, the Army henceforth directing all phases on the basis of a single, co-ordinated plan.
Guided by the experience of 1950, the Provincial Government two years later passed the Dyking Act, designed to ensure an adequate system of dykes along the Red River in the Greater Winnipeg area. The Act applied only to six municipalities with frontage on the Red River — Winnipeg, St. Boniface, Fort Garry, St. Vital, East Kildonan and West Kildonan. Under the Act, a provincial official was designated as Dyking Commissioner, with authority to compel the six municipalities to construct and maintain a system of dykes along their Red River frontage. In addition, the Commissioner was made responsible for ensuring the pumping station operated by the Greater Winnipeg Sanitary District are adequate to their task.
The Dyking Commissioner is not responsible for fighting a flood, however. When a flood threat developed in the spring of 1956, the Provincial Government requested a private engineering consultant to inspect and report on the metropolitan area's flood defences. One of his recommendations was that a central, metropolitan organization be established to direct all flood fighting measures. The Provincial Government thereupon organized the Greater Winnipeg Flood Protection Committee which ultimately included representatives of St. James and Tuxedo (who requested that they be included), representatives of the Federal and Provincial Governments, of the Red Cross, and of the Civil Defence organization. A private engineer was appointed to direct the battles, and under his direction the existing dykes were substantially raised. The Provincial Government paid the cost of maintaining the headquarters organization which was established to direct the work and paid the contractors who carried out the job of building up the dykes, with the understanding, however, that it would recover from each municipality the cost of the work done within its boundaries.
With the passing of the flood threat, the Greater Winnipeg Flood Protection Committee was disbanded, so that once again the metropolitan area lacks a single, flood-fighting authority.
The City of Winnipeg has entered into agreements with five suburban municipalities, (1) whereby any one of the latter may call for the assistance of the Winnipeg Fire Department, when threatened by a dangerous conflagration which its own Fire Department is unable to control. The Winnipeg Fire Department is not obliged to respond to such requests, however, the Chief being authorized to refuse if he feels that the equipment cannot be spared. When the Winnipeg Fire Department does give assistance to a suburban municipality, the latter is billed for the men and equipment sent out, according to an agreed schedule of rates.
The water which is brought to the Greater Winnipeg Water District must be forced through local distribution systems, and pumping stations are accordingly necessary to furnish the required pressure. The City of Winnipeg operates two pumping stations which provide pressure, not only for the City, but also for suburban municipalities, (2) the latter being charged for the service, and for the use of the City's water mains.
The Jefferson trunk sewer was built in 1914 as a joint undertaking of the City of Winnipeg and the municipality of West Kildonan, and it was agreed that future maintenance costs would be equally shared; the two municipalities also share the cost of operating the Flood Control Pumping Station recently installed in connection with this sewer.
The City of Winnipeg permits Transcona to discharge sewage into the Nairn Avenue Sewer in Elmwood, which is part of the City's sewage collection system. While the City does not charge for this privilege, it has demanded that Transcona contribute to the cost of repairs and replacements; in 1953, when a section of the Nairn Avenue sewer required replacement, the City requested Transcona to contribute one-third of the cost, which the latter municipality did.
The City of Winnipeg has agreed to incinerate garbage delivered by the Town of Tuxedo, charging the same rate per ton as is charged to Winnipeg commercial firms. In addition, Winnipeg has negotiated an agreement with West Kildonan whereby the City is permitted to dump its non-combustible garbage in the West Kildonan dump, and in return will incinerate all combustible garbage delivered by West Kildonan to the City incinerator.
Within the Greater Winnipeg area, the Red River is spanned by five traffic bridges, and the Assiniboine by another five. Of these ten bridges, six are wholly within the limits of the City of Winnipeg; the other four however link the City to other municipalities: the Provencher and Norwood bridges across the Red joins the City to St. Vital, while the St. James bridge across the Assiniboine links Winnipeg to St. James.
As has already been indicated, the Winnipeg-St. Boniface Joint Bridge Committee administers the agreement by which maintenance costs o the Provencher and Norwood bridges are shared. No similar body exists in regard to the St. James or Elm Park bridge. By agreement, however, the City of Winnipeg Engineering Department maintains the St. James Bridge, charging 25% of the cost to Tuxedo, and another 25% to St. James. (1) The Elm Park Bridge is regarded as St. Vital's responsibility; however in 1953, when substantial repairs to the structure were required, the City contributed one-third of the cost.
Within the metropolitan area there are three major parks which are freely available to the general public of Greater Winnipeg and visitors from elsewhere. All three are owned and maintained by the City of Winnipeg, although not one of them is actually located within the City limits; Assiniboine Park being located in Tuxedo, (2) Kildonan Park in West Kildonan, and St. Vital Park in St. Vital.
A fourth major park was planned by the Winnipeg Parks Board, but failed to materialize. The City purchased the Wildwood Park property from Fort Garry in 1929, at a price of $12,000, intending to develop the site into a major public park, which would be comparable to Assiniboine Park (Fort Garry had acquired the land through tax sale proceedings). No work was done on the project during the Great Depression, however, or during the war years which followed the Depression. In 1945 the Fort Garry Municipal Council asked the City of Winnipeg for a small portion of the property, to be used for school purposes; the Winnipeg Parks Board then decided that it was no longer desirable to develop the site as a park, and, on its recommendation, the entire property was given back to Fort Garry.
In addition to the co-operation is practised by municipal officials. All police forces in the Greater Winnipeg area work very closely together, particularly in the handling of major crime cases: the Winnipeg Police Department gives generous assistance in various forms to suburban police departments, and freely trains their recruits along with its own, in its Police Training establishment. The Winnipeg Engineering Department and its staff supplies valuable advice and guidance freely to other municipalities, upon request. The public welfare officers of all municipalities frequently exchange information in regard to particular cases and problems. While the City of Winnipeg figures in practically all inter-municipal matters in the metropolitan area, co-operation exists among the smaller municipalities as well, notably in the form of unofficial agreements between adjoining municipalities to render mutual assistance in the event of serious fires.
The original settlers of the Greater Winnipeg area established themselves on farms along the banks of the Red and Assiniboine Rivers; as each new community came to have its own church, it became identified as a parish with a geographical area including the land occupied by members of its church. When the increased density of settlement made local self-government feasible, the first municipal boundaries were based on existing parish divisions.
Winnipeg was incorporated as a City in 1873; the agricultural area surrounding the urban centre was divided by the Provincial Government into three municipalities. The colonization of Western Canada supported by that economy spread into the adjacent municipalities; the City carried out a series of annexations, the last major one in 1906, to absorb adjoining districts which had become populated, or were likely to become populated, by members of the Winnipeg community.
The rapid spread of this Winnipeg community beyond the City's boundaries, gave rise to serious administrative problems in the three adjoining municipalities, each of which straddled a river, and included a substantial rural population. With the advent of better means of local communication, such as the street railway, the two rivers became transformed from highways into barriers; rapidly growing suburban communities became impatient with administration from across a river barrier, and, between 1912 and 1915, each of the three surrounding municipalities was split in two, with the river as the basis of division. In the early post-war years, rural and urban elements found it impossible to live together harmoniously and four of those municipalities which had both urban and rural wards, (1) split in two, each section becoming a separate municipality.
The suburban municipalities experienced severe financial strain during the inter-war years. Shortly after the First World War, it became evident that the pre-war boom would not be resumed: municipalities which had borrowed heavily to finance ambitious public works projects in anticipation of large population increases, found themselves saddled with heavy debt charges and inadequate revenues. The youthful character of their population, comprised to a considerable extent of younger married persons and children of school-age, rendered necessary large expenditures on education, which severely aggravated their financial difficulties.
When four suburban municipalities failed to meet their obligations to found-holders in 1924, the Provincial Government suspended self-government in them, and set up a Board to administer their affairs. During the Great Depression of the 1930's, when practically all suburban municipalities failed to meet their debenture obligations, defaulters were placed under the supervision of another Provincial Board.
The finances of suburban municipalities improved materially during and after the Second World War, due to the collection of tax arrears, the sale of property previously acquired through tax sale proceedings, and the growth of their assessments in consequence of the post-war building boom. Their substantially enlarged revenues enabled suburban municipalities to meet once more than their debentures obligations and consequently to obtain or become eligible to obtain their release from supervision by the Municipal and Public Utility Board.
The division of what has always been a single economic community among a number of separate political jurisdictions has posed serious problems in regard to the provision of public services and the administration of community affairs. As early as 1883 the Provincial Government attempted to establish in each district region of the Province a County Council which would administer matters of inter-municipal concern. The attempt proved to be premature, however: the poor communications of that day rendered administration of a large area difficult i the extreme, while the cost of an additional level of government was a heavy burden on a country so sparsely settled. Under this plan a County Council was established to administer inter-municipal matters in the present Greater Winnipeg area (and adjoining territory besides), but its duration was brief.
Co-operative action became necessary during the twentieth century, however, as suburban populations grew to substantial proportions, and major projects of community-wide benefit had to be undertaken and administered on a joint basis by all the municipalities of the Greater Winnipeg area. A separate administrative body was created for each undertaking, and there exists today in the metropolitan area seven administrative bodies, each of which deals with a project of area-wide concern, and each of which is composed of representatives of the interested municipalities. In addition, there exist four bodies which administer inter-municipal matters affecting only a segment of the metropolitan area, and include representatives only from that segment. The majority of these inter-municipal bodies have been created by the Provincial Government: in the absence of voluntary co-operation, or of a central metropolitan authority which could set up the necessary administrative organization, it has been necessary for the Government to arrange for the establishment of organizations composed of local citizens to administer matters of concern to Greater Winnipeg.
In addition to the co-ordination achieved through the existence of eleven inter-municipal boards, a further degree of co-ordination is achieved in practice through formal agreements between municipalities for the sharing of costs of particular projects and facilities, through informal co-operation among officials of the different municipalities, and through the use by other municipalities, freely or upon payment, of facilities owned and operated by the City of Winnipeg.