At its first meeting since June 29, Peterborough city council has endorsed a report from city staff providing an update on the city’s economic development activities for the first half of 2026, with the report drawing both praise and scrutiny from councillors.
Meeting as general committee on Tuesday evening (August 4), councillors considered the 11-page report from Blair Nelson, the city’s commissioner of infrastructure, planning and growth management.
The report is the first public update to council on the city’s economic development activities since the City of Peterborough and Peterborough County each assumed responsibility for economic development and tourism in January 2025, after ending their multi-year tri-party agreement with Peterborough & the Kawarthas Economic Development (PKED), a non-profit organization that had been providing economic development and tourism services on behalf of the city and county for 25 years.
City builds its economic development framework
The report covers the city’s economic development activities from January to June 2026, which the report describes as “a period of deliberate momentum” for economic development in the city, with a “key milestone” being full staffing of the city’s economic development team, including hiring a manager of economic development in January and two economic development officers in June.
According to the report, the team has also been working across city departments “to establish an economic development lens throughout the organization,” with economic development “intended to function as a connective thread across the organization, bringing an investment and growth perspective to decisions across municipal operations.”
The city has secured around $92,000 in provincial and federal funding to support its first city-led economic development strategic plan and its foreign direct investment work. The strategic plan, which will guide investment attraction, business support, and sector development through 2031, is being prepared by an external consultant following baseline research and consultations with businesses, residents, Indigenous partners, institutions, community organizations, council, and city staff. It is expected to be presented to council later in 2026.
The report says that business retention and expansion is a “foundational priority” for economic development, with staff engaging with businesses in the manufacturing, aerospace, defence, nuclear, hospitality, retail, and service sectors. This included assisting manufacturers considering expansions, connecting major employers with government funding and workforce programs, supporting early discussions about new hospitality development, and helping retail and service businesses with permitting, signage, patio licensing, and funding opportunities. A formal business retention and expansion program is expected to launch during the second half of the year.
The city also launched the Peterborough Aerospace & Defence Cluster in June, bringing together 60 businesses, post-secondary institutions, and public-sector funding partners to address workforce development, supply-chain connections, and industry promotion. Other sector development activities included attending the CANSEC defence trade show in Ottawa in May, continuing work with nuclear-sector organizations (including exploring opportunities related to the medical-isotope supply chain), and supporting an increasing number of inquiries from film productions considering Peterborough as a location. The city is developing a standardized film permitting process intended to make it easier for productions to film locally.
According to the report, the city has active but confidential investment files involving industrial, commercial, hospitality, and film projects. Its foreign investment efforts included trade missions to Brazil in March and Japan and South Korea with Global Affairs Canada in June, with staff meeting companies, investment agencies, trade commissioners, and aerospace and advanced manufacturing organizations. However, the report cautions that foreign investment work typically unfolds over several years and characterizes the 2025 and 2026 activity as relationship-building that could produce investments in subsequent years.
The report frames physician recruitment as part of economic development, in that it attracts highly skilled professionals to Peterborough, supporting the growth of local medical practices and creating skilled employment opportunities within the healthcare sector. Three newly recruited doctors assumed patients from five retiring physicians, preserving care for more than 6,500 people, while the city supported a physician’s family succession plan for another 1,100 patients. The report states that new and expanded practices could create capacity for up to 10,000 patients. Following a city-supported exemption from provincial eligibility requirements, three Practice Ready Ontario physicians were also offered local positions that could provide care for more than 3,500 additional patients.
The report identifies the shortage of development-ready industrial land and access to skilled workers as continuing obstacles to growth. Priorities for the second half of 2026 include completing the economic development strategic plan, launching formal business retention and industrial concierge programs, mapping the aerospace and defence supply chain, following up on international investment leads, advancing the remediation of strategic industrial properties, and developing the film permitting framework.
Councillor Riel questions staffing and reporting gap
Commenting on the report at Tuesday’s general committee meeting, councillor Keith Riel asked commissioner Nelson how the four staff on the city’s economic development team — director Darryl Julott hired in January 2025 and the three staff hired in 2026 — would be able to carry out the economic development and tourism work previously conducted by the 16 staff who worked for PKED.
Nelson noted that the tourism component is being carried out by the city’s corporate services and community services divisions, and that the city’s existing staff levels are sufficient to carry out economic development work at present.
“As the demand and the requirements grow, then obviously there could be the possibility of additional staff being requested, but at this point obviously that whole system is still growing,” Nelson said. “We’re working towards ensuring that the staff that we have hired remain efficient and continue to do the work that they’re assigned to do, and build out that framework as we grow.”
Calling city council the “board of directors” for economic development, councillor Riel raised a concern about a lack of reporting to council to date.
“This is the first time since we hired a director, outside of a couple of emails, that we’ve had a report on economic development,” Riel said. “We held the former (PKED) executive director’s feet to the fire to come here every quarter and make a report on economic development.”
While councillor Joy Lachica recognized the work of city staff, Julott in particular, she said it would have been “nice to see” a report on what happened in 2025 and expressed concern that she was not aware of the Peterborough Aerospace & Defence Cluster until after it was publicly announced. She asked commissioner Nelson whether city CAO Jasbir Raina or Mayor Leal directed the priorities for city staff to focus on foreign direct investment and the aerospace cluster.
CAO Raina said that neither he nor the mayor provided direction to city staff, and asked director Julott to answer the question. Julott said the cluster initiative was presented to him by The Loomex Group, which operates the city-owned Peterborough Regional Airport.
“I worked with Kyle Bruce as our airport manager, because obviously he works with our businesses at the airport,” Julott said. “We invited our existing businesses in our aerospace and defense supply chain and brought them together for an event to learn more about the state of federal and provincial funding that they might be able to access, as well as opportunities to connect and collaborate on local supply chain to see about growth.”
Councillor Bierk questions trade mission costs and value
Councillor Alex Bierk, who participated in the meeting virtually, asked about the cost for city staff to participate in the trips related to foreign direct investment and trade missions, specifically to Brazil, Tokyo and Seoul, and the Farnborough International Airshow in the UK.
Julott said the city’s cost of the trade mission to Brazil with the Brazil-Canada Chamber of Commerce was $1,479 and the total cost of the Global Affairs Canada trade mission to Japan and Korea was $2,644. He added that the cost of the trip to Farnborough is still being confirmed and he will report back “once we have all the final receipts.”
Councillor Bierk noted that the consultant working on the city’s economic development strategic plan has said that municipalities are moving away from the traditional economic development approach to secure an anchor industry or employer. He asked Julott whether he believes these types of trips will continue in the future and whether they are valuable in attracting investment.
Julott said all the trips were “highly targeted and organized,” noting that the Brazil trip followed a period of relationship building. He added that foreign direct investment is a multi-year process.
“A lot of investors that you’ll talk to operate on a two-to-five year window, so relationships are key, time is key … just ensuring Peterborough is relevant is key — making sure that we’re on the map for when some of these businesses from this countries are considering decisions,” Julott added. “We have a lot of active follow-up, a number of files from both trips that we’re still actively engaged with. It’s everything from specific businesses to the local trade commissioners in those markets.”
Councillor Bierk said there are local businesses “that are feeling very unheard and very left out” of the city’s planning and econonmic support.
“My hope with the new (economic) strategic plan is that we can maybe move away from these big pink cloud, silver bullet saviours to the city and sort of move towards looking at the people that are driving our economy and thinking how we can best serve them,” he said. “I know that there are always opportunities to come, but I think the public is really hungry for us to get some results, and that’s definitely the feedback that I’m hearing.”
For his part, Mayor Jeff Leal explained that he had no involvement with organizing that aerospace and defence cluster event, but was invited to provide opening remarks and also to welcome a deputy minister from the Ontario government who attended. He said the defence sector is an “enormous opportunity” for manufacturers, and noted that Fairbanks Morse Defense has finalized its acquisition of the Rolls-Royce Naval Handling facility in Peterborough, which will become the company’s Canadian headquarters.
After citing recent tourism statistics from Peterborough’s visitor centre (2,900 visitors in 25 days, 67 per cent of which were from across Ontario and 18 per cent from other countries, with U.S. visits up 18 per cent), the mayor mentioned that both Northern Skyline Ventures and Circul-Air Corp are considering investment in Peterborough. He also lauded Peterborough’s success at physician recruitment.
“There’s a lot to be bullish about,” Leal said.
Councillor Keven Duguay said the city has seen “enormous gains” in sports tourism. He noted that, while PKED staff had to be invited to council meetings, director Julott is always available at every council meeting.
“We took on the responsibility and had to build our own toolbox,” he said. “We used what was available to us, but we are building our own. I’m satisfied that what’s been undertaken today and I’m satisfied (what) the report has produced is helpful (and) informative.”
After councillor Don Vassiliadis spoke in support of the “direction we’re going,” councillor Riel once again raised concerns about the lack of reporting.
“We waited almost two years for a report,” Riel said. “We are the board of directors of economic development for the City of Peterborough … I would think there would be quarterly reports to us about economic development, one of the most important things in the City of Peterborough to move this city forward with an eroding tax base.”
“I learned more about economic development from the mayor, when he just spoke here. Why am I getting it from the mayor as opposed to the director of economic development?”
Riel noted that council could go into closed session for any confidential economic development matters.
Lack of industrial land cited as major impediment to growth
Pointing out recent announcements by two major employers announcing they are leaving Peterborough, councillor Gary Baldwin asked Julott about the process of reaching out to these businesses.
Julott said that the city tries to identify business that are contemplating leaving before they make announcements. In the case of Woodward Inc., which announced in July it would be relocating production from Peterborough to Poland, Julott said the city reached out with 12 hours and learned that staff at the Peterborough location were also surprised by the announcement.
“If it was a surprise to the staff, then it absolutely was not something we could have surfaced in our regular meetings,” he said, before describing the process for helping employees, noting that some have already been hired by other companies.
In response to another question from councillor Baldwin about the major impediment to bringing in jobs, Julott pointed to the lack of industrial land.
“We’re trying to be as creative as possible,” he said, providing an example of a business looking to expand that is “boxed in,” but there’s a business directly behind them with a large amount of greenspace they are not using. “We’re working together — economic development, planning, and other departments — to try and see if there’s a bit of a creative solution we can kind of MacGyver there.”
Julott gave another example of a piece of industrial land that “We’re currently finalizing the remediation of, that’s going to free up about six acres of industrial land that will go on the market later this summer.”
Councillors then voted unanimously, 10-0, to receive the report. Councillor Matt Crowley was absent from the meeting.
Items endorsed by general committee on August 4 will be considered by council for final approval the following Monday. Council meetings are streamed live at www.peterborough.ca.
