Peterborough city council has voted against asking GE Vernova to provide a demolition plan for 25 buildings in the historic General Electric (GE) factory complex at 107 Park Street North in downtown Peterborough, and has also voted against asking city staff to obtain more information about the contaminants on the site.

Both decisions were made despite several councillors acknowledging the health and safety risks to the community from the potential demolition.

At its regular meeting on Monday night (February 23), council considered two amending motions put forth by councillors Alex Bierk and Joy Lachica — the two councillors in whose ward the factory complex is located — at last Monday’s general committee meeting in response to a report from municipal operations commissioner Ilmar Simanovskis that provides a high-level outline of a health and safety approach for the demolition of buildings at the GE Vernova site.

Proposed amendments to city staff’s health and safety report

Last October, based on a motion from councillor Bierk, council had directed city staff to develop the report in response to community concerns about the demolition given the long history of toxic substances used at the factory complex.

The report outlines which agencies could be involved in the demolition and describes their regulatory authority, and includes a guideline document for a community health and safety approach, proposing a “joint oversight table” that would include the city, the Ontario Ministry of Environment, Conservation and Parks (MECP), Lakelands Public Health, GE Vernova, the demolition contractor, and an independent environment monitor hired by the city and funded by GE Vernova.

At last week’s general committee meeting, councillor Bierk said the report did not reflect what he had asked for in his original motion.

“My concern for this report is simple,” he said. “It explains jurisdiction, but it does not provide the city’s plan that council requested for this site. I am moving to not defer this, but to refer this back to staff so that council can actually receive that plan with clear deliverables, roles and timelines, and I have a motion which I will submit to the clerk.”

Councillor Bierk’s motion requested that staff report back with a “city health and safety plan” for the GE Vernova site that is not limited to the demolition plan itself, referring to the original discussion on the item in October that led to the staff report.

After the motion lost in a 5-5 vote, councillor Joy Lachica put forward a detailed amendment to the main motion that council request that GE Vernova disclose its full demolition plan under the Ontario Building Code through the city’s chief building official and to all members of municipal council as part of its application for demolition.

Due to the length and detail of councillor Lachica’s motion, councillor Gary Baldwin put forward a motion to defer consideration of the motion to give councillors time to review the motion before voting on it at the regular city council. His motion carried 8-2, with councillors Lachica and Bierk voting against the deferral.

The debate at last week’s general committee consumed almost two hours and, at Monday night’s council meeting, councillors spent almost another two hours debating the item.

Neighbourhood resident urges council to “take power back”

Council only heard from a single public delegation at the meeting: Nicholas Lato, who lives on Frederick Avenue near the GE factory complex and whose child attends Prince of Wales Public School on Monaghan Road northwest of the complex.

“You gave away the power from this council to determine how the demolition proceeded and you gave a large chunk of the power to General Electric, presumably for nothing in return,” Lato said, referring to a previous decision by council to only proceed with heritage designation of a few of the buildings at the site and permitting GE Vernova to demolish the rest.

“It’s up to you to figure out to take enough power back that we determine how the demolition proceeds, not General Electric. I imagine everybody here doesn’t trust General Electric to do what’s best for the community.”

Councillor Keith Riel asked Lato if he would have bought his home knowing what he knows now, and whether he intends to sell it.

“I would not have bought it, and we are wondering if we should sell,” Lato replied.

In response to councillor Lesley Parnell, who told Lato that council has already decided on the heritage designation, he said, “That’s what I’m saying — you screwed up and you need to fix it. You need to figure out what levers you still do have after you gave it away.”

Legal limits debated as demolition plan motion fails

Later in the meeting, after council voted to approve general committee’s decision from the previous week to reverse its earlier decision and exclude from heritage designation all four buildings at the GE site leased by BWXT Nuclear Energy Canada Inc., councillors debated the amending motion from councillor Joy Lachica that would require the city’s chief building official to request a demolition plan from GE Vernova.

“We need to be proactive, to use this window to take charge of the narrative,” councillor Lachica said. “This is our city, this is our Prince of Wales community, this is our Town Ward. It is our city and region that could be impacted by the scale of something like this.”

While he said he supported the intent of the motion and the need to ensure the safety of the community, councillor Matt Crowley echoed concerns raised by the city’s legal staff at general committee that the motion would direct “a chief building official that is free from political (and) bureaucratic influence to do a thing from the municipality, which we are not allowed to do.”

In response to a question from councillor Crowley, the city’s legal services director Alan Barber confirmed the independence of the city’s building official and outlined the responsibilities of those involved in any demolition.

“There is comfort to be had for members of council and for members of the public that anything that happens on that site will be watched by the (provincial) ministries with oversight, will happen in accordance with the statutory requirements of the Building Code Act, and under the professional obligations of the owner’s engineer of record,” Barber said.”

“One final thing I’d like to say about what the city can’t do, is it would be improper to try and add a condition onto the owner, through a council resolution or otherwise, that would change what the owner is required to submit under the building code to get a permit,” Barber added. “That is improper and should not be done.”

Councillor Crowley said that, “while every single one of us around this table have dire concerns,” he didn’t want to be in a position where he’s putting the city at risk for a lawsuit. He suggested instead that, when city staff receive a demolition plan from GE Vernova through the proper process, they could come to council to provide an overview of the plan.

For his part, councillor Keith Riel said GE Vernova “will do the bare minimum” to protect the community.

“They’ll tear the buildings down, they’ll fence it off, they’ll seed it and plant a couple of trees, and you’re left with a 43-acre brownfield in the City of Peterborough,” he said. “The problem with the site is underneath the ground.”

“I can tell you they know exactly what contaminants are there, exactly what it’s going to cost them to remediate the property complete(ly). They already know that — they’ve drilled enough holes, they’ve done enough sampling … they know what their liability is. They’re trying to get off scot-free. I have dealt with this company for 38-and-a-half years. I’m not trying to sit here and fear monger — I’m telling you how they operate.”

Councillor Bierk said he’s “not buying” the argument about what the city can’t do — “all that we’re doing here is asking for something.”

“The worst that can happen is they can say no,” he added, noting that the chief building official could bring information to council in closed session and advise council if they are overstepping their authority.

In response to questions from councillor Baldwin, city CAO Jasbir Raina said that GE Vernova has not yet applied for a demolition permit and that it was under no obligation to do so, but would otherwise be required to maintain the buildings, noting that the company is spending around $5 million a year for such maintenance.

Although he said he understood the “spirit and intent” of the motion, councillor Kevin Duguay said he found it “unnecessary and somewhat superfluous” given the existing process for demolition.

“For the city at this point to introduce any language that would suggest we expect more from our chief building official, or more of the process above and beyond the prescribed regulatory framework would be inappropriate,” he said. “I’m satisfied there’s a process that will follow, that will protect the interests of our community.”

Council then voted on councillor Lachica’s amending motion, which lost 3-8, with councillors Bierk, Lachica, and Riel voting in favour.

Council rejects asking city staff to obtain contimination information

Following the defeat of councillor Lachica’s amending motion, councillor Bierk reintroduced his original motion with changes, asking city staff to report back to council with any available information about the extent of contamination on or around the site, and that the city request GE Vernova to provide any available information about contamination on or around the site.

Councillor Baldwin said he couldn’t support the motion, after the city’s infrastructure commissioner Blair Nelson told him “I’m not certain that we have any of the information” about contamination and the city would have to hire an outside consultant if testing is required.

After councillors Riel and Lachica spoke in support of his motion, councillor Bierk said “I feel like we’re in the Olympics right now, with all the mental gymnastics and the twisting and turning that’s going on with the logic around this.”

“I did not mention a consultant. I did not mention doing core sampling of bricks at General Electric. I’m not an idiot, I understand that we don’t have the capacity or the funding to do that. That’s not what I’m asking. It says very clearly in the preamble (of the motion) ‘to the city’s best available knowledge.'”

“I’m not asking for us to do anything beyond our capacity,” he said. “We need the subject matter experts in our city to review the documents that they can get their hands on — the documents through the ministry (of environment), the documents through these many meetings, and give the public a sense of what the contamination is, because we have not heard a clear and definitive answer through any of this discussions as to what that is.”

“We own sidewalks and roads and sewers, and we own portions (of the rocks that keep Little Lake around there. We own all that, and I see them (GE Vernova) testing around there, and the public sees them testing around there. We don’t know what they’re testing for. We don’t know how frequently.”

“What’s the list of contaminants? There’s a lot of conjecture going on in the community. ‘Can you set the record straight? Can you tell us what’s going on at that site and how it’s happening?’ This is what the ask is, and I don’t understand the resistance to this.”

In her comments, councillor Parnell said GE Vernova is a private company that holds all the liability and that the motion could place the city in “legal jeopardy.” She asked Barber if councillor Bierk’s motion could be considered as interfering with the authority of the chief building official prior to a demolition permit application.

Barber replied that, while the debate and the motion itself is not “definitive evidence that council is interfering” with the chief building official, somebody could conclude that council is seeking to influence the chief building official.

To avoid that perception, he suggested that council could reconsider the motion at a later date after GE Vernova has made its application for a demolition permit and the chief building official has issued their decision to either approve or deny the permit.

“That may be the safest course of action, to both limit the city’s potential liability and to best protect the city’s reputation so that no one outside of this room could think that council is trying to influence the (chief building official),” Barber said.

After some further debate, council voted on councillor Bierk’s motion, which lost 4-7, with councillors Lachica, Bierk, Crowley, and Riel voting in favour.

Councillor Crowley proposed an amendment to the main motion to request city staff obtain a copy of GE Vernova’s demolition plan when it is available, but Mayor Jeff Leal ruled it out of order as it was too similar to councillor Lachica’s motion that council had already voted against.

Council then voted on the main motion to receive the report from commissioner Simanovskis, which carried 9-2, with councillors Lachica and Duguay voting against, although Duguay subsequently said he voted incorrectly.

Peterborough’s Dragon Boat Festival will celebrate a quarter century of paddling for cancer care this summer, marking 25 years as one of the region’s signature fundraising events.

The 25th anniversary festival takes place Saturday, June 13 at Del Crary Park, once again featuring dragon boat races on Little Lake alongside artisan and food vendors, a family fun zone, a beer garden, and more.

Registration for teams opens at 12:01 a.m. on Wednesday (February 25) at ptbodragonboat.ca, with the first three teams to register winning a complimentary dragon boat lake practice.

Organizers say the milestone anniversary will be reflected not only in celebrations, but in the event’s fundraising goal. This year’s target is $325,018.01 for the Peterborough Regional Health Centre Foundation — a 25 per cent increase over last year.

In a media release, festival chair Michelle Thornton explained the goal’s specific figure carries symbolic meaning, including that two in five Canadians will be diagnosed with cancer in their lifetime, that one in eight women will face a breast cancer diagnosis, and that .01 per cent of men will also be diagnosed with breast cancer.

“But most importantly, what’s raised here, stays here,” Thornton said, noting the funds support cancer care close to home. “We all know someone who has been affected by cancer and, by paddling together, we can make a lasting impact on the lives of family, friends, and neighbours in our region.”

Hosted by the Survivors Abreast Dragon Boat Team, Peterborough’s Dragon Boat Festival was first launched in June 2001 as Liberty Mutual’s “Day on the Water,” becoming Peterborough’s Dragon Boat Festival the following year.

Since then, the festival has become a favourite community event to kick off the summer season and has raised more than $4.9 million for breast and other cancer screening, diagnosis, and treatment at Peterborough Regional Health Centre (PRHC).

Last year alone, the festival raised a record-breaking $400,104.01.

Survivors Abreast president Janice James said the team, founded in 1999, has always focused on breast cancer awareness and raising funds for the PRHC Foundation.

“We know first-hand the importance of the work the PRHC Foundation does and their continuing mission to bring the best cancer care the world has to offer, right here to our hospital,” James said.

Lesley Heighway, president and CEO of the PRHC Foundation, called the 25-year milestone “an absolutely remarkable testament to what a community can achieve when we all come together for a cause that touches so many lives.”

As all funds raised by paddlers and donors are donated to the PRHC Foundation, the festival relies on sponsors to cover expenses in creating the best experience possible for participants. That includes Kawartha Financial Services (formerly Kawartha Credit Union), which is marking its 25th consecutive year as the event’s presenting platinum sponsor.

“This milestone reflects a shared legacy of compassion, community spirit, and support for local healthcare, and we are proud to continue standing alongside the many teams, volunteers, and partners who make this event such an enduring force for good,” said Kawartha Financial Services president Norah McCarthy.

Organizers say plans are already underway to commemorate the 25th anniversary on festival day, as Peterborough once again gathers on the shores of Little Lake to paddle in support of cancer care across the region.

More than two years after launching its organic waste diversion program for single-family households, the City of Peterborough will be expanding it to a small number of restaurants and food-generating businesses to evaluate a larger expansion of the program.

The city launched the first phase of its curbside green bin program in October 2023, collecting organic waste from around 28,000 households. In 2024, the program diverted more than 6,800 tonnes of methane-producing organic material from the city-county landfill, processing it into compost at the Peterborough Organics Facility.

The second phase of the program involves expanding the green bin program to restaurants, multi-residential properties, and small commercial sites.

In December, city council approved a report for an implementation program that included the first step of phase two, focusing on restaurants primarily within the Downtown Business Improvement Area (DBIA) and in the surrounding areas that use the city’s garbage collection service, potentially also including other food-generating establishments.

“These establishments generate a significant volume of organic waste, making them strong candidates for early implementation,” the report states, noting that each small restaurant typically produces between 10 and 25 kilograms of organic waste per day.

“The initial rollout will include approximately 25 voluntary participants, primarily at restaurants. This focused approach will allow the city to refine collection methods, address logistical constraints, and optimize service routes within a high-density commercial area.”

Businesses interested in participating in the project can fill out a form at peterborough.ca/greenbin until March 6. The city says those not selected for the initial rollout of the project will be considered as the program expands.

Some of the operational challenges the city has identified in collecting organics from downtown restaurants include one-way streets that limit the collection vehicles’ automated arm use, on-street parking obstructing green bin placement, limited indoor or outdoor storage space for bins, scavenging from bins, bin sizes suitable for high-volume generators, and determining optimal collection frequency.

The initial rollout to 25 participants will allow the city to evaluate the program in 2026 and 2027 before expanding it to additional restaurants. Following the expansion to restaurants, the city will focus on organics collection at multi-residential buildings that receive city garbage collection services, scheduled to take place from 2028 to 2030.

As Black History Month comes to an end, Peterborough resident Charmaine Magumbe is calling for more accountability and action when it comes to anti-racism. She says silence from media, officials, and public institutions is not neutral — it’s how violence is sustained.

The chairperson of the Community Race Relations Committee of Peterborough and co-founder of the Afrocentric Awareness Network of Peterborough, Magumbe has written an article titled In Peterborough, Anti-Racism Must Mean Accountability, Not Silence.

“Once it’s invisible, people will say, ‘Oh, there’s no such thing as racism here in Canada’ and ‘We’re not racist,'” Magumbe tells kawarthaNOW. “It’s buried. And that’s why we have Black History Month, because people don’t know about the racism that occurred here in Canada.”

Magumbe’s article shares the story of Keith Porter, a Black father who was killed by an off-duty United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer on New Year’s Eve. At least 32 people, many of whom were people of colour, died in ICE custody in 2025 — the deadliest year in two decades.

During the City of Peterborough’s annual Black History Month proclamation on February 4, Magumbe listened as city councillor Joy Lachica similarly commented on racialized violence and the lack of media attention when Black, Indigenous, and other minority communities are harmed.

“She was really referring to the U.S. but then I thought, there are killings that we don’t know about here in Canada because they’re invisible,” Magumbe says. “Why is that? Why don’t we hear about these killings of people who are Black and Indigenous?”

Upon doing research, Magumbe learned about Darrell Augustine, a Mi’kmaw from Sipekne’katik First Nation in Nova Scotia, and Bronson Paul, a Wolastoqey man from Neqotkuk First Nation in New Brunswick, who were both killed by RCMP just days apart in January.

“The outcry from us Canadians was very muted because we don’t know about this,” she says. “Then I also heard about a Black lawyer (Sudine Riley) who was doing her job and was brutally attacked (by the Durham Regional Police Service) because they said that she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. They didn’t believe that she could be a lawyer because she looked the way she did. These are things that people don’t know about.”

“I really thought, why is it that we don’t talk about Black and Brown people who are violently attacked in our society? I feel the ugly side of our history doesn’t want to be exposed, (including) what happened to Indigenous people at residential schools. Black Canadian history is Canadian history, but they don’t want to really talk about what had happened.”

Magumbe says people like to believe Canada is not like the U.S., but the difference is racism in the U.S. is just more visible than it is in Canada. While Canada did not have Jim Crow laws, segregation did exist.

Peterborough itself was once a “sunset town” (or “sundown town”), where Black people were threatened with violence if they were not off the streets by sundown.

“If you talk to the white counterparts here, they’ll say there’s no racism here, it doesn’t exist,” says Magumbe. “That’s what makes it really hard to fight racism. If everyone thinks there is no such thing as it, then why fight it?”

Recent statistics released by the Peterborough Police Service paint a different picture. An average of 46 hate/bias incidents have been reported to the police each year over the past five years, with police adding the number of incidents is underreported.

A high-profile incident of racism involved Peterborough mayor Jeff Leal, who used an anti-Black slur while referring to former U.S. president Lyndon Johnson during a guest lecture at Trent University last year. That incident resulted in a number of complaints to the City of Peterborough’s integrity commissioner, who completed an investigation and released a report earlier this year.

The report concluded that, while the mayor’s use of the racial slur was “odious,” he did not violate council’s code of conduct. Magumbe notes how harmful the messaging in the report was, including the finding that the mayor’s “one-time use of the N-word” did not violate section 10 of the code, which prohibits members of council from speaking in a manner that is discriminatory to any person, including based on their race or colour.

“Once is all it takes and, for overt racism like that, it does affect the person’s morality,” Magumbe says. “The reason why this is so important is that our leaders in those positions have to set the example — they have to set the bar — because once the leader gets away with it, then it’s a free-for-all. That’s what’s happening down south.”

As the chairperson for the Community Race Relations Committee of Peterborough, Magumbe sees many incidents of children being bullied using the N-word and other racial slurs.

“It’s very extreme and it’s not just a one-off,” she says. “The kids are psychologically being bullied and abused in that way, and it’s affecting them to even not want to go to school or to think about going to another school. It’s brutal because there’s no recourse because you’ll say, ‘Well, the mayor said it so I can get away with it.'”

Though Leal issued a public apology and Peterborough’s city council agreed to anti-racism, diversity, equity, and inclusion training for all councillors and city staff, in addition to directing staff to amend the strategic plan and code of conduct to prohibit the use of the racial slurs “regardless of circumstance,” Magumbe says that’s not accountability.

“He said he believed that he was sincerely sorry for what he said, and then he recuses himself from the council meeting,” she says, referring to mayor’s behaviour during the January 19 meeting when council heard public delegations responding to the integrity commissioner’s report. “The accountability would’ve been he stays in (and) listens to the hurt (and) the pain. If he had said then, ‘I hear your pain and I’m sorry,’ that would have been accountability.”

As for the rest of the public, Magumbe has other suggestions for further proving that action — not silence — is the way to confront racism.

“It’d be great to see more people from different backgrounds being employed, especially in the public sector — that would be something they could probably put forward as leaders,” she says.

“I always recommend that you should read authors from all walks of life. The more you read, the more you get into the mindset of what people are thinking and how they’re feeling and how they deal with things in a different way.”

This can be done by joining AANP for Afrocentric Storytime, a monthly event for children that explores stories about Africans and the African diaspora, or by joining the BIPOC Book Club. Both events are held in partnership with the Peterborough Public Library.

In celebration of Black History Month, AANP will also be hosting “Get Real,” an interactive workshop that combats anti-Black racism in the film industry. The event is being held at the lecture hall at Sadlier House on Wednesday (February 25).

“We are seeing people from all walks of life who want to know more about Black joy,” Magumbe says of AANP events. “This is good to get to know them and say ‘Hey, they’re just like me.’ We’re all human beings. We all want good things in life, we all want good things for our children, a good job, a good education — we’re all the same.”

In Peterborough, Anti-Racism Must Mean Accountability, Not Silence

Last week, the Peterborough community gathered to mark the launch of Black History Month with the city’s annual proclamation, read by City Councillors Alex Bierk and Joy Lachica. While the ceremony celebrated Black history and contributions, it also raised a pressing question for our city: what does anti-racism mean when violence against Black and Indigenous people continues to be met with silence in Canadian society?

During the event, Lachica drew attention to racialized violence in the United States, particularly deaths linked to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), and the lack of media coverage when Black, Indigenous, and other racialized people are killed. While some deaths receive attention, many others disappear from public view.

One such case is that of Keith Porter, a 43-year-old African American man killed during an encounter with an ICE agent. The circumstances of his death remain contested, no video footage has been released, and media coverage has been minimal. His killing is part of a broader pattern. This year alone, at least 32 people have died in ICE custody or during ICE encounters — the highest number recorded since 2004. The majority were Black or People of Colour.

These realities may feel distant to some in Peterborough. They should not.

Canada often distinguishes itself from the United States by pointing to a less overt form of racism. But silence is not the absence of violence — it is how violence is sustained. When racialized deaths and assaults are underreported or framed as isolated incidents, institutions are shielded from scrutiny and communities are denied justice.

Recent events across the country expose this pattern. In January, RCMP officers shot and killed Darrell Augustine, a Mi’kmaw man from Sipekne’katik First Nation in Nova Scotia, and days later killed Bronson Paul, a Wolastoqey man from Neqotkuk First Nation in New Brunswick. Both cases are under investigation by the Serious Incident Response Team (SIRT), yet public details remain limited and media coverage fleeting.

That same month, a Black female lawyer, Sudine Riley, was violently assaulted by police while working in an interview room after completing a trial. According to her lawyer, Neha Chugh, officers responded to her presence with “rage, disrespect, and contempt,” slamming her head onto a desk and pressing their knees into her back and neck. She was dragged from the room, handcuffed, and placed in a cell, during which her headscarf was torn off, and her skirt lifted. No charges were laid.

“She committed no offence other than being a Black woman practising law,” Chugh said.

For Peterborough, Black History Month must be more than proclamations and symbolic gestures. Municipal leadership has a responsibility to name systemic racism, demand transparency from institutions, and support meaningful oversight and accountability. Silence-whether from media, elected officials, or public institutions-is not neutral. It is a choice.

Anti-racism requires action: media coverage, public accountability, and a willingness to confront uncomfortable truths, even at the local level. If Peterborough is committed to justice, it must ensure that Black, People of Color, and Indigenous lives are not only celebrated in February but also defended every day.

Charmaine Magumbe
Chairperson of the Community Race Relations of Peterborough

Sources

Atlantic chiefs call for ‘meaningful action’ after 2 First Nations men killed by RCMP (CBC News, January 28, 2026)

Durham Regional Police Service refers lawyer assault case to York Regional Police (Law Times, February 2, 2026)

York Regional Police to take over criminal investigation into cops accused of assaulting lawyer in Oshawa (CP24, January 30, 2026)