Mayor Josh Morgan: Taking on London’s challenges, opening opportunities
Mayor Josh Morgan is no stranger to the council horseshoe in London City Hall, but when he looks around the room, he is looking from a much different chair than he is used to. He also happens to be looking at a whole lot of new faces.
Morgan sat as a city councillor from 2014 to 2022 before taking his successful run at the city’s open mayor’s seat. Since being sworn in last October, he has had to get used to his new position. One of his first adjustments was getting to know the eight first-time councillors elected to the city’s 14-member council. And while this might sound daunting to some, Morgan looks at it completely differently.
“I am in a new position on council and that provides some challenges, but also some great opportunities. The challenge is there’s a learning curve, especially with new individuals. I’m in a new job. There’s a learning curve with any new job, and that means there’s the potential to be slow out of the gate,” Morgan said. “But the advantage is it brings different perspectives, different approaches, and I have found this council, in particular, to be very collaborative. We have very distinct and diverse views. We recognize that what we create, when we put all that together, is greater than kind of the individual pieces. That is at the heart of collaboration.”
Morgan said his council colleagues are willing to “sit, listen, and adjust their position” to find compromise. It is through these diverse perspectives, and a willingness to work together, Morgan said, that council can tackle the serious challenges facing the city.
London’s Wicked Problems
When looking at the state of the Forest City, Morgan sees both challenges and opportunities. With this perspective in mind, it is why he decided to start with the challenges first, because often they hold back a city’s opportunities.
In his first State of the City speech as mayor, Morgan chose not to focus on economic growth or job creation. Instead, he addressed London’s challenges, including homelessness, mental health, and addiction. Morgan said these are the challenges that are holding London back from fulfilling its potential growth.
These issues are also, he said, holding back the ability of people to achieve their full potential. Tackling those challenges is critical to London becoming the city Morgan believes it can be.
“That is why a major focus of our council, and our community who have come together in an unprecedented way, is to face the health and homeless challenges that we see in our city. It is a critical thing for us to confront head on and not be afraid to talk about it,” Morgan said. “There are people dying in our streets and that’s unacceptable. We have to take bold and decisive action, which is why we’re taking the actions we are taking.”
Morgan said there is a “tremendous, unimaginable opportunity” to take advantage of London’s current position as a large, fast-growing city. People who are coming to London are doing so because they also see the future. The jobs that are coming to London, he said, are coming because the city is both open for business and well positioned geographically to land these opportunities.
Morgan said companies such as Maple Leaf and Volkswagen in near-by St. Thomas will create economic spinoffs that will come from those investments. Morgan said job creation that has taken place in London recently, coupled with impressive population growth, gives the city “tremendous influence and tremendous clout” in the province and in the country.
“If we use that right, we can really take that to the next level,” Morgan said. “We can use that clout to solve some of the challenges we have, but also seize the many opportunities to come with the position we’re in.”
Collaboration is Key to Success
The scope of problems facing local government leaders across the country is daunting. But Morgan is hopeful for change. He said there has been “the unprecedented level of collaboration” tackling the city’s most serious issues.
An example is the work undertaken on the city’s health and homelessness summits, bringing together hundreds of individuals, representing more than 70 organizations, including major institutional health care, frontline service providers, the business community, the development community, and city staff.
The system as it currently exists doesn’t help people, Morgan said. People are suffering within it, and there needs to be transformation from the ground up. People working to solve issues are at times at odds with each other. In London, an example is harm reduction. There are people who support harm reduction in the room with people who support a focus on recovery and rehabilitation. But Morgan said hope stems from the fact they’re working hand in hand to transform the system.
“All the pieces have a part, but what can we do to actually stop people from dying in our streets and get more people housed? When you have such a clear focus, with such a broad-based group of individuals coming together to pitch a solution, that gives me incredible hope that we can tackle the challenges,” Morgan said. “Yes, the buck stops with me on many, many issues. But I’m very practical and I know that I’m not the one to solve things in isolation with all the talented people that we have in our city.”
Personal Opportunities at City Hall
If there are challenges and opportunities facing the City of London, then its mayor faces a similar situation.
Morgan said he finds his new job “very enjoyable” as he loves engaging with people and challenges that being mayor presents. Even though there are many difficult decisions to make, Morgan said that – “at the base level” – he enjoys the job and the opportunity to help people every day.
He finds it even more exciting to be able to take his skills and apply them in different and creative ways to solve problems. Even so, there have been lessons to be learned, including how different the role of councillor is from being mayor.
One big lesson is that the perspectives between the two positions are quite different. It wasn’t unexpected, Morgan said, but when you are in the position of mayor, and doing the job, it doesn’t feel the same. For one thing, Morgan said the ability to make a difference as mayor is on a much larger scale than when he was a ward councillor.
The biggest lesson learned though is that it remains important to say no. As a ward councillor, Morgan said it was easy to say yes to pretty much every meeting or event, but the demands on the time of a mayor are so great that the need to learn how to say no is essential.
“You have to learn, very quickly, to know what you want to say yes to, what you want to say no to, and how you want to take what limited time that you have. I have to be strategic about my time,” Morgan said. “I have to make sure that what I spend time doing is creating the biggest, the best impact for our city. It’s not easy to say no to things. It’s not easy to pick and choose, but it was quickly clear that that was something that I had to get good at fast.”
Family Balance is Essential
Time management is essential for the job of being mayor. But it is equally as important for the job of being a husband and a father.
Morgan said he and his wife have demanding careers and four kids they need to make time for. This is particularly true when the children are 14, 12, seven, and two years old. Morgan is thankful that Londoners not only elected him, but did so knowing he had a young family at home.
One way to keep the kids involved is being able to take them to community events. This includes everything from taking his daughters to city cultural events to having his son help throw out the first pitch at a London Majors baseball game.
Carving out time for his family is something Morgan is deeply committed to doing. Being mayor is a demanding job. And so, finding balance is the key to not only making the job doable, but ensuring he isn’t burning himself out.
“When I think about the challenges and opportunities our city has, and I spend time with my kids, I think about how we’re building a city for them,” Morgan said. “Spending time with them, having them integrated in every part of my life and, and in the work that I do here, I think gives me a very valuable perspective in how to do the job as mayor.” MW
✯ Municipal World Executive and Essentials Plus Members: You might also be interested in Sean’s other article: Local government champions look ahead to new experiences.
Sean Meyer is Senior Editor for Municipal World.
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