Windsor’s population, employment participation take huge leap

After what seems like decades of stagnating population growth, Windsor-Essex County is once again bracing for the boom.

The region saw another population surge this past month — for the second consecutive month — 1,000 new residents called Windsor and the surrounding municipalities’ home.

“It's been a long time coming here,” remarked Rakesh Naidu, the president of the Windsor-Essex Regional Chamber of Commerce. “We've got we've gone through some challenges. But this is the time when I think this region is poised for growth and strong growth.”

Since April of this year, 4,400 new residents have settled in the Windsor census metropolitan area — including Lakeshore, Tecumseh, LaSalle and Amherstburg.

That’s more than all of 2022, when 4,000 moved to the region.

17,100 have moved to the region since 2020, according to Statistics Canada.

“It's one thing to welcome a lot of people, but can you also create jobs at the same time?” asked Justin Falconer of Workforce Windsor Essex.

The answer to that, he said, is a resounding ‘Yes.’

According to Falconer, the total number of people employed has jumped 25,000 over the past 12 months.

“That's 25,000 new paychecks coming in that weren't coming in a year ago,” he said. “We're certainly feeling some shelter from what the rest of Ontario and Canada has experienced over the last couple of months.”

Some big projects are helping drive the in-migration include ongoing construction of the Gordie Howe International Bridge and the new Stellantis LG battery plant.

“When you see employers like LG and Stellantis opening a battery factory, hiring people to start ramping up and all of the supply chain that's coming, you have people that they have to bring here in order to fill some of those positions because they're highly skilled,” said Windsor Mayor Drew Dilkens. “The vast majority [of jobs] will go to the local population, but you're starting to see people moving here to take positions as those plants start ramping up.”

Dilkens also points to immigration and the steady influx of international students as reasons for the higher numbers.

He said more people is good for the tax base, but will ultimately create pressures on traffic, transit and housing.

“I'll take these pressures any day over the ones that we were dealing with back in 2010 when we had 16 [per cent] unemployment and our largest employer was going bankrupt,” said Dilkens. “These are good problems to have and we will figure it out.”

Naidu meanwhile said the increased economic activity from major and traditional sectors like manufacturing is having a spillover effect to the service and hospitality industries, retail and other small and medium-sized businesses.

“All of these sectors will be leveraging each other and growing on the back of each other,” Naidu said, who noted the focus must now be on quality over quantity.

The next challenge, he said, will be matching skills with labour force needs so the right people are coming here to fill the right positions.

“You know, that's very important, so that we can fill those positions that are there where businesses are really crying for help and needing the people,” he said.