GOVN 500

My municipal role is defined less by clear answers than by a constant push and pull between competing demands. On one side, I am expected to exercise formal authority such as drafting policies, meeting reporting requirements, following legislation, and upholding council decisions. On the other, I am responsible for leading through relationships, trust, and collaboration with community partners and residents, in a space where municipal decision-making shapes how safety and well-being are addressed. In reality, this work happens within provincial rules, long histories of mistrust, and uneven power that shape how communities experience decisions (Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, 2015; Denis et al., 2012). When these approaches collide, community development risks becoming procedural rather than relational, limiting trust, participation, and long-term impact.

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This tension is visible in the Community Safety and Well-Being (CSWB) Plan, where my role requires delivering clear, structured updates to council while working within municipal systems that prioritize efficiency and measurable outcomes, even as I engage youth, service providers, residents, and people with lived and living experience (PWLLE) in ways that feel respectful, inclusive, and safe. Community Safety and Well-Being plans must be carried out through municipal processes, even though the work itself does not fit easily within them. Municipalities cannot control the issues CSWB addresses, yet they are expected to respond to experiences that cannot be reduced to metrics, including people’s sense of belonging, dignity, safety, and cultural experience (Lewis, 2015).

 

Additionally, in many circumstances, social service delivery operates outside the municipality framework which creates distance between municipal work and service delivery, reinforcing an emphasis on numbers and metrics over relationship-building (Dunleavy et al., 2006; Van Ymeren & Lalande, 2015). When this happens, decisions (relating to CSWB) can appear successful on paper while failing to address the relational conditions that actually support safety and well-being. This dynamic is clear in municipalities such as Timmins, ON, where the City does not directly deliver social services but instead funds a Service Delivery Manager to oversee provincially required programs, creating even more distance between measured outcomes and community relationships.

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It is within this space of competing expectations that I have come to lean on values-based leadership. Kraemer’s (2011) framework emphasizes that effective leadership begins with clarity of values and the discipline to act consistently with them. Approaching my work through this lens helps me see leadership not just as municipal authority, but as an ethical practice grounded in self-reflection, balance, humility, and genuine collaboration (Kraemer, 2011). These principles help me balance the formal demands of my role with the relational work that equitable community development requires (Kouzes & Posner, 2023).

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Values-based leadership provides a practical way to manage these tensions. It allows municipal leaders to meet expectations while working in the grey areas required by community safety and well-being. As municipalities respond to increasingly complex and unprecedented social challenges, leadership needs to be less prescriptive and more relational, reflecting a necessary shift in how municipal work is carried out (Canadian Urban Institute, n.d.).

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Leadership in a Municipal Setting

Community development within a municipal setting reaches far beyond traditional service delivery or managing infrastructure (Ife, 2016). At its core, it is about strengthening the social and cultural conditions that allow people to feel connected, safe, and valued in their communities (Ife, 2016). It relies on collaboration, shared decision making, and the creation of environments where residents participate meaningfully in shaping the systems that influence their lives (Ife, 2016). This work is relational; built through conversations, partnerships, and trust, rather than through outputs that can be easily counted or entered on a dashboard (Murray et al., 2010).

This differs from the conventional role of municipal governance, which has historically prioritized infrastructure, taxation, budgeting, and economic development and growth (Brail et al., 2022). Municipal systems are structured to emphasize efficiency, consistency, and accountability, often positioning social and relational concerns as secondary (or tertiary) rather than central (Dunleavy et al., 2006). Even in social and recreation areas, municipalities often pull back from delivering services themselves, handing the work to nonprofit or private organizations while keeping control over policy and oversight (Canadian Union of Public Employees, 2015). This approach reinforces a model in which municipalities are positioned as coordinators of social well-being rather than active participants in its delivery, creating layers of complexity for community development work and reinforcing silos rather than collaboration (Dunleavy et al., 2006).

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This model appears clearly in discussions surrounding the Community Safety and Well-Being (CSWB) Plan. Council debates often return to cost, resource allocation, or operational risk, even when the issues at hand centre on belonging, safety or community trust. Across all levels of government, quantitative indicators such as shelter counts, participation rates and performance metrics are often treated as the only true form of knowledge. The quantitative figures gives the appearance of clarity and progress but can easily overshadow relational dimensions of community safety, such as cultural connection and trust (Dunleavy et al., 2006).

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This dynamic is evident when provincial reporting focuses on measurable outputs, like shelter bed occupancy, as indicators of system performance. While occupancy data shows how many people are using beds, it offers absolutely no insight into whether people feel safe, supported, or are moving toward stability. Yet municipal staff, myself included, are still required to follow provincial metrics, even when those measures do not reflect what service providers and PWLLE identify as meaningful. The issue lies not in data, but in relying on indicators to represent human situations that are complex. An emergency shelter bed meets an immediate need, but it does not show the conditions or pathways that led someone there to begin with. This disconnect reflects how layered federal and provincial governance really is. Funding priorities and performance expectations are set by higher levels of government, while municipalities are left to carry out decisions that often do not align with local realities (Porter & Kramer, 2011). Resources are allocated to ensure supervision and overnight shelter use, while the conditions that bring people into emergency settings remain largely unfunded.

Historical and ongoing trauma further complicates community development (Li et al., 2023). Many residents, particularly those who have experienced displacement, child welfare involvement, or contact with policing, carry deep mistrust toward government institutions (Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, 2015).  These layered dynamics do not disappear when a municipality initiates a new program or invites participation rather, it shapes how people interpret municipal intentions and whether they feel safe engaging at all (Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, 2015). In municipal consultations, some residents hesitate to speak openly due to past experiences where participation resulted in negative consequences or unmet commitments. In other cases, meetings repeatedly revisit issues that are already well known. Together, these patterns point to the need for a relational approach to engagement, one that municipal systems are not always designed to support (Ife, 2016).

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Much of my work, therefore, does not align neatly with conventional measures of success and also involves holding space for built up emotions such as frustration and anger. The impact of building trust with youth or creating safe spaces where PWLLE cannot be captured into a single measure. Community development relies on qualitative insights and long-term relationship-building; elements that are harder to document, yet deeply influential (Murray et al., 2010). When quantifiable measures dominate, relational work risks being undervalued or misunderstood. This creates ongoing tension in my role, as I am expected to show measurable progress while also advocating for the human, non-quantifiable elements that truly shape community well-being (Kouzes & Posner, 2023).

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Role of the Municipal Manager

In my role as a municipal manager, I hold authority that shapes both my responsibilities and how my leadership is understood. This authority includes developing policies, ensuring compliance with legislation, preparing council reports, managing sensitive information, and working with partners across multiple sectors. These responsibilities give me influence, but they also tie me to a governance structure where accountability and clear procedures are prioritized over community-driven work.

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My role is further complicated by the fact that, like many municipalities, the City of Timmins does not deliver its own social services. This responsibility is offloaded to an external agency, leaving the municipality with accountability for community outcomes but without direct operational authority. As a result, the Community Safety and Well-Being Plan requires me to coordinate, influence, and mobilize partners across homelessness, mental health, youth services, and outreach; all without a formal mandate to direct their work. This dynamic reflects what Van Ymeren and Lalande (2015) describe as the structural gap.  This is created when municipalities are expected to lead collaborative social initiatives without having full authority (Van Ymeren & Lalande, 2015). In practice, my work often feels like trying to direct traffic at a busy intersection without traffic lights, relying on timing, trust, and signals rather than authority. Denis et al. (2012) argue that leadership in complex governance environments depends on relationships, negotiation, and shared understanding, rather than formal authority. This means that, despite holding formal municipal authority, my work depends on influence, bringing partners together, aligning priorities, managing conflict, and building the relationships required for collaboration. In this sense, my job is about creating the space in which collective action becomes possible.

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These realities shape every major initiative I lead, including the development of an Encampment Protocol. In this example, I am required to follow legal requirements; including a 100-metre restriction around child-focused spaces (parks and playgrounds) as a non-negotiable section of the protocol. At the same time, I have to recognize the need for compassionate, practical responses, including allowances for overnight use when shelters are full. Balancing these demands (and requirements) requires ongoing reflexivity, meeting legal and political expectations while also remaining attentive to lived realities and past harms (Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada, 2015).

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A similar dynamic appears in quarterly council reporting. While these reports focus on accountability, I intentionally include insights from youth, service providers, community members, and people with lived and living experience to balance the focus on numbers. Even so, these narratives are often met with limited traction. Council discussions frequently return to questions of measurement, tracking, and comparability, reflecting an ongoing preference for indicators that can be counted over experiences that must be interpreted. As a result, municipal reporting often overlooks important nuance by focusing on numbers rather than relationships (Murray et al., 2010).

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Municipal power dynamics influence what is able to move forward and, in many municipalities, responses to immediate risk moves quicker than efforts focused on prevention, social connection, or long-term planning. This is evident in responses to encampments where sites exist throughout the summer with little coordinated action, yet urgency often appears only with the arrival of northern winter, when snow removal timelines leave a short window for people to vacate a location. The result is a reactive response driven by operational pressures rather than prevention, early intervention, or ongoing engagement. These dynamics shape which responses are viewed as legitimate within municipal systems. (Van Ymeren & Lalande, 2015). A similar tension appears in prevention work such as Planet Youth, an Icelandic model focused on reducing youth substance use by strengthening protective factors across families, schools, and communities (Planet Youth, 2023). The model emphasizes long-term investment and early intervention rather than crisis response. However, after years of operating in reactive conditions, both service providers and municipalities often mobilize resources only once issues have already intensified. This makes investment in prevention difficult, particularly when outcomes may take 5 to 10 years to see any change and no immediate crisis is visible (Planet Youth, 2023).

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My role includes convening focus groups with PWLLE and to create spaces for meaningful input into initiatives such as the CSWB Plan. However, this influence comes with a lot of constraints. This means that while community feedback is gathered and brought forward, it loses momentum once the feedback is shared to the appropriate agency. These dynamics can unintentionally reinforce perceptions that I represent “the City” more than the community, shaping how openly people choose to engage (Denis et al., 2012).

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Despite ongoing efforts to foster inclusive processes, structural boundaries remain. I can advocate for relational approaches and share community perspectives, but final decisions ultimately rest with council and are shaped by provincial requirements, municipal culture, and political priorities. These realities complicate the idea of partnership within municipal systems, where power is not shared evenly. I am not naïve to the fact that power cannot be fully equal. Still, what matters is whether people believe their input has a real chance of shaping something. Regardless as to whether it is perception or not, navigating this imbalance requires a values-based leadership approach, one that is grounded in humility, reflection and flexibility (Kraemer, 2011).

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Concepts & Competencies

A title gives formal authority, like the ability to call meetings, write policies, or speak on behalf of ‘the City’, but it does not make people willing to engage. Trust grows from how you show up, not from hierarchy (Kouzes & Posner, 2023). In community development, people engage when they feel respected and safe, not simply because someone with a title is present (Ife, 2016). Over time, credibility is built through consistency, follow-through, and honesty about limitations, not through a formal agreement or authority. Even when I cannot deliver the outcome someone hopes for, trust is shaped by whether I am transparent and reliable.

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Values also shape how community members interpret and engage in engagement processes (Hood et al., 2023). When engagement is performed as a procedural requirement rather than genuine collaboration, residents quickly recognize the transactional nature of the process. In contrast, when I enter these spaces with curiosity and a willingness to listen, conversations deepen and relationships strengthen (Murray et al., 2010). This shift transforms engagement from something done to communities to something done with them (Denis et al., 2012). In practice, this calls for a set of grounded skills. It means reading the room, being reflexive, and knowing when to listen and when to speak. It means setting boundaries, being honest about what the municipality can and cannot do, without closing the door on conversation. It also means acting as a bridge, bringing community knowledge into institutional spaces where it might otherwise be overlooked. In this way, values function as the true foundation of leadership (Kraemer, 2011).

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Kraemer’s (2011) values-based leadership framework offers a grounded way to navigate the demands of municipal community development. His four principles, self-reflection, balance and perspective, true self-confidence, and humility, provide a discipline of leadership that reaches far beyond positional authority (Kraemer, 2011). Rather than relying on hierarchy, values-based leadership emphasizes clarity, integrity, and an ethical commitment toward others (Kraemer, 2011). These principles shape not only what decisions are made, but how they are made, particularly in moments of tension, uncertainty, or conflict. Personally, they guide how I move between institutional expectations and relational responsibility, and how I remain grounded when outcomes are unclear or constrained.

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Values-based leadership is not without risk. Municipal systems are designed to be efficient and predictable; snow must be cleared quickly, invoices must be processed, facilities must open and close on schedule. These functions rely on standardization and speed. In contrast, community development rarely works this way. It requires time to listen, to sit with competing perspectives, and to respond to issues that do not fit neatly within timelines. When I slow a process to create space, it can be misread as inefficiency or indecision within a system geared toward control and resolution (Gohari, 2024). Meaningful engagement is rarely linear, and prioritizing speed over relationship risks reproducing harm rather than addressing it. These competencies become most visible when values are tested by institutional pressure, which the following sections explore through concrete examples from my municipal role.

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Self-Reflection

Kraemer (2011) describes self-reflection as the ability to pause and examine one’s motivations, assumptions, and impact. This principle has become essential in my role, particularly when balancing council expectations with the realities expressed by residents, youth, and people with lived and living experience (PWLLE). Municipal systems privilege measurable outcomes, yet these norms can flatten complex human experiences (Brail, 2022).

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A common example across municipalities involves drafting and presenting homelessness updates for council. The administrative instinct is to focus on counts and numbers that signal progress. When I step back and reflect, I can see how this framing can pass over what people living outside are actually telling us. Including these perspectives is not simply a matter of language, but an ethical choice to centre lived experience within systems that prioritize data (Gohari, 2024).

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Self-reflection also requires acknowledging historical and ongoing trauma (Kraemer, 2011). In many communities, mistrust of government is grounded in real experiences of displacement, child welfare involvement, and enforcement-focused approaches (Hynes, n.d.). Awareness of these histories informs how I engage and helps me understand how municipal actions may be interpreted, not only through policy, but through lived experience and memory. This matters in a context where the City’s role is often expressed through regulation and enforcement rather than through direct social supports.

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Self-reflection also shapes how I participate in meetings and learning spaces. When frustration or strong emotion surfaces, my instinct is often to move quickly toward explanation or problem-solving. I have become aware that this can close down conversation, even when the intent is to be helpful. A recent example emerged in a MAIS class discussion, where a peer relied heavily on academic jargon in discussion forums. Noticing my own reaction prompted reflection on how easily language can close off conversation instead of opening it. This awareness has carried into my work, reinforcing the importance of slowing down and using clear, accessible language that allows people to fully express concerns before moving toward response or resolution.

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Balance and Perspective

Balance and perspective requires holding multiple priorities without losing sight of broader systemic dynamics (Kraemer, 2011). This describes my daily reality as I navigate youth mental health concerns, provincial reporting frameworks, and community expectations. Each of these operates under different pressures, timeframes, and definitions of success.

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An example of balance and perspective appears in the City’s role in coordinating cold weather responses. While the municipality is often expected to organize the response, there is no funding attached to this role, as social service delivery sits with an external agency. This places me in a liaison position, responsible for convening partners, aligning efforts, and communicating expectations without the leverage that comes with holding financial authority. Holding this tension requires balancing what the City is perceived to be responsible for with what it can realistically deliver, while still advocating for responses that reflect the lived realities of people staying outside.

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The CSWB Plan creates a similar tension. While municipalities are tasked with leading the plan and reporting on progress, there is no dedicated funding attached to it. As a result, I am expected to demonstrate outcomes and coordination across systems without the resources to directly drive change. Balancing this reality requires holding expectations placed on the City alongside the limits of its role, while being honest with community partners about what the plan can and cannot deliver.

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Balance and perspective also shape how I work internally across municipal systems. While department heads regularly meet to discuss strategic priorities, managers historically did not have a shared space to meet across departments, despite being closest to day-to-day operations. Managers often understand implementation challenges, community pressure points, and system gaps in ways that are not always visible at higher levels of the organization.

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Recognizing this, I created a monthly interdepartmental table open to any manager who wished to attend. It is intentionally informal and not framed as a “managers table,” but as a space for shared problem-solving across departments. The purpose is simple: to discuss issues we can realistically address together, rather than working in silos. Creating this space reflects a values-based approach to leadership, one that prioritizes listening and collaboration over formal hierarchy.

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This collaborative approach also shapes how I work with funding. My role does not centre a lot on delivering programs directly. Instead, I often act as a connector/liaison, applying for funding and then transferring or supporting its use across departments where it can be most effective. For example, through the EASE grant and Jumpstart funding, resources were directed to Recreation and the Sportsplex Arena to support programming already embedded in those spaces.

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This work requires balance and trust. It involves letting go of ownership while remaining accountable for outcomes, and recognizing that impact is often strongest when resources are placed with those who can deliver it successfully. Rather than positioning funding as departmental control, I approach it as a shared tool that supports collective goals. In this way, leadership is expressed not through holding resources, but through enabling others to use them well.

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True Self-Confidence

True self-confidence comes from knowing your values and judgment, not just from having a title or authority (Kraemer, 2011). It involves understanding one’s strengths and limitations and acting from a sense of purpose rather than authority.

In practice, true self confidence in my role is less about certainty and more about steadiness. My responsibilities shift daily, and much of my work depends on influence. For example, convening partners around the CSWB Plan requires me to speak candidly about system gaps and limitations, even when I cannot offer funding or immediate solutions. Doing so means trusting my values and professional judgment because clarity and honesty are often the only forms of leadership available in that moment.

Another example of true self confidence shows up in how I navigate pushback. When community members express frustration with the pace of change, I am often the visible face of the system, even when decisions sit elsewhere. Responding honestly about limits and timelines rather than defaulting to defensiveness or overpromising, requires confidence grounded in values rather than authority (Kraemer, 2011). It means staying present in discomfort, even when I cannot resolve the issue in front of me.

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Humility

Humility is perhaps the most transformative of Kraemer’s (2011) principles. It requires recognizing that leadership does not mean having all the answers and that the knowledge needed for decision making often lies outside municipal structures. Humility is particularly important in community development, where power dynamics between government and residents can shape participation long before any meeting begins.

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My work with Indigenous partners illustrates this clearly. Through the Timmins Police Indigenous Advisory Committee (TPIAC) I have learned that meaningful collaboration requires moving at the speed of relationship rather than the speed of municipal timelines. Humility helps me understand when expectations clash with community needs and when the best leadership choice is to step back. This is not easy, and it is something I am still learning, especially in a role that often expects certainty and control.

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A scenario common across municipalities involves engagement sessions where participants hesitate to speak openly because previous (government-led) processes resulted in broken trust. Humility requires acknowledging this history and creating space for voices that systems have historically marginalized. It also requires accepting that trust is not owed to municipal leaders, it must be earned through consistent, values-aligned behaviour (Kraemer, 2011)

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Practicing Values-Based Leadership in Municipal Governance

Municipal leadership is defined by tension, shaped by the pull between legislation and lived experience, political expectations and community needs, and measurable outputs and relational outcomes. These tensions are not occasional; they are embedded in everyday municipal governance and they influence how every decision is interpreted by the community (Dunleavy et al., 2006). Public scrutiny, risk management, and shifting provincial priorities make this work more complex on a daily basis.

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Values-based leadership helps ground leadership in these conditions. Kraemer’s (2011) framework guides how I understand my role and how I act within it, particularly when municipal decisions affect community members differently. For example, political priorities can differ from what service providers or people with lived experience identify as necessary. Council may focus on neighbourhood impact, while community members focus on safety and dignity. Leading from values allows me to balance competing realities without prioritizing administrative convenience over human experience. (Kraemer, 2011; Kouzes & Posner, 2023).

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This tension is especially visible in moments when municipal authority could be exercised, but is purposefully held back. One example is a community mural project, where my role was not to direct or manage outcomes, but to create space for participation. The project did not require policy decisions, enforcement, or any formal approval, yet it carried social significance for the community. Rather than imposing structure, I focused on convening partners, supporting the process, and then stepping aside. Using authority lightly in this context helped build trust, shared ownership, and a sense of belonging that could not have been produced through formal municipal control. This experience illustrates how values-based leadership can mean resisting the instinct to manage and instead using positional power to enable community-led outcomes (Kraemer, 2011).

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It is within these conditions that values-based leadership becomes essential. Equitable leadership means balancing policy and politics with the realities of people’s lives. In practice, this can involve resisting pressure to prioritize only what is easily measured. For example, creating space for youth to partner through Timmins Youth Connect required valuing relational engagement over immediate quantifiable outputs. Youth participation did not fit neatly into traditional performance indicators, yet their insights shaped programming, and built trust that could not have been achieved through consultation alone. Acting from values meant supporting youth voice without controlling outcomes, and recognizing that meaningful impact does not always translate into short-term metrics (Lewis, 2015).

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A similar values-based approach shaped my work on a neighbourhood security pilot. While the initiative included quantitative data from a private security company, I intentionally paired this with qualitative input from residents living in the area. Seven neighbours participated directly, sharing observations, concerns, and day-to-day realities that could not be captured through quantitative counts alone. Their lived knowledge added context to the data, offering a fuller picture of what was actually happening in the neighbourhood. This approach was a deliberate choice I made and brought forward to council. It was time-consuming and often felt slow, requiring hours of listening, follow-up, and translating community conversations into qualitative analysis that could sit alongside quantitative findings. Over the six-week pilot, trust developed. Residents reached out regularly, sometimes to raise concerns and sometimes to challenge decisions. I did not always have answers they wanted to hear, but the openness of the process mattered. Values-based leadership, in this case, meant staying attentive to these dynamics and advocating for work that prioritizes trust and lived experience, even when it does not align with institutional priorities (Kraemer, 2011). Together, these examples show that values-based leadership does not remove tension, but influences how authority, participation, and evidence are balanced in municipal work.

There are moments when efficiency would be easier and perhaps that initial impulse is reinforced by my job that rewards speed and resolution. At times, it would be faster to make decisions without additional conversations, or to move ahead without seeking further input. Relationship-based work is often tiring and time-consuming. Yet values-based leadership requires choosing engagement even when it is uncomfortable or slow, because it is what leads to fairer outcomes. Equity is built over time, not through one-off consultations or rigid timelines, but through consistency, openness, and a willingness to adapt as communities share what they need (Kouzes & Posner, 2023; Murray et al., 2010).

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Pathway Forward

My role as a municipal leader is shaped by ongoing tension between policy and people, legislation and lived experience, and formal responsibilities and human need. Whether drafting the Encampment Protocol, preparing council reports, engaging people with lived and living experience, or coordinating youth-focused initiatives, I work where systems and people collide. These experiences demonstrate that community development cannot be reduced to metrics or administrative processes alone. It depends on relational depth, humility, and a willingness to hold space for experiences that fall outside formal municipal frameworks.

Values-based leadership provides a practical and ethical way to navigate this complexity (Kraemer, 2011). Kraemer’s (2011) principles of self-reflection, balance and perspective, true self-confidence, and humility offer a way to stay grounded when political pressures or administrative expectations conflict with community needs. Leading from values allows me to remain accountable not only to municipal systems, but also to dignity, equity, and community voice.

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Importantly, values-based leadership requires staying with uncertainty rather than resolving it too quickly (Kraemer, 2011). Much of my work unfolds in grey spaces where outcomes are not immediate, linear, tidy or easily measured, and where trust is built over time rather than reported quarterly. This kind of work can sit uncomfortably within municipal cultures yet it is often what enables community development to move forward in meaningful ways. By holding authority and relationship building together, values-based leadership makes it possible to practice community development that is ethical, accountable, and grounded in lived experience, even within systems designed to favour efficiency over complexity.