New book chronicles how Stratford residents defeated a proposal to build a factory on their farmland

Four years ago, Stratford, Ont., prepared to welcome Xinyi Canada's $400 million glass plant, which was set to create 380 new jobs for that area.

Concerned citizens there raised the alarm, citing that Xinyi's environmental impact was unknown and their questions about what it would mean for their community weren't being answered. 

Get Concerned Stratford was born, an advocacy group that would eventually cause the company to abandon its factory proposal. 

Now, a book has come out highlighting their success — and the work it took to get there. Co-authors Mike Balkwill and Sam Demby saw the campaign as it was happening.

Mike Balkwill joined CBC Kitchener-Waterloo's The Morning Edition and host Craig Norris to talk about the book called A Winning Campaign.

The following has been edited for length and clarity. Audio can be found at the bottom of the page.

Craig Norris: What is this book about?

Mike Balkwill: It's a story of how a community defeated a proposal to build a factory on farmland against tremendous odds. We told it in a way that recounts step by step what happens, and provides lessons for other communities who are looking at similar situations where they think something's a done deal. We were able to demonstrate that it's not always a done deal.

Norris: How long have you been working on the book?

Balkwill: It took us three years to write the book, partly because I'm an ongoing organizer and finding time to write is a challenge.

But also we wanted to work closely with the community to be sure it was their story, so we did lots of research. We had lots of meetings with them. They had kept very good archives about their whole campaign, so we had lots of resource material we could draw.

Norris: What impact has the book had on Stratford now that you can sit back and look at what happened?

Balkwill: I would say two things. When I talked with groups like this, you know, all these people came together, it was a unique situation for them to work together to have a campaign like this. It's like developing a political muscle, and when you have that muscle, when you go through the exercises and develop them, you have them and you can use them.

And an interesting part of this all has been Get Concerned Stratford has continued to be a force in local advocacy ever since the campaign.

The campaign happened during the pandemic, which by the way was really interesting. I live in Toronto, it was a 15-week campaign. I was involved in the campaign every day via Zoom. I had never done that before. I'd never been part of organizing on Zoom. That was new for all the people as well. We were having weekly online meetings where 400 people were attending. It was incredible. 

When we held the book launch a week ago Sunday, I was meeting people for the first time in person that I had not met during the campaign at all, and they knew each other of course, but it was really quite warm and quite welcoming and quite a celebration for us all to be together and reflect back on that experience.

Norris: What was it personally for you that made you want to be part of all of this?

Balkwill: It's what I do for a living. I work for the Small Change Fund now and back at that time I was working for a group called the Wellington Water Watchers, which you may be familiar with, and that's the work I do.

I work with people in communities doing grassroots organizing, helping them win things they want to win and stop things they don't want to see happen, like this glass factory.

Norris: Was there ever a moment, or maybe there were more than a few of them during the campaign against Xinyi setting up shop, where it just felt like it was inevitable and you wanted to throw in the towel?

Balkwill: Right at the very beginning, and it's important to me to recount this story, was that Mayor Dan Matheson and council had been working for two years in secret on this proposal supported by a Minister's Zoning Order, an MZO from the Doug Ford government.

So they had been working in secret for two years and then at the end of October in that year they announced that in two weeks' time they were going to be voting on a proposal to provide financial incentives. Nobody had heard anything about this.

Now Sharon Collingwood, who's one of the local leaders, and was a member of the Water Watchers at the time, called me up and said, Mike, what can we do? And part of the background story to this is Xinyi had tried to be approved for a proposal in Guelph Hermosa Township, just outside of Guelph.

And they sought to stop them then because they had to participate in a public planning process. So because they had lost by going through a public planning process, they went through a private process.

But we mobilized quickly. There was a public meeting online on Zoom, a lot of people got on and complained about what was going on. 

So I told the mayor and council this was anti-democratic, they were rushing it. It was so loud that the council postponed that initial decision of the financial incentive. So in the five days leading up to when they made that decision to postpone it, we weren't sure at all we were going to get anywhere. But once they postponed that decision, then we knew we had a chance.

Norris: What message do you most want people to take away from this book?

Balkwill: Two things, one that what might look like a done deal is not a done deal. It's no guarantee when you organize to push back to fight these things, there's no guarantee you'll win, but there's a guarantee for sure if you don't fight, you'll lose. And so first of all, it's not a done deal. 

The second thing I want to say, which is the point of the book, which includes many, many lessons from their experience, is that there is a method to organize, to build grassroots power to make the community we want to have, to write the future we want to have.

So everybody who's worried about climate change, who's worried about the developments are happening in the neighborhood, who feel maybe overwhelmed, there's nothing we can do. There is a method for organizing that's reliable, that people and communities can take on, can learn, can do and can have success.

Not every time, but as we like to say in organizing, there's two imperatives — make progress on the issue and build your power. And even if you don't necessarily win on the issue, you'll build political muscle so you can win next time. And that's the lessons we hope people take from this book.

LISTEN | Mike Balkwill talk about A Winning Campaign:

The Morning Edition - K-W7:19A Winning Campaign details Stratford residents' success in shutting down factory proposal

In 2021, a group of Stratford advocates spoke up and stopped the construction of a glass factory they believed would have a harmful impact on the environment. Now, there’s a book about their efforts. Mike Balkwill is co-author of A Winning Campaign and talks about the book.