Joint services with Waterloo

We work with the City of Waterloo to streamline services and benefit residents on both sides of our borders. These services include fire dispatch, equipment sharing and more.

On this page:

1. Why we share services
2. Current projects
3. Ongoing services

Why we share services

We work with Waterloo to:

• identify services we share and look at ways we can streamline them to benefit residents on both sides of our borders
• maximize the effectiveness and efficiency of our resources and service delivery
• develop and complete strategic joint initiatives
• learn from our collective best practices

The joint projects we pursue align to three basic principles:

• accessibility: residents in both cities must be able to understand the purpose and benefits of the project
• accountability: each project must represent the needs of both communities and clearly identify areas of responsibility
• affordability: each project must maximize cost efficiencies where possible, without sacrificing the benefits to residents

Each project must:

• enhance the ability of either city to deliver or develop a service or program outside of its resources
• create service-level improvements, while either maintaining costs or producing savings opportunities
• provide operational and/or capital opportunities
• feature best practices of both of our organizations

Current projects

These joint projects are underway:

Continuing initiatives (into 2026)

• Fleet Innovation: Kitchener and Waterloo are jointly piloting autonomous mower technology and telematics systems.
• Inclusionary Zoning – Affordable Housing: The two cities are coordinating consultant work and policy analysis on Inclusionary Zoning in Protected Major Transit Station Areas.
• Official Plan Comprehensive Reviews: Kitchener, Waterloo, Cambridge, and the Region are aligning Official Plan updates with the aim of ensuring more consistent growth frameworks and coordinated policies.
• Sport and Recreation Joint Services Committee: Municipal partners are working on aligning sport and recreation service delivery and preparing collaboratively for the 2026 Ontario Summer Games.

New Initiatives (beginning in 2026)

• Zoning By‑Law Review: Kitchener and Waterloo will explore opportunities for greater alignment in zoning regulations to streamline frameworks and enable consistent housing and built form standards.
• Excess Soils Feasibility Study: The cities are collaborating on sustainable strategies for reusing excess soils from municipal projects, reducing reliance on gravel pit disposal and exploring beneficial reuse on municipal lands.
• Streaming Services in Recreation Facilities: A joint policy framework will establish consistent guidelines for live streaming in city recreation spaces, while balancing technology use with privacy considerations.
• OneWater Initiative: Kitchener and Waterloo are assessing circular water system models that prioritize reuse, aiming to extend capacity and avoid costly infrastructure investments.

Ongoing services

We collaborate to improve service delivery in these ways:

• maintenance of the 20 border streets including snow removal, general upkeep, street sweeping and leaf collection
• joint fire dispatch: Kitchener offers dispatch services to Waterloo and Cambridge for an annual fee, this includes all infrastructure, hardware, software and mapping data
• mutual aid: if a major emergency occurs and the situation cannot be contained or controlled with available resources, both cities will look to one another to provide support or coverage in needed areas
• equipment sharing to reduce duplication and costs
• Kitchener manufactures Waterloo's traffic signs
• common platform for resident engagement
• coordinated lobbying efforts in support of two-way, all-day GO service from Toronto
• joint advertising campaigns to reduce cost of letting residents know about programs like snow and ice removal, Earth Week, Earth Hour and more
• joint purchasing through the Cooperative Purchasing Group of Waterloo Region to achieve savings on the purchase of everything from road salt to envelopes
• Waterloo Region Small Business Centre is supported through the economic development functions of both cities
• staff learning and development: finding opportunities to share best practices and common staff learning programs
• joint promotion of the ‘Bloom in a Box’ program, which offers a grant to homeowners toward purchase of a naturalization kit for a landscaped area to reduce stormwater runoff to municipal systems
• corporate fleet training and best practice information sharing
• common Administrative Monetary Penalty System to move adjudication of parking tickets out of the provincial court system
• joint bylaw enforcement and reciprocal support arrangements for large special events
• Alert Waterloo Region, a service that sends residents important public safety messages in the event of a large-scale emergency
• coordinate winter weather updates to ensure citizens receive consistent messages and give more web-based and social media communications.
• both cities contribute to Explore Waterloo Region to provide tourism services to their respective communities