Last week, the St. Andrew's Ward councillor resigned from the St. Catharines executive of the provincial Liberal party after receiving a reply from Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing Jim Watson. Gill wrote to the minister months after city council passed a resolution calling on the province to appoint a facilitator to review the city's representation within the region.

Currently, St. Catharines has seven councillors (including the mayor) on the 30-seat regional council, which works out to just over a quarter of the members. Yet the municipality has one-third of the population.

Larger municipalities such as Niagara Falls and Welland are also underrepresented and though the three largest make up the majority of the population, they can be outvoted by the smaller municipalities.

The minister's letter indicated the province would not get involved without being called to do so by the region.

Gill had sent his letter partially because the province had yet to respond to council's March resolution, which was followed up by a letter from Mayor Brian McMullan.

Along with his resignation from the executive he has sat on since shortly after being elected in the municipal election, Gill sent another letter to Watson, calling on him to reconsider.

"I was really disappointed that they continued to allow this to happen to St.Catharines," he said.

Some of Gill's comments were reported in the media in a story that also mentioned the province's failure to reply to the mayor. That very day, Watson's office called the mayor to apologize for the delay and to promise that Watson would meet with him and Niagara Region Chairman Peter Partington sometime this summer to discuss the issue.

McMullan said he was pleased with the response.

"Basically, our request has been granted," he said.

But Gill said he has other beefs with the province that must be addressed before he rethinks his stance. Chief among them is its apparent unwillingness to enforce the Places to Grow Act, which designates St. Catharines as Niagara's urban growth centre. To Gill, this means there should be no question that the police headquarters be located downtown.

"It's very, very good legislation, just enforce it," Gill said.