Dozens of foreign workers in pilot program recommended for permanent residency in Thunder Bay

A three-year pilot program aimed at recruiting immigrants to work and live in various communities across Canada has been growing and flourishing in Thunder Bay, Ont.

The Rural and Northern Immigration Pilot (RNIP), a community-driven program started in 2019, is a way for newcomers to obtain permanent resident status in Canada by connecting them with full-time job opportunities.

Thunder Bay, among 11 cities chosen for the pilot, now involves 80 employers in the city.

We need people to move here, so this is a part of that overall strategy to have an immigration program that is directly supplying newcomers to our community who can fill the jobs, fill the needs, move here and relocate their families.​​- Emily Lauzon, Thunder Bay Community Economic Development Commission

To date, 138 foreign workers have been recommended for permanent residency. The goal is to increase that to 150 by December.

Emily Lauzon, program co-ordinator and workforce development officer at the Thunder Bay Community Economic Development Commission (CEDC), said the city was chosen because it's shown a need for population growth.

"A lot of the time, we see immigrants relocating en masse to Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, all of these bigger places. So the unique thing about this program is that the communities get to select newcomers and they directly relocate to Thunder Bay."

According to the federal government, the RNIP, which will continue through at least the end of 2022, was "designed to spread the benefits of economic immigration to smaller communities by creating a path to permanent residence for skilled foreign workers who want to work and live in one of the participating communities."

Along with Thunder Bay, the other Ontario communities are:

• North Bay.
• Sudbury.
• Sault Ste. Marie.
• Timmins.

Areas of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and B.C. are also involved in the pilot.

Program helps keep population up

Lauzon said it's an important program for regions like northwestern Ontario as people move to other communities, including through workplace retirements.

Attracting new residents is important in boosting businesses and keeping school enrolments up, she said.

"We need people to move here, so this is a part of that overall strategy to have an immigration program that is directly supplying newcomers to our community who can fill the jobs, fill the needs, move here and relocate their families."

Although the RNIP has boosted northwestern Ontario, there have been challenges, including delays in paperwork and because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Initially, some businesses were hesitant to support newcomers, due to changing policies, high costs and uncertainty about what to expect.

But Lauzon said that with the RNIP, businesses can get valuable help from the CEDC.

"They trust us. We're handling all of the details alongside with them while they're participating in this program, so we've been able to ease employers into interacting with the immigration system in a new way."

Lauzon said there are economic benefits to the RNIP.

"They're not temporary foreign workers," she said about the people in the program. "They're here to become permanent residents of our community. ... that's a really important aspect of this program. It's not just a quick fix … we're selecting future community members."