{"id":10738,"date":"2015-05-20T14:48:20","date_gmt":"2015-05-20T18:48:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=10738"},"modified":"2015-05-27T15:59:35","modified_gmt":"2015-05-27T19:59:35","slug":"magna-to-leave-aurora-for-king-by-2017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/magna-to-leave-aurora-for-king-by-2017\/","title":{"rendered":"Magna to leave Aurora for King by 2017"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

Magna International is planning on relocating its operations to King Township by the end of December 2017.<\/p>\n

The company recently purchased 105 acres of land on the southeast corner of King Road and Jane Street, with an eye to constructing an amalgamated corporate office of 200,000 square feet of office space, plus research and development facilities, underground parking and various amenities for over 625 employees.<\/p>\n

Presently leasing office and research and development space in Aurora, Newmarket, and into Peel Region and beyond, these deals expire at the end of 2017 and the company has been exploring moving all their corporate and group office operations under one roof. <\/p>\n

The company planned to file for a formal rezoning application with King Township on Tuesday, May 19.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have been exploring the concept of relocating all our Magna Global and Canadian family corporate and group office operations under one roof,\u201d says Tracy Fuerst, Director of Corporate Communications, for Magna International. \u201cWe have progressed to the point where we made a formal rezoning application submission to King City Municipal Council.\u201d<\/p>\n

Calling Magna\u2019s departure \u201cdisappointing\u201d is \u201cthe understatement of the year\u201d, according to Aurora Mayor Geoff Dawe.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is hard to say [what the impact will be at this point],\u201d he says. \u201cIt is 400 jobs [in Aurora] and we don\u2019t want to lose 400 jobs, but my understanding is this doesn\u2019t actually happen until the end of 2017, so there are certainly lots of opportunities for us to be out beating the bushes and find out whatever potential clients we may have for that.\u201d<\/p>\n

As their current location on the Magna campus on Wellington Street East is a rented facility, Mayor Dawe adds he expects the owners of the building to be \u201cworking diligently\u201d to find new tenants.<\/p>\n

As word spread this week of Magna\u2019s intentions, there has been little opportunity to explore possible avenues to retain the business, he notes, but that is a conversation the municipality would like to have with Magna.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had some brief conversation with them a number of months ago and we talked about how they were starting to run out of room at their location,\u201d says Mayor Dawe. \u201cI know the building itself has always been a challenge in it being an efficient building to operate. It is a pretty spectacular building, but I gather it is not the most effective building for their purposes.\u201d<\/p>\n

As publicity started to roll out this week for the annual Wild, Wild West Hoedown, set to be hosted on the campus by Magna this September, the Mayor stressed the \u201cgenerosity\u201d Magna has displayed throughout the entirety of York Region and he did not expect that to change. At this point, however, it is too early to say the wider impacts Magna\u2019s departure will have on local business and the economy outside that particular sphere.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we need to stress Magna has been an extremely good corporate citizen and [we] certainly thank them for the involvement they have had in the Town,\u201d says Mayor Dawe. \u201cObviously we would like to see them stay, but they need to do what is right for their business as well. We understand that. We don\u2019t necessarily like that, but we certainly understand that.\u201d<\/p>\n

King Mayor Steve Pellegrini, on the other hand, welcomed the move, noting Magna\u2019s decision to stay in York Region. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s fabulous news,\u201d\u2008he said. \u201cI\u2019m so ecstatic. The plans are fantastic.\u201d<\/p>\n

Magna\u2019s application is to formally rezone the lands from agricultural to commercial. The lands, in King City\u2019s Community Plan, have always been designated as Prestige employment and King couldn\u2019t have secured a better corporate partner.<\/p>\n

\u201cTalk about Prestige,\u201d\u2008Mayor Pellegrini added. \u201cWe couldn\u2019t do any better. We are proud to welcome a highly regarded and globally significant corporation such as Magna to the King community.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mayor Pellegrini is hoping to have concept drawings and more information available at his June 4 business lunch. It will be held from 12 noon to 2 p.m. at the Cardinal Golf Club on Highway 9.<\/p>\n

With files from Mark Pavilons.<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Disappointment” over Magna’s departure is “understatement of the year”, says Mayor Geoff Dawe. The company recently purchased 105 acres of land on the southeast corner of King Road and Jane Street, with an eye to…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10738","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-2Nc","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-08-02 07:38:01","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10738","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10738"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10738\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10738"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10738"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10738"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}