When WSIB moves its headquarters to London, Ont., will the office be downtown?

Office workers offer core area businesses a steady weekday customer base.

Struggling with more than a million square feet of vacant office space in core business districts, hope for a turnaround has been riding on last year’s announcement that the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board’s (WSIB) headquarters would move from Toronto to London, Ont.

Prior to the pandemic, 3,000 workers commuted each day to Toronto.

At the April 2022 announcement, the WSIB was unsure how many of those positions would move here given the evolving opportunities for working remotely.

However, multiple sources have told CTV News that the WSIB is now eyeing the 3M building at 300 Tartan Dr. near Veterans Memorial Parkway as a new headquarters.

The six-storey office building offers 134,500 square feet of space.

It was put on the market last summer when 3M reduced its need for local office space.

The online listing was recently updated to read “under contract”, so CTV News specifically asked if the WSIB is planning to relocate to the building on Tartan Drive rather than relocate to downtown London.

Office building at 300 Tartan Dr. in east London, Ont. as seen on June 2, 2023. (Daryl Newcombe/CTV News London)

The Labour Minister’s Office reiterated that, “Our government promised to move the WSIB to London and we're getting it done. This decision will bring economic development and hundreds of well-paying jobs from downtown Toronto to the region.”

A response from the WSIB also included no reference to 300 Tartan Dr., “We have been actively looking to confirm the ideal location for our new head office for many months, and that comprehensive process continues.”

On June 6, a strategy to address core area vacancies will be considered by city council.

It determined that office vacancy in the core reached 24.6 per cent last fall (1.2 million square feet) in the downtown, midtown, and the Old East Village.

In a statement, Mayor Josh Morgan told CTV News, “Our understanding is that no final decision has been made on the location of WSIB. Until confirmation is received from the appropriate parties, I’m not in a position to comment on that aspect.”

At last April’s relocation announcement, Morgan discussed the possibility of bringing WSIB to the core.

“This is the type of thing that works very well in our downtown, there’s lots of opportunities there, but it’s not city council that will make that decision, it will be the good folks at WSIB,” he said at the time.

No timeline has been offered to announce the new location in London.