Even in a incessantly fogbound port metropolis alongside the Atlantic Ocean, the billowing clouds of steam rising from Canada’s largest oil refinery over Saint John, New Brunswick, are inconceivable to overlook.
On a ridge overlooking the refinery sit six monumental tanks, every containing a million barrels of crude oil. Letters painted in darkish blue spell “Irving,” the household whose companies dominate not solely Saint John, however most of New Brunswick.
The bigger of the Irvings’ two native paper mills looms above the Saint John River like a medieval fortress. Irving-owned railway tracks crisscross the town, linking smaller factories owned by the household to ports underneath Irving management. Irving-owned building-supply shops and gasoline stations dot the streets on this metropolis of 78,000 folks, the place park indicators honor Irving contributions to their repairs.
The household’s 4 radio stations in New Brunswick fill the airwaves. And Irving-owned transport vans carry Irving-made items, like structural metal and frozen French fries. An Irving-owned safety firm offers guards for Irving-owned properties.
Canada has many households which have constructed enterprise empires, most notably the Thomson household, which controls Thomson-Reuters, the media, monetary and authorized data firm.
However the Irvings stand out for his or her command of a single area. Beginning within the Nineteen Twenties with a common retailer and gasoline station that bought Ford Mannequin Ts, Kenneth Colin Irving, who was often called Okay.C., established a privately owned household enterprise now price an estimated 14.5 billion Canadian {dollars}, or about $10.1 billion.
The household’s legacy in Canada is sophisticated. Its corporations have introduced employment to a area the place jobs are scarce. By some estimates, one out of each 10 folks in New Brunswick works for an Irving firm. Nonetheless, the province persistently ranks at or close to the underside in Canada for household earnings.
And whereas Irving corporations have created giant industries, its factories have additionally introduced air pollution to Saint John and blighted its neighborhoods, in keeping with residents and former authorities officers.
However the household’s financial energy and political affect have made many individuals in Saint John reluctant to overtly criticize the Irvings. The household’s determination in 2003 to shut its shipyard in Saint John, which as soon as employed 4,000 folks, to focus on its operation in Halifax, Nova Scotia was broadly seen as a consequence of fractious labor relations.
“There’s a tradition in Saint John of retaining your head down and retaining your mouth shut,” mentioned Don Darling, the town’s mayor from 2016 to 2021.
He mentioned he believed that Saint John’s robust industrial base ought to make the native financial system stronger, however that the comparatively low taxes on many Irving-owned companies have made it tough to assist wanted social companies.
“I don’t blame the Irvings essentially,’’ he added. “However all people has to play a job and everybody ought to take accountability for his or her half locally.”
The Irving household didn’t reply to a listing of questions on its impact on the town.
As we speak the Irving empire primarily consists of two giant conglomerates, each nonetheless owned and managed by the Irving household.
The businesses haven’t all the time been straightforward neighbors. In 2018, the residents of Nice Metropolis Road in Saint John East have been twice jolted by the Irving refinery. First, a leaky pipe led to an explosion that injured 36 employees. Then the neighborhood was evacuated after a rusty pipeline carrying poisonous and explosive butane burst.
Irving Oil was fined 200,000 Canadian {dollars}, about $140,000, for the explosion, and Nice Metropolis Road was ceaselessly modified. Irving purchased about 20 homes close to the pipeline and demolished them, apparently to create a buffer between the refinery and residents. The deserted neighborhood is now blocked off by concrete boundaries and patrolled by Irving-employed guards.
Like different folks in Saint John, Lisa Crandall, who lives close to the boundaries, mentioned she knew of members of the family and pets that had died from uncommon cancers.
However there was little scrutiny of any well being points associated to the Irving firm by native authorities companies or personal teams. A 2009 examine for the Conservation Council of New Brunswick, an advocacy group, discovered that lung most cancers charges for ladies in Saint John have been 82 p.c greater than nationwide charges and 98 p.c greater for males.
There have been no identified research instantly linking well being issues to Irving-owned companies.
The refinery has dusted neighborhoods with chemical particulate. The provincial authorities has declared these releases of mud and soot to be low danger to residents, however that has did not reassure them. Effective particles have been linked to bronchial asthma, lung illness and bronchitis.
Ms. Crandall mentioned she was annoyed by the shortage of communications from the corporate. Up to now, she mentioned, it has supplied no details about the bulldozing of homes on her avenue.
“They don’t speak about it,” she mentioned. “They only all the time ship out a letter saying: Hello, we’re your neighbor. Sorry for the inconvenience.”
Okay.C. Irving started the household’s empire by including an oil firm to his automotive dealership and gasoline station. Through the Nice Despair, he took over failing bus and truck corporations, and after World Conflict II expanded to paper, ships and lumber.
The corporate’s rising affect introduced concessions and tax breaks from authorities. In 1951, the province handed a regulation, which is now not in power, permitting the Irving pulp mill to pour waste into the Saint John River. And Irving Oil was given a 42-year property tax exemption that led to 2023.
“The extent of entry to elected officers that they’ve is like that given to nobody else,” mentioned Mr. Darling, the previous mayor. “Present us if it is smart to offer particular tax remedy to any enterprise — to the Irvings or anybody else.’’
Again on Nice Metropolis Road, Ms. Crandall mentioned she wished there was some solution to diminish Irving’s outsize presence in Saint John.
“I’d like to see them simply promote every little thing and have totally different corporations are available in,” she mentioned. (Irving has not introduced any such plans.)
“It might be actually good for the town,” she added. “I do know lots of people would hate me for saying that.”
