new regional government built highways, water systems and public transit, while the thirteen townships, villages, towns, and cities continued to provide some local services to their residents. To manage the yearly upkeep of the new infrastructure, the new regional government levied its own property tax, collected by the local municipalities. On January 1, 1967, several of the smaller municipalities were amalgamated with larger ones, reducing their number to six. Forest Hill and Swansea became part of Toronto; Long Branch, Mimico, and New Toronto joined Etobicoke; Weston merged with York, and Leaside amalgamated with East York. This arrangement lasted until 1998. Although a referendum of the Metro municipalities showed broad opposition, the Ontario government passed the City of Toronto Act, 1996, which spelled the demise of the Metro Toronto federation. During 1997, the municipalities of Metro were placed under provincial trusteeship. On January 1, 1998, Metro and its constituent municipalities were dissolved, replaced by the single-tier "megacity" of Toronto, which is the successor of the previous City of Toronto. Mel Lastman, the long-time mayor of North York before the amalgamation, became the first mayor (62nd overall) of the new megacity. Existing by-laws of the individual municipalities were retained until new citywide by-laws could be written and enacted. New citywide by-laws have since been enacted, although many of the individual differences were continued, applying only to the districts where the by-laws applied, such as winter sidewalk clearing and garbage pickup. The existing city halls of the various municipalities were retained by the new corporation for various purposes. The City of York's civic centre became a court office. The existing 1965 City Hall of Toronto became the city hall of the new megacity, while Metro Hall, the "city hall" of the Metro government, is used as municipal office space. The community councils of Etobicoke–York, North York and Scarborough meet in their respective pre-existing municipal buildings. In 2018, just before that year's provincial election, the Ontario government of Doug Ford passed the Better Local Government Act, which redefined the number and representation of Toronto City Council. The number of councillors was reduced to 25, and council districts were defined that matched provincial electoral districts. The passage took place during the ongoing election campaign and spurred a number of lawsuits by potential candidates and a referral to the Ontario courts of the act's constitutionality. Its constitutionality was upheld and the reduced number of councillors was