Talks between city-owned Exhibition Place and the union it locked out last month are set to restart as the Canadian National Exhibition loses visitors, revenue and performers to picket lines.

Negotiators for the Exhibition Place board of governors sent IATSE Local 58, representing skilled audio, visual and lighting technicians, an offer late Wednesday to return to contract negotiations with a new mediator, in addition to the existing provincially appointed mediator.

IATSE agreed to resume negotiations Friday and also Sunday if required, said Justin Antheunis, president of Local 58.

The lockout continues, however, and picket lines will remain outside CNE gates.

The Ex pays the city, its landlord, about $7 million a year for use of Exhibition Place and services such as garbage pickup, but has no say over the contract with IATSE workers.

Exhibition Place’s overture followed a city council meeting Tuesday where, behind closed doors, councillors agreed to urge mediation.

Mayor John Tory and Councillor Mark Grimes, the chair of the Exhibition Place board of governors, opposed a proposal from some councillors to urge binding arbitration, which would end the lockout.

The resumption of talks more than a month after the board locked out IATSE members also follows a plea from CNE chief executive Virginia Ludy for agreement to end picket lines at the Ex which have reduced attendance and could cost the Ex $1.5 million or more.

The picket lines have also triggered Classic Albums Live and a band called The Carpet Frogs to cancel scheduled appearances.

Also, in response to the lockout, the Just For Laughs comedy organization is relocating the Joe Rogan: Strange Times 2018 Tour in late September from two venues on Exhibition Place grounds to the Scotiabank Arena and Winter Garden Theatre.

The Exhibition Place board “wants to bring in a third-party mediator who usually does arbitration with the Ontario Labour Relations Board and we’ve agreed to one of the three names they offered,” Antheunis told the Star on Thursday.

“It gives us hope because they’re finally willing to come to the table. I think they see the effect that this lockout has had on the CNE and they’re starting to see the effect that this lockout is having on future clients as well.”

Grimes said in an email to the Star that he met with Exhibition Place staff after the council meeting and directed them to write the letter. Antheunis said he reached out to the board at the same time.

Grimes added: “I am pleased that IATSE Local 58 President Justin Antheunis has accepted the invitation.”

The crux of the impasse is whether companies and events using Exhibition Place, where tenants include the Ex, Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment and LiveNation, should be given free rein to bring in their own workers and not be forced to hire IATSE Local 58 members.

The union says the city should not act as a hands-off landlord and let foreign crews, or non-union locals hired by U.S. companies, get wages now paid to skilled Toronto workers with benefits.

Exhibition Place says it needs a more flexible contract that allows tenants with increasingly complex shows to use their own staff without having to hire IATSE members to “shadow” them, a requirement the board says increases costs and reduces activity on the grounds.

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Virginia Ludy, the CNE’s chief executive, said there is room for improvement in Exhibition Place’s most recent agreement with IATSE, but the Ex, which draws on the technicians more than any other tenant on the site, has learned how to “work within the collective agreement.”

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“It sounds to me that what the board has put on the table is quite a significant ask: the union losing jurisdiction as sole supplier on the site, to lose exclusivity. And I don’t know any union that would agree to that,” she said.

Grimes said in an email that “it is vital that we modernize our collective agreement to be better positioned to attract new business to Exhibition Place, reflect changes to industry practices and technology, and to meet the needs of our current stakeholders, tenants and clients.”

But Councillor Jim Karygiannis, who also sits on the Exhibition Place board, has a different view.

“This is a union-busting exercise, nothing else,” he said in an interview. “It’s unfortunate that we, as a board, locked the workers out.”