Even in a frequently fogbound port city along the Atlantic Ocean, the billowing clouds of steam rising from Canada’s largest oil refinery over Saint John, New Brunswick, are impossible to miss.
On a ridge overlooking the refinery sit six enormous tanks, each containing one million barrels of crude oil. Letters painted in dark blue spell “Irving,” the family whose businesses dominate not only Saint John, but most of New Brunswick.
The larger of the Irvings’ two local paper mills looms above the Saint John River like a medieval fortress. Irving-owned railway tracks crisscross the city, linking smaller factories owned by the family to ports under Irving control. Irving-owned building-supply stores and gas stations dot the streets in this city of 78,000 people, where park signs honor Irving contributions to their upkeep.
The family’s four radio stations in New Brunswick fill the airwaves. And Irving-owned transport trucks carry Irving-made goods, like structural steel and frozen French fries. An Irving-owned security company provides guards for Irving-owned properties.
Canada has many families that have built business empires, most notably the Thomson family, which controls Thomson-Reuters, the media, financial and legal information company.
But the Irvings stand out for their command of a single region. Starting in the 1920s with a general store and gas station that sold Ford Model Ts, Kenneth Colin Irving, who was known as K.C., established a privately owned family business now worth an estimated 14.5 billion Canadian dollars, or about $10.1 billion.
The family’s legacy in Canada is complicated. Its companies have brought employment to a region where jobs are scarce. By some estimates, one out of every 10 people in New Brunswick works for an Irving company. Still, the province consistently ranks at or near the bottom in Canada for family income.
And while Irving companies have created large industries, its factories have also brought pollution to Saint John and blighted its neighborhoods, according to residents and former government officials.
But the family’s economic power and political influence have made many people in Saint John reluctant to openly criticize the Irvings. The family’s decision in 2003 to close its shipyard in Saint John, which once employed 4,000 people, to concentrate on its operation in Halifax, Nova Scotia was widely seen as a consequence of fractious labor relations.
“There is a culture in Saint John of keeping your head down and keeping your mouth shut,” said Don Darling, the city’s mayor from 2016 to 2021.
He said he believed that Saint John’s strong industrial base should make the local economy stronger, but that the relatively low taxes on many Irving-owned businesses have made it difficult to support needed social services.
“I don’t blame the Irvings necessarily,’’ he added. “But everybody has to play a role and everyone should take responsibility for their part in the community.”
The Irving family did not respond to a list of questions about its effect on the city.
Today the Irving empire mainly consists of two large conglomerates, both still owned and controlled by the Irving family.
The companies have not always been easy neighbors. In 2018, the residents of Pleasant City Street in Saint John East were twice jolted by the Irving refinery. First, a leaky pipe led to an explosion that injured 36 workers. Then the neighborhood was evacuated after a rusty pipeline carrying toxic and explosive butane burst.
Irving Oil was fined 200,000 Canadian dollars, about $140,000, for the explosion, and Pleasant City Street was forever changed. Irving bought about 20 houses near the pipeline and demolished them, apparently to create a buffer between the refinery and residents. The abandoned neighborhood is now blocked off by concrete barriers and patrolled by Irving-employed guards.
Like other people in Saint John, Lisa Crandall, who lives near the barriers, said she knew of family members and pets that had died from unusual cancers.
But there has been little scrutiny of any health issues related to the Irving company by local government agencies or private groups. A 2009 study for the Conservation Council of New Brunswick, an advocacy group, found that lung cancer rates for women in Saint John were 82 percent higher than national rates and 98 percent higher for men.
There have been no known studies directly linking health problems to Irving-owned businesses.
The refinery has dusted neighborhoods with chemical particulate. The provincial government has declared these releases of dust and soot to be low risk to residents, but that has failed to reassure them. Fine particles have been linked to asthma, lung disease and bronchitis.
Ms. Crandall said she was frustrated by the lack of communications from the company. To date, she said, it has offered no information about the bulldozing of houses on her street.
“They don’t talk about it,” she said. “They just always send out a letter saying: Hi, we’re your neighbor. Sorry for the inconvenience.”
K.C. Irving began the family’s empire by adding an oil company to his car dealership and gas station. During the Great Depression, he took over failing bus and truck companies, and after World War II expanded to paper, ships and lumber.
The company’s growing influence brought concessions and tax breaks from government. In 1951, the province passed a law, which is no longer in force, allowing the Irving pulp mill to pour waste into the Saint John River. And Irving Oil was given a 42-year property tax exemption that ended in 2023.
“The level of access to elected officials that they have is like that given to no one else,” said Mr. Darling, the former mayor. “Show us if it makes sense to give special tax treatment to any business — to the Irvings or anyone else.’’
Back on Pleasant City Street, Ms. Crandall said she wished there was some way to diminish Irving’s outsize presence in Saint John.
“I would love to see them just sell everything and have different companies come in,” she said. (Irving has not announced any such plans.)
“It would be really good for the city,” she added. “I know a lot of people would hate me for saying that.”