April 27, 2021, at 4:00 PM

Original link

The meeting is called to order at 4:00 PM; it being noted that the following Members were in remote attendance: Councillors M. van Holst, M. Salih, J. Helmer, M. Cassidy, J. Morgan, S. Lehman, A. Hopkins, P. Van Meerbergen, S. Turner, E. Peloza, A. Kayabaga and S. Hillier.

1.   Disclosures of Pecuniary Interest

Councillor S. Turner discloses a pecuniary interest with item 5.1, having to do with an update on City services during COVID-19, by indicating that he is an employee of the Middlesex-London Health Unit.

2.   Consent

2.1   Update – Development of the Climate Emergency Action Plan

2021-04-27 Staff Report - Update – Development of the Climate Emergency Action

Moved by P. Squire

Seconded by E. Peloza

That, on the recommendation of the Managing Director, Environmental and Engineering Services and City Engineer and the Managing Director, Development and Compliance Services and Chief Building Official, the staff report with respect to the development of the City’s Climate Emergency Action Plan BE RECEIVED for information.

Motion Passed (14 to 0)

3.   Scheduled Items

None.

4.   Items for Direction

4.1   RBC Place London – COVID-19 Financial Impacts

2021-04-27 Staff Report - RBC Place COVID

Moved by S. Lehman

Seconded by M. Cassidy

That, on the recommendation of the Managing Director, Corporate Services and City Treasurer, Chief Financial Officer, the following actions be taken:

a)      the staff report on RBC Place London COVID-19 Financial Impacts BE RECEIVED for information; and,

b)      RBC Place London BE REQUESTED to review their 10-year capital plan to re-assess priority needs and to mitigate potential capital budget requests through the 2022 Annual Budget Update process.

Motion Passed (15 to 0)

4.2   2020 Year-End Operating Budget Monitoring Report and COVID-19 Financial Impacts

2021-04-27 Staff Report - 2020 Year-End Operating Budget Monitoring Report

Moved by E. Peloza

Seconded by S. Lewis

That, on the recommendation of the Managing Director, Corporate Services and City Treasurer, Chief Financial Officer, the following actions be taken with respect to the 2020 Year-End Operating Budget Monitoring Report:

a)      the 2020 Year-End Operating Budget Monitoring Report for the Property Tax Supported Budget, Water, and Wastewater & Treatment Budgets BE RECEIVED for information. An overview of the net corporate positions are outlined below:

     i) Property Tax Supported Budget surplus of $22.3 million prior to the recommendations listed in this report and contribution to the Operating Budget Contingency Reserve, noting a balanced budget position after factoring in these items;

ii) Water Rate Supported Budget surplus of $5.0 million prior to the contribution to the Water Budget Contingency Reserve;

iii) Wastewater and Treatment Rate Supported Budget surplus of $3.9 million prior to the contribution to the Wastewater and Treatment Budget Contingency Reserve;

b)      the following contributions to reserves in accordance with Council direction from the Mid-Year Report BE RECEIVED for information, noting the contributions were endorsed as funding sources to offset potential financial impacts of COVID-19 on the City’s 2021 Budget:

i) $12.3 million to the Operating Budget Contingency Reserve, noting the year-end contribution takes into account the contributions listed in items c) and d);

ii) $5.0 million to the Water Budget Contingency Reserve;

iii) $3.9 million to the Wastewater and Treatment Budget Contingency Reserve;

c)     the Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to make the following contributions from the Property Tax Supported Budget surplus:

i) an additional $5.0 million to the Economic Development Reserve Fund to support social and economic recovery measures, it being noted the total 2020 contribution for these purposes would be equal to $10.0 million;

ii) Fleet Management net operational savings of approximately $1.5 million from the Property Tax Supported Budget be contributed to the Vehicle and Equipment Replacement Reserve Fund to offset increasing vehicle costs, and to mitigate potential near-term budget increases due to these cost pressures;

d)      the following allocations from the Property Tax Supported Budget surplus BE APPROVED with respect to RBC Place London:

i) a one-time grant to support RBC Place operations for the remainder of 2021 in the amount of $2.5 million;

ii) a one-time contribution to the RBC Place Renewal Reserve Fund to ensure funding for the current RBC Place capital plan in the amount of $1.0 million;

e)      the summary of anticipated COVID-19 impacts on the 2021 Budget BE RECEIVED for information, noting these represent updated forecasts and may vary as the impacts of the pandemic and recovery continues to dynamically evolve; and,

f)      the presentation providing an overview of the 2020 Year-End Budget Monitoring and 2021 COVID-19 Impacts (Appendix “C” of the staff report dated April 27, 2021) BE RECEIVED for information;

it being noted that the reported year-end position is subject to completion of the financial statement audit; and,

it being further noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee received a communication dated April 22, 2021 from C. Butler with respect to this matter.

Voting Record:

Moved by E. Peloza

Seconded by S. Lewis

Motion to approve the staff recommendation, excluding part d) i):

That, on the recommendation of the Managing Director, Corporate Services and City Treasurer, Chief Financial Officer, the following actions be taken with respect to the 2020 Year-End Operating Budget Monitoring Report:

a)      the 2020 Year-End Operating Budget Monitoring Report for the Property Tax Supported Budget, Water, and Wastewater & Treatment Budgets BE RECEIVED for information. An overview of the net corporate positions are outlined below:

i) Property Tax Supported Budget surplus of $22.3 million prior to the recommendations listed in this report and contribution to the Operating Budget Contingency Reserve, noting a balanced budget position after factoring in these items;

      ii) Water Rate Supported Budget surplus of $5.0 million prior to the contribution to the Water Budget Contingency Reserve;

      iii) Wastewater and Treatment Rate Supported Budget surplus of $3.9 million prior to the contribution to the Wastewater and Treatment Budget Contingency Reserve;

b)      the following contributions to reserves in accordance with Council direction from the Mid-Year Report BE RECEIVED for information, noting the contributions were endorsed as funding sources to offset potential financial impacts of COVID-19 on the City’s 2021 Budget:

     i) $12.3 million to the Operating Budget Contingency Reserve, noting the year-end contribution takes into account the contributions listed in items c) and d);

     ii) $5.0 million to the Water Budget Contingency Reserve;

     iii) $3.9 million to the Wastewater and Treatment Budget Contingency Reserve;

c) the Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to make the following contributions from the Property Tax Supported Budget surplus:

     i) an additional $5.0 million to the Economic Development Reserve Fund to support social and economic recovery measures, it being noted the total 2020 contribution for these purposes would be equal to $10.0 million;

     ii) Fleet Management net operational savings of approximately $1.5 million from the Property Tax Supported Budget be contributed to the Vehicle and Equipment Replacement Reserve Fund to offset increasing vehicle costs, and to mitigate potential near-term budget increases due to these cost pressures;

d)

     ii) a one-time contribution to the RBC Place Renewal Reserve Fund to ensure funding for the current RBC Place capital plan in the amount of $1.0 million;

e)      the summary of anticipated COVID-19 impacts on the 2021 Budget BE RECEIVED for information, noting these represent updated forecasts and may vary as the impacts of the pandemic and recovery continues to dynamically evolve; and,

f)      the presentation providing an overview of the 2020 Year-End Budget Monitoring and 2021 COVID-19 Impacts (Appendix “C” of the staff report dated April 27, 2021) BE RECEIVED for information;

it being noted that the reported year-end position is subject to completion of the financial statement audit; and,

it being further noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee received a communication dated April 22, 2021 from C. Butler with respect to this matter.

Motion Passed (14 to 0)

Moved by E. Peloza

Seconded by S. Lewis

Motion to approve part d) i) of the staff recommendation:

d)      the following allocations from the Property Tax Supported Budget surplus BE APPROVED with respect to RBC Place London:

     i) a one-time grant to support RBC Place operations for the remainder of 2021 in the amount of $2.5 million;

Motion Passed (13 to 1)

4.3   2020 Year-End Capital Budget Monitoring Report and COVID-19 Financial Impacts

2021-04-27 Staff Report - 2020 Year-End Capital Budget Monitoring Report

Moved by E. Peloza

Seconded by M. Cassidy

That on the recommendation of the Managing Director, Corporate Services and City Treasurer, Chief Financial Officer, the following actions be taken with respect to the 2020 Year-End Capital Budget Monitoring Report:

a)      it BE NOTED that the City Treasurer, or designate, will undertake the housekeeping budget adjustments identified in the staff report dated April 27, 2021, in accordance with the Multi-Year Budget Policy adopted by By-law No. CPOL.-45-241;

b)      the following actions be taken with respect to the completed capital projects identified in Appendix “C”, as appended to the above-noted report, which have a total of $14.4 million of net surplus funding:

     i) the capital projects included in Appendix “C” BE CLOSED;

ii) the following actions be taken with respect to the funding associated with the capital projects approved for closure in c) i), above:

Rate Supported

A) pay-as-you-go funding of $213 thousand BE TRANSFERRED to capital receipts;

B) authorized debt financing of $2.5 million BE RELEASED resulting in a reduction of authorized, but unissued debt;

C) uncommitted reserve fund drawdowns of $5.2 million BE RELEASED back into the reserve funds which originally funded the projects;

Non-Rate Supported

D) authorized debt financing of $2.7 million BE RELEASED resulting in a reduction of authorized, but unissued debt;

E) uncommitted reserve fund drawdowns of $2.8 million BE RELEASED back into the reserve funds which originally funded the projects; and,

F) other net non-rate supported funding sources of $883 thousand BE ADJUSTED in order to facilitate project closings.

Motion Passed (14 to 0)

4.4   Greater London International Airport Authority (GLIAA) Board of Directors

2021-04-27 Submission - GLIAA Board

Moved by M. van Holst

Seconded by P. Van Meerbergen

That the communication dated April 8, 2021 from Michelle T. Faysal, Chair, Board of Directors, Greater London International Airport Authority (GLIAA) BE RECEIVED and the GLIAA BE AUTHORIZED to leave the aforementioned position vacant while undertaking a review of the size and composition of the board.

Motion Passed (14 to 0)

5.   Deferred Matters/Additional Business

5.1   (ADDED) COVID-19 – City of London Services Update (Spring/Summer 2021)

2021-04-27 Staff Report - COVID-19 City of London Services Update

Moved by S. Lehman

Seconded by J. Morgan

That, on the recommendation of the City Manager, the staff report dated April 27, 2021, entitled “Covid-19 – City of London Services Update (Spring/Summer 2021)”, BE RECEIVED for information.

Motion Passed (13 to 0)

6.   Adjournment

Moved by P. Van Meerbergen

Seconded by S. Lehman

That the meeting adjourn.

Motion Passed

The meeting adjourned at 5:52 PM.

Full Transcript

Transcript provided by Lillian Skinner’s London Council Archive. Note: This is an automated speech-to-text transcript and may contain errors. Speaker names are not identified.

View full transcript (2 hours, 0 minutes)

Do a sound check, please. Can hear you fine. Thank you. Can I ask colleagues to have screens on, please?

I’ve just been advised by the clerk not to touch all the buttons so I don’t break things here. Have we got all screens on, please? For those who are here, I’ll just confirm with the clerk for court. We are good, so colleagues, welcome to the, excuse me, I’m going to the eighth meeting of the Strategic Parties and Policy Committee.

This is a virtual meeting during the COVID-19 emergency. We would ask viewers to check the city website for current details of COVID-19 service impacts, excuse me. The messages can be viewed via livestreaming on YouTube and the city’s website. The city of London is committed to making every effort to provide alternate formats and communication supports for council standing or advisory committees and information upon request.

To make a request for any city service, please contact accessibility@london.ca or 519-661-2489 extension two, four to five. To make a specific request to this meeting, please contact SPPC@london.ca. So colleagues, I’ll now look for any disclosure of superior interest. Seeing none, we have one item on the consent agenda, the development of an update on the development of the climate emergency action plan and there is details in your package.

Do I have a mover? Councillor Lewis, seconded by, or pardon me, Councillor Squire, excuse me, seconded by Councillor Palosa. Any comments or questions, colleagues? Councillor Hopkins.

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Chair. And I want to thank City staff for the report and keeping us updated with the climate emergency action plan and I understand we’re just receiving it. It is an update and I do have a quick question.

I understand there’s been quite a bit of community engagement on this and we’ll be receiving a report later on in the fall, but I would like to know a little bit more about the stakeholders. There’s quite a bit of engagement with community groups. Climate change is a conversation out there in the community and wondering how these community groups will further be engaged with their own advocacy and surveys that they’re doing in the community. It is noted in the recommendation that it’s going on, but wanting to know a little bit more what the outreach of the city will be with these stakeholders through the chair.

Thank you, let’s ask Ms. Sharer to start us off. Thank you, Your Worship. I’m going to actually ask Mr.

Stanford to answer that. We have a big team here tonight from Mr. Cox’s area and mine. So hopefully we can answer all your questions.

Then let’s go to Mr. Stanford, if you would please. Thank you, and through the chair, the community engagement so far has been predominantly online for obvious reasons. We will carry on like that for the foreseeable future and carry us into the fall.

We have actually managed to really reach a lot of community groups who now are much more comfortable dealing online because we’ve all had to endure that. It has actually proven quite valuable in the way of the number of people who are attending our online sessions, the number of people who are actually engaging online with comments and we’re quite pleased with what has come back forward from the community. Part of our work in our next couple of months though, will be a bit of a gap analysis. We’re going to try to determine who we’re not hearing from and we will go out for one final push to really get a better sense from some of the community groups and some of the sectors in London that we have likely not heard from.

However, what’s really important to note though, is that once the plan comes forward later this fall, it’ll be key that one of our biggest missions will be ongoing outreach in this area. It is crucial that we tap into so many different community groups, so many different business groups and so many people that will work alongside the city to really help to get deeper into the community, particularly to groups that normally don’t engage with the city that might be more comfortable engaging with the community groups or with others in their area. And that will be a key group that we’ll be focusing our attention on. Thanks very much, Councillor Evans.

Yeah, I’m really pleased to hear that response. I think it is vital that we keep engaging with the stakeholders in the community because they do a great value in informing. And like Mr. Stanford said, working beside the city.

So I’m glad to hear that. I do have one further question regarding the process moving forward with working at home. And if we have started looking at how that is gonna look like, I know we’re probably right not into recovery at the moment, but just wondering when that is going to be taken into account as we look at the climate action plan. Mr.

Stanford. Through the chair, it is very fascinating what is occurring ‘cause at the city here, of course, with many of, if not most of us working from home, we’re really getting a better sense on a variety of environmental benefits that are quoted with this. And this is something that working with our senior leadership team, of course, we’ll be getting a better appreciation of how we return to work and what will look like, but we’re also recognizing some true benefits that are occurring from working at home. So these are items part of our corporate and our internal work that we are working on right now to sort of determine what will be things that maybe the opportunity for some permanent features into the future that will be wise from financial investment as well, from an environmental investment.

These are some big, big discussions that will be occurring with many in the city. Councilor? Yeah, I’m glad those conversations are going to continue. I sat on a webinar that AMO had last Friday on the city of Brantford, I think has made some drastic changes within their city hall and working from the home.

It was quite interesting and, you know, also looking at both sides of the story too, how we can also support restaurants and the workplace that we have downtown and combining that with working from the home. So I can see lots of conversations still to be had in the city of London. So thank you. Thank you.

I do not see anyone else on the speakers list. So with that, we’ll call the question. Councilor Cassidy, you were hiding in the corner there. Go ahead, please.

Thank you. Yes, and my apologies for taking, so trying to figure out my buttons so that I could get my hand out. So I just want to make a quick comment, first question, on the mention about the Adelaide Street underpass. It talks about the reducing of wait times and all of that stuff.

And I wonder if the city staff might have, and, you know, my apologies if this is throwing something out of left field. They might have an idea on the, what an estimate would be for the reduction of emissions by eliminating all of those cars multiple times a day, sitting at that crossing and waiting. I wonder if, if they have an idea what that might be. Only because it sounds like engineering, I might go to Ms.

Sher, unless she refers me back over to Mr. Stanford. Thank you very much, Your Worship. We have done some work around quantifying the delay and the impacts on emissions.

I don’t have that figure with me. I certainly can provide it by separate email. There was a definite benefit in this location because of the duration of that congestion versus sort of a road widening project that accommodates the same number of vehicles quite more quickly, as well as some safety impacts and the impacts on the business support. Certainly can find that number.

As I said, I unfortunately don’t have it at my fingertips. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I appreciate that.

I would be very interested in that information, especially because the length of time that cars generally sit there is longer than the five minutes, which is often, often it’s longer than the five minutes, which is supposed to be the limit that’s allowed. And there tend to be a lot, a lot of cars waiting at that stop for the trains to get out of the way. I just wanna say quickly that this is a really good report and I wanna thank city staff for health thorough and just diving into every possible nook and cranny that this report goes to. And I know when the city council declared the climate emergency there was, there was some question of whether or not it meant anything, whether or not there could be action behind it, whether it was just symbolic.

And I think that this report shows exactly how far we can go by just declaring, making that simple declaration and then giving it to staff to do their work. And this is really, really good work. And I too am looking forward to the report that’s coming back later on this year. Thank you.

Thank you and colleagues. I’m gonna just come back to something we’ve talked to before and I just want to remind myself, which means I’m gonna remind you, I think it’s probably a helpful practice that when I recognize a colleague that you have that conversation with appropriate staff and we’ll try to find initially the appropriate staff, but you finished that conversation back and forth until it’s done. I don’t think it serves a great purpose in an SPPC meeting to recognize you individually, each time you have a question of that same individual. So with that, I guess I thought of it because I’m gonna get Councillor Turner up next and he’s my conscience on such things and should be because it’s just a better dialogue when we do it this way.

So, Councillor Turner, why don’t we turn it over to you? Let’s try this and see how it works. Shall we? Thanks, Your Worship.

Thanks for the report and I recognize there’s more to come and that’s a really important part to this. The part, as I read through this, a lot of the actions that are identified in these are actions that were on track anyway. And when we talk about low impact development, when we talk about fleet rights sizing, when we talk about water consumption patterns, energy use, all of those things, all of those things were initiatives underway prior to their declaration of the emergency. And so I wonder if there’s a few key pieces and perhaps I missed it in reading the report that can be identified as market changes from normal business or from the course that we were on.

What did we change as a result of that declaration? What are those big ticket items that kind of changed philosophically or in practice as a result of the declaration? So make sure we’ll start with you and then we will allow that dialogue as we said to carry out between you and your team and the council. Thank you, my pleasure, your worship.

Certainly the council is correct. There are a number of things that were in progress are being planned that are reflected in this report. What I think is really interesting that’s been added is the embedding of these principles in our major master planning work, which has not been the practice in the past. Those, I think the climate emergency action plan needs to be seen as a program and it’s going to be a whole lot of projects that are related to our business as usual, our business with the community, our designs, our plans over the course of several years.

So those master plans and they range across facilities, fleet, water, transportation, solid waste management, waste water management have not typically considered climate change as an important integral outcome in their design. It’s baked into everything that’s recently underway or just starting and we’re making adjustments even to work that was well in progress. The other things I think that are interesting here is the climate emergency screening tool. We had started off with the idea of a universal tool that would be one size fits everything.

And in doing so it became so cumbersome, it wasn’t particularly useful. So what we have developed now is the opportunity for that to really custom fit the particular issues to support good decision making on projects and programs and plans on the big picture stuff in service areas depending on their needs and where their impacts lie. And you will be seeing something from us this summer on two of our biggest control pieces which is going to be roadway widening the transportation and solid waste management. What we found in that discussion with our staff was that there’s also a real need and this wasn’t something previously contemplated to screen our business with usual decisions, our day-to-day operation decision making to look for ways to improve how those services are delivered in our community from a climate perspective.

A lot of the conversation on climate change is around projects, around infrastructure, big pieces, but there are a lot of little cumulative actions that can actually add up really effectively in our community. So I think this is some really good work done there. I’m excited about the level of understanding and capacity that we have throughout the organization. I’m really keen to see how it gets built into our development conversations with our colleagues in development in communities, developers and into throughout the organization.

So there are some really good things here and we’re excited to bring it back to you in the fall with more details on it. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Perhaps to Ms.

Livingston, I’ve noticed on staff reports that we’ve been reading, there are in a number of circumstances they’ve identified some of the climate change impacts or considerations and that speaks to the screening tool itself. Will we routinely see a section in every staff report that identifies kind of those considerations that have been weighed and how it goes against this, how it’s been measured against that screening tool for the specific area. Your worship, I’m happy to answer that. And Ms.

Livingston can jump in if she wishes. That is part of our climate emergency action plan in the capacity building within the internal city of London team. And our expectation is that yes, we would report out on climate change impacts as part of a standardized section for any applicable report. Thank you, Ms.

Chair. One of the things I was hoping to see in this was the actual tool, I recognize that that tool is going to be modified based on the service area. Will we have a sense of what that is, what the elements that are being measured and in those service areas and what contemplations were considered or rejected as a result of its measurement against the tool? Your worship, you absolutely will.

And we will be bringing those a couple of examples back with the tool this summer. So you’ll see how it’s been applied to solid waste management, waste diversion in the community. And you’ll see how it’s been applied to transportation as well as the general principle about lighting how that tool works in various service areas throughout the city. Great, thank you.

And through your worship, one final question is that the timing in the fall part of the challenge, one of the advantages of climate change work is that some of the activities themselves may have a positive impact on our budget. We might have to spend less as a result because some of the things that we’re doing might have negative climate impacts and then we might have cost savings opportunities. On the other side, there might be some investments that we have to make in order to recognize those. Will the report coming forward in the fall give us opportunity to consider those adequately in time for the budget update for the 2023 year?

Your worship, absolutely. So the multi-year budget that gets done in terms of our next multi-year will probably be our first one where climate change principles are really deeply entrenched in the business case. And we’re working out with that with finance. But even as we prepare for the update, it is something that the senior leadership team and our friends in finance have been working together on to ensure that that opportunity is not lost in advance of those more robust tools.

Great, thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Your Worship. Thank you, Councillor Redholst.

Thank you, Your Worship. And through you to staff, just to thanks to see some of the savings that were alluded to by Councilor Turner in Appendix D. And of course, every time we’re taking actions where we’re saving money, that gives us more funds to pursue other projects. So I think prioritizing those means that we get more done and I’m pleased to see that.

I was happy to see it in the report, thank you. Thank you, I am looking at the screen and I do not see anyone else. So we have a motion moved and seconded. We will call the question.

Mr. Sully, closing the vote, the motion’s passed 14 to zero. Yes, we have no scheduled items. However, we have four items, four direction.

And the first deals with RBC Place London 4.1 on the agenda, the COVID-19 financial impacts. The recommendations that on the recommendation of the managing director of corporate services and city treasurer CFO. A, this report on RBC Place COVID-19 financial impacts we receive information in B, RBC Place London B requested to review their tenure capital plan to reassess priority needs and mitigate potential capital budget requests through the 2022 annual budget update process. So to begin the discussion, I will look for a mover and a seconder, as it is, please, is the remover.

Councillor Layman, seconded by Councillor Cassidy. Thank you, I will share with you as well that Lori De Silva from RBC Place is also available. Should there be questions that you wish you wish to have directed there as well? But a motion is on the floor.

We’ll open up for any questions colleagues may have. Councillor van Hose, please. Yes, thank you, Your Worship. I think about the many events I’ve attended at the RBC Place over the last five of six years.

And I think I could describe it as, it was the best of times and it was the best of times. So I’m sad to hear about the devastating impact referred to in the first sentence of the executive summary. Though I can’t say it’s true that it was caused by a pandemic, it was caused by our response to a pandemic. So I’m wondering if there’s a way that we can make use of this asset in our response.

And in the back of my mind is the citizens threatening to pick at the Hamilton Road Senior Center. So perhaps this could be a place where we relocate the warming center or do something else. But the question is, how do we use this asset to make sure our citizens get something for what is ultimately their $3.5 million? We will last start with Ms.

Barbara on, please. Thank you through the chair. So certainly the convention center and perhaps that might be a discussion that the board may wish to have in terms of what the uses are. Certainly from our discussions with Lori and obviously through some of the decisions that the board has made, they have tried to utilize that space on a number of different ways to try to, they had looked at various options that could be utilized for that space.

So certainly that would be a question at the board. I know that there are a number of activities that they have still been using in terms of serving as support to the food bank and making meals throughout the rest of the building. But there is obviously costs also associated with using the building if you choose to do other sources that they would need to contemplate. So certainly that’s something that if council wishes to request the board to look at other options, I know the board has already been looking to try to generate as much revenue as they can in other ways.

And this would certainly have other implications that they would need to consider in terms of how that space is utilized. It might assist the councilor as well as colleagues to know that you elected three members of council to sit on the board currently, Councillor Lehman, Councillor Turner and myself hold those positions. And should any colleagues have any ideas along that, those decisions get, in my view, would be directed to their board. And feel free to walk, you’re free to utilize the connectivity with our colleagues on council.

Anything else, Councillor Van Host? No, thank you. Other than saying that this is a very important asset and I’m happy to support the motion. Thanks very much.

Councillor Lehman, next, please. Thank you, Chair. As the mayor said, myself, Councillor Turner and the mayor sit on the board. And I just wanted to give my colleagues a sense of my thoughts on this and to give them confidence as they look to approve another funding request to keep the conventions that are viable.

Prior to COVID, RBC Place was looking at 2020 and 2021 as having exceptional years based on pre-booking, if not record years. And then last year at this time, as you know, we were shut down by the province. And it wasn’t shut down by, okay, you’re gonna be out of business now for a year and a half. It was, I think we all thought, well, maybe by late summer, the fall, we might be up and running in some aspect.

So I just want to give you a sense of the confidence I have. I just speak for myself. And I think the board, ‘cause the board is supporting management of the job management has done here early on despite the unknowns. They took the hard decision of making significant changes in operations, including laying off 90% of the staff, which was like, that’s an extremely hard call to make.

But they did it and in hindsight, that was the right thing to do way back at the beginning. They’ve kept on with the skeletal marketing staff. Obviously security maintenance had to be retained as well. So I want to speak to the skeletal marketing staff and how important that is, not only were the management and operators of RBC Place, trading in unknown monitors, but so were their customers.

And the marketing staff did a fantastic job of keeping relationships with our customers and guiding them through the process to retain that business. And I’m really happy to tell you that 80% of the business is still on the books. It has been postponed. It hasn’t been canceled.

So I think that gives you an idea of the confidence that the customers of RBC Place has in our operation there and also gives us an indication of where we’ll be when we come out of this. We don’t know where we’re gonna be with transit. We don’t know on the hospitality end of things where things are gonna land when we come out of this. Probably will be different, but we do know a large majority of people that were planning events at our convention center are still playing to go ahead with those events.

And in some ways in the planning, management has looked into possibilities of what could come out of this. There is indications that international conventions that we go ahead and international customers might be harmed, but the winner of that will be regional convention business. And that’s where London shines on. That’s our business.

So we could come out of this even stronger. I just wanna remind staff or sorry, colleagues, just due to the ownership of RBC Place, we did not qualify for a lot of government supports, including a wage subsidy. So we had no special funding come down like a transit did. The convention center is totally relying on the city to get this asset through and good at better shape.

So when business does return, we’re gonna be in a really good spot to capitalize this and start to work our way out of this deficit. So I wanted to thank the management of RBC Place. And I also want to encourage the continued support that I feel Council has for this jewel of— 30 seconds. The asset that I think we’re all realized, it’s a benefit to London in many ways that this will continue to provide us.

Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Square. Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

And I think this is a difficult situation, but it shouldn’t be a surprising situation to any of us. Certainly as Chair of London transit, I know that we’ve received a lot of government money to keep our service going much more money than this. It’s a different kind of service, but I understand that in this climate, we have some difficult situations. And I think the key for me is to know which of our key assets need help and where we need to allocate money to help out with those key assets.

So I come from this from the point of view that spending money is always painful for me. This is a large amount of money. If you look at the money we gave previously, the Convention Center, we’ve given them 4.1 million for operating in there and we’ll also maybe be giving them another 1 million. These are real issues that are rising right now in our community and there’s nowhere else for them to go.

And I’m satisfied after certainly listening to Council Layman on a chancellistic Councilor Turner. This is not an issue of the management of the facility. I think everybody has confidence in them that they’ve done what they need to do. I will say something later on how we’re solving this problem, but I think the idea that we would abandon the Convention Center today in the middle of COVID is just not tenable.

I think there’s gonna be a lot of future discussions about things like transit. What’s transit gonna look like in the future? Is it going to be what it used to be? Will the Convention Center be what it was in the past in the future?

But I don’t think that’s the discussion we’re going to have today. We have to take the steps that we’re taking to preserve this asset. And I think that’s an entirely prudent thing to do and I’m gonna have to live with that. And hope that the turnaround is as good as Councilor Layman says and that we won’t be looking in the future to provide further assistance.

Thank you, Councilor Turner. Thanks Your Worship. And thanks to my colleagues for their comments as well. I just wanted to pick up on something Councilor Layman had said about the Convention Center not qualifying for some of those ancillary government supports from the federal and provincial governments.

And that’s a really important piece. The Convention Center being a municipal asset doesn’t qualify. And the municipalities have received a fairly significant amount of funding from the provincial government and the federal government in terms of transfers to be able to support municipal operations through the COVID times where those might have had financial impact to us. And so that’s why we’re being asked to front and float the funds required to maintain the Convention Center.

I also have to take a look at it as Councilor Squire talked about as an asset. And it’s an asset that over the years in order to get started in order to establish there was a fairly significant municipal contribution to do so. The Convention Center has worked hard to bring itself to a self-sustaining model. And as Councilor Layman identified has done a great job over the past specifically over the past few years.

And there was no indication that that wouldn’t continue. So being on the board gives a lot of insight into the measures that have been taken to try and mitigate the impacts of basically a full loss of business. And to be able to try and carry through to the times that we can start rebooking events and have people back in the building again. I’m convinced and I feel confident that every reasonable measure has been taken.

And it’s basically left it as Councilor Layman identified skeletal. It’s basically a bare bones as low cost as you can to float through this period of time. So I’m encouraged to hear the words of support from our colleagues, but I hope that you’ll see fit to be able to continue the support. And we’re looking forward to the days when the convention center and the RVC place can perform as well as it has in the past years and maybe even better.

Thank you, Custer Cash. Thank you, Your Worship. And I think there used to be a fine for people that didn’t, that continued to call the convention center instead of RVC place. That was when I was on the board up to January of last year when I stepped off the board.

So I’m happy to support this as various Councilors have said this is an asset, it’s an investment that the city made some years ago and it would not be prudent to just cut and run right now in the middle of a crisis that we’re facing that’s completely unprecedented. I saw how management operates at the RVC place. They are nothing short of amazing. I’ve been to conferences across Canada and I compare it with RVC place every place I go and they don’t compare.

Even like the biggest cities in Canada, the meals that are prepared. And if you saw, whether it’s a gathering of 50 people or a gathering of 500 people, it’s the same small crew in the kitchen that run that kitchen like a wet oil machine. And those events go off without a hitch and they may climb and look really good. I was extremely disappointed that the pandemic continued to cause ongoing lockdowns just because I was really looking forward to the AMO conference this summer.

I was really looking forward for London and the RVC place to shine on that big stage and have all of the other municipalities come here and see what we already know here. When it comes to the costs of the building, it has been shut down over these many months, but I imagine a huge building like this, you can’t just turn off the lights and lock the door. I imagine that there are ongoing costs, a certain level of heating has to be maintained, a certain amount of airflow and things like that to keep the building healthy and viable. So no matter how much we cut, I’m sure you can’t get right down to zero.

So I am actually quite proud of the staff at RVC place for doing the community things that they have done with meals for the food bank and things like that, all of the community-minded steps that they’ve taken to try to help out during the pandemic. And I have confidence in you, Mr. Mayor and Councillor Turner and Councillor Layman as our representatives on the board. I know that every step of the way, there has been proper oversight and governance and the right decisions have been made all along the way.

So as I said, I’m very happy to support continuing to support the RVC place. Thank you. I have no other speakers. Well, I do now.

Councillor van Mirbergen, please go ahead. Thank you, Mayor. I’m looking at this perhaps from a different perspective. Nobody can argue the importance of RVC place to London.

We all recognize that. But that being said, there is a question here. The operation or the operating funding requirement is substantial for an entity or building an organization that is essentially at this point non-operating. Yes, there is some, but by and large, essentially non-operating.

So we’re asking for this operating funding or we’re being asked for the operating funding of 2.5 million plus another million for something which is really not functioning for obvious reasons at the moment. And if you just have to look on page 25, there’s a whole list of what has not happening and what has been cut. 90% of the team was laid off. It’s 90% of the, that’s the obvious big ticket item there.

So 90% is laid off. The remaining team members have accepted a 15% to 25% wage reduction. All these costs have been pared down. All discretionary spending was canceled.

Recares and maintenance was deferred. We’re not urgent. Service contracts were placed on hold as appropriate. So it begs the question, where is this operating funding that is requested to the tune of 2.5 plus one million dollars going to, maybe I could ask that question to staff.

We’ll direct that to Ms. Perbal. Yes, thank you through the chair. So obviously the RBC place building is a very significant building.

So there is a lot of assumptions in terms of some of the revenue and costs at the last quarter of the year. However, there are still, even with the building, because the building’s not effectively boarded up, there are many costs that still have to be maintained. So obviously over the winter, the heat and hydro is still running, so that pipes don’t freeze and that the asset is preserved. So there are energy costs, there are facility services costs that are still there.

There is still, because there are people still in the building, there are still some custodial costs and some other cleaning costs that are still being also incurred by the organization. There is obviously maintenance of the parking garage and some of the other expenses that are there in terms of maintenance and just overall upkeep of the building. So even though the building is essentially not functioning to its normal capacity, there are always costs in terms of repairs and maintenance that still might need to occur if certain, if the pipe breaks or other things that might potentially be there, that you need to keep an eye on. So there is a good number of costs and we have a breakdown.

Ms. De Silva sends us on a monthly basis what their projections are in terms of the costs that they are incurring. So obviously there is still 10% of the staff that are still working in the building and that there are some minimal costs to maintain the building. But the building, short of being completely shut down and boarded up, there are costs in terms of insurance and other things and security to ensure that it is not creating a loss for the city in terms of maintenance of a very significant asset for the city of London.

So we do have breakdowns. We do have regular updates that are provided to us and there is still a significant cost in terms of maintenance of the building, even though it is not being used to its full capacity is still significantly less than what is normally incurred. But there are those costs do amount in the course of a year. Yeah, okay, thank you for that.

I may have missed it, but I don’t see that breakdown that you’re referring to. It just, again, seems like a lot of money for an entity or a building that’s fairly functioning. And we just have to look at some of the recent past history. We forgave a $3 million promissory note.

We gave 1.6 million not that long ago. There was 500,000 given from the municipal accommodation tax, not to mention the income that comes from the naming rights. So we just look at this whole package together and it does raise questions. And I also want to thank John Winston for sending in a note with some fairly salient points and questions earlier to the Marrington Members of Council to help highlight on this.

My next question is with regard to the KPMG report, which has found at least some of the findings on page 26, talks about looking at the subsidy program with regard to the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy the SUSE program. It makes it look like, when you read this, that it’s not a done deal. And indeed, the Convention Center may actually qualify for 75% reimbursement of remuneration. That’s certainly how it looks in this report.

Could I ask that question? Is that still being investigated? Or is that completely closed? For the chair, would you like me to answer that?

Yes, please. So through the chair. So essentially that was the initial findings that KPMG had wanted there to be a review to just, because obviously that was a hope that they would possibly qualify underneath a program. The Convention Center has since gone back and done further work to in fact confirm that they do not qualify under the existing rules for the wage subsidy program.

And I believe they have sought a legal opinion to have that reviewed and we would concur with that analysis given that they are a creature of municipality and fully funded by the municipality. 30 seconds Council. Okay, thank you very much for that. I didn’t see that in the report.

I just see this point that makes it look like it’s still very much a possibility. But thank you for that response. So at this stage, it looks like we’re receiving the report, which I certainly can. And so I’ll just leave it there.

Thank you. Thank you. I have a Councilor, again, I’m trying to do this in order of colleagues for those who have spoken once. There seems to be a second round for at least one.

So let’s, but I’m going to go to those who have not yet spoken on this Councilor Hopkins. Please go ahead. Yeah, thank you, Your Worship. And I appreciate Councilor then Mirbergen’s concerns.

It is a significant amount of money. But I also understand this is a significant building. And I want to thank my colleagues who sit on the board for this conversation. I think it is an important conversation to have.

One of the things I have learned is that the RBC place did not receive any government funding. I think that is really important to note. And as well that 80% of our businesses being postponed. And I know as a member of AMO at the executive, it was disheartening to not be able to have the conference here this year, we are having it virtually.

But we were, London was given an additional year to 2023, which will be in 2026. And so that’s on the books. We still have two conferences coming forward in this building. And that is important.

This building has to keep on going. So I understand the concerns of the significant amount here, but it is important that we keep this building going for the future when we get back to normal. So thank you to my colleagues who sit on the board too and previous colleagues for this conversation. Thank you.

Thank you, Casher Squar. I just wanted to raise the one issue that came out of Ms. Barbone’s answer. And I know as a counselor, it’s really challenging when you sort of get a report on a Wednesday and the report says, oh, the convention center is struggling and needs a 2.5 million for operating dollars and a million for capital without knowing that sort of background that leads to it as we’re going along.

Now, I know we were told at one point that the convention center may need help, but what I’m hearing with regards to reporting is that staff’s aware on sort of a monthly basis of what the challenges were for the convention center. And I just think as we’re doing updates in COVID and moving into the future, it would be really helpful to know if there is an organization that is going to be coming to council for an influx of money so that we can deal with that in terms of how we’re spending the money. For instance, we had $5 million that we started to spend and we spent $1.9 million of it. It would have been, at least for me, nice to know that by the way, the convention center is struggling and it may need a significant amount of money.

And I would suggest that somehow we’ve got to get to that point where, as councilors, we have some kind of a dance notice as what direction we’re going with COVID. So we’re not spending money that’s in a reserve when other valid proposals are coming forward. And I find that concerning. I certainly met with the manager, the convention center for a check-in and I wasn’t alerted on that particular day that there was anything going on.

So I’m at least one councillor who likes to have advanced notice of challenges as they’re coming forward. And I hope that’s something the treasurer will consider as we move forward. I have no other speakers on the list. This has been duly moved and seconded.

We’ll call the question. Closing the vote, the motion is— I think 4.20 is the 2020 year-end operating budget monitoring report in COVID-19 financial impacts to and it’s a fairly extended recommendation from staff. So to open up discussion and focus our discussion, I’d look for a mover and seconder please. Moved by Councillor Ploza, seconded by Councillor Lewis.

Any comments or questions for staff? Councillor Raminirberg. Thank you Mayor. I’d like to, this could call D part one separately please, which is the actual motion to move the 2.5 million.

Thank you, done, anything else Councillor? If I could just reiterate for the arguments that I stated earlier, it just seems that there is some missing pieces here when we’re being asked for this kind of money. We’re being told that it’s basically in non-operating mode and it’s being asked for operating funds of this magnitude over and above what’s already been given as I pointed out just a few minutes ago. So with those thoughts in mind, I cannot support the 2.5 million at this time.

Thank you, Councillor. Thanks, Your Worship, just a couple of quick questions. One, this report identifies a couple of times the No Sex Line and Health Unit. There’s no funding implications in this report itself.

So I just want to flag it and I don’t deem there to be a conflict, so there’s nothing pecuniary in here. But the second part, I had some questions around the opportunities to shift funds into reserve funds and these are as a result of some operating surpluses that come in a couple of reasons. One, as a result of being able to be supported by federal and provincial transfers, and two, because of a reduction in expenditures in certain program areas. Are there, through Your Worship, any specific programs and opportunities that we suspended that we’d need to be able to to start back up again that by doing a transfer into reserves takes away our opportunity to do that.

I think I’ve asked this question in a few different ways on previous reports and I think part of the challenge was that there was a lack of opportunity to do so because of other competing priorities. But I just want to be sure that if there were important programs and elements that we’ve saved money on as a result of not doing, I’d hate to see us not have those in place because we’ve already budgeted for them. Let’s start with Ms. Barbone and then we can have a conversation, go ahead, please.

So thank you through the chair. So in 2020, a number of one-time initiatives were suspended just early on while we were waiting to start to see what the pandemic was going to be like. And the majority of the changes really came down to things that we were unable to do because of provincial legislation. So early on where we had made a couple of decisions that council had ratified through the early reports were a few some short-term measures to stop capital projects or suspend things which we were able to reverse once we found out that we had additional provincial funding laid in the year that we were able to do.

So the majority of the measures that were taken were all one time in nature and not ongoing permanent reductions that we would be looking to reinstate. So I think certainly from this perspective, we’re looking across both years in terms of trying to provide the flexibility to be able to solve the short-term impacts that we do see till the end of 2021 but there still does remain a broader impacts beyond 2021 that we still don’t potentially understand yet at this point in terms of what could be potential lingering impacts we need to consider. So from our perspective, there isn’t anything that was done on a permanent basis that we would be looking to reinstate. Those budgets and programs are still intact.

There was nothing on a permanent basis. That must go on. One other thing for you I think is in the report, it discusses some of the revenue lost as a result of a decrease in the interest rates. So we weren’t generating as much revenue on our investments.

And then later on in the report, it talks about how the debt that we have, the debt servicing charges that we wouldn’t see as much or that we’d actually see more loss of funds as a result of not earning as much on our investments as compared to the interest that we’re paying, servicing the debt that we have. And when I read that, it makes it sound like we’ve got more in investments than we do in debt, which raises a really interesting question as to why. But perhaps I’m reading that a little long and you might be able to help me go through that. Goodness, but I won’t have a conversation, please.

Thank you, I’m through the chairs. So from, I don’t have the number right in front of me, I’d have to go look that up. But we certainly do have more in terms of investments than we do in debt at this moment. And certainly from our long-term perspective, we have been trying to minimize debt and keep it within the debt cap on a longer-term basis.

Mr. Murray can probably give a little bit more details if you’re looking for some. He’s just looking at that information for me as we speak. But certainly our long-term strategy from a policy perspective has been to limit the amount of debt.

What we have tried to do over the last number of years as we have been looking to have, specifically with our investment policy to increase the amount of investments and try to generate additional non-tax revenue, we have also increased the budgets in that regard where we were anticipating higher returns. That certainly as a result of COVID, we are not seeing those returns. So where we’re able to offset within our actual budget monitoring, we know rates are starting to come up slowly. Where they’ll go in the long-term still remains to be seen, but we’ve certainly seen quite a bit of change just in the last couple of months in terms of some of the rates.

And we anticipate they’ll still be holding steady for a little bit time, so we will gradually see a bit of an increase. So we think a large amount of this deficit we’ve seen in the interest rates that we’re getting is going to be, there’s a portion of it, there’ll be a short-term and an immediate pressure, but then we’re still trying to anticipate what that longer-term pressure is going to be. And if there’s any changes in the budget, then need to accommodate that in the future. Thank you, Ms.

Provon. And so I guess perhaps through to Mr. Murray, the strategy of holding more in assets than in debt, it makes sense we want to have a positive side on the balance sheet, but if we could eliminate debt servicing costs altogether, I know we can’t just pay down our debt. It’s not an option for us, but if we’re liquid enough that we have greater assets than we do in debt, could we get ourselves feasibly to a position in over a certain period of time where we had no debt and we had a certain amount of investment assets as that built.

Thank you, and through the chair, conceptually certainly we could get to that point. I’m not sure we would want to. There are many good reasons to carry debt in some cases. For some projects, debt is very much appropriate.

It’s a tool that allows us to achieve intergenerational equity, whereby the cost of an asset and construction of an asset is borne by the taxpayers who ultimately benefit from that asset. So debt is a tool that allows us to do that. So I would say some debt is reasonable and appropriate in those circumstances, but certainly as Ms. Barbara indicated, we have been making a concerted effort to minimize debt in our capital plan, wherever possible to provide, I guess the most financial flexibility going forward that we possibly can have.

Thanks, Mr. Maria. And I certainly do want to recognize the strong work finance team has done in terms of addressing debt and debt servicing charges and interest charges in general. Councilor Helmer repeatedly identifies those every time those come through corporate services.

And I think we’ve done a great job of just more of a philosophical question than anything. I just kind of stood out as I was reading through the report. So I appreciate the answer. Thank you, Councillor Square.

Just a couple of questions that I have. The first one is the money, I’m interested that the money we’re paying or we’re proposing to give to RBC place is not coming out of the reserve fund, but it’s coming out of the surplus. And I just, I just wonder if that’s just because we’re aware of it today. And so we’re gonna pay it as part of the surplus.

In other words, if this requests from the convention center, that’s what I’m calling it. The convention center came forward three months from now. Would it be money that would come out of this reserve fund or would it still come from another place? Let’s direct these through Ms.

Barbone, I presume, go ahead, please. Thank you, so through the chair, the money that is suggested for RBC place, certainly we’ve recommended it to come out of the surplus because that is a reflection and a factor of the additional provincial federal funding that we have received. So as noted earlier in the RBC place discussion, RBC place doesn’t qualify to receive direct support, but certainly through the grants that we have received as a municipality allows the council to apply those to where it most sees the need. And certainly as a wholly owned asset of the municipality, that is something that they do require support and would be prudent to try to initially send through.

Now, what you may recall is that in our report at our mid-year monitoring, which was in September, we did bring forward that for 2020, we had provided the $1.6 million grant to RBC place out of the surplus at that time, which was intended to offset the 2020 costs that we were seeing the pressures. This additional amount is basically to be proactive to support them with the additional pressures that they’re having for 2021, noting that we knew in 2020 and had included in our prior reports that they were going to struggle and were going to need some additional work, which is why we had commissioned the RBC report to go forward with KPMG to take a look at what their business plans were and if there were ways that they could potentially mitigate what the support was we were going to need in the future. So this is how we’ve continued to expand on the recommendations that we had initially noted, but certainly councils, you know, if we were to take it from a reserve fund, it would all essentially be coming from the same place that would just mitigate how much you would be putting forward there, but there are certainly other options that you could consider if you wanted to draw it from other sources. So just to follow up on that, I think what I’m having difficulty with is we’re now going to have a economic development reserve fund with $10 million less, the 1.9, I assume that we already spent, how I’m having difficulty understanding what kind of COVID related payments, you know, whether it’s for city assets, other things, other businesses, how do we determine that it qualifies to come out of this economic development reserve fund as opposed to coming from somewhere else?

So I’m trying to get a feel for how much money we’re going to need going forward. So through the chair, thank you for that question. So essentially through some of the work that you’ve already seen through the London Recovery Network, there has been a lot of community conversation about how best to support the city of London and the community as a whole in terms of how we recover from COVID. Obviously from an economic perspective where you look at how we support businesses as well as the social impacts of COVID, there has been a desire from past conversation with council to try to support our community.

This recommendation was there to be able to give a specific amount that council could use as potential ideas come forward from the community that council wishes to support and to give a little bit of flexibility and also put some parameters around here’s a specific amount that would contain it in terms of what you were looking for social and economic recovery. What we may see forward, so certainly you’ve seen $1.9 million out of that fund that has already been approved and allocated and we know that the broader work is now beginning again. So I don’t know what specific ideas are going to come forward and whether there will be anything there that council wishes to support. But as we see COVID evolve, we may, and it may not be until possibly the end of the year and possibly even into the first quarter of next year where you may see some of those ideas come forward and there may be some very clear actions the council may wish to support in terms of supporting the community from an economic perspective.

And that could be a whole number of things from housing or supporting businesses in terms of putting things in place that might be needed. That conversation is just beginning. So the intent was to allow some finite amount of council may wish to use that would support that. We have not clearly defined that.

However, from the Economic Development Reserve Fund, there are very clear parameters in terms of things that you could support from an economic perspective and things that have been utilized out of that reserve fund in the past. That doesn’t limit council to not be able to consider other things where we could potentially need to amend the bylaw that could support housing or homelessness or other initiatives that would be of a social or very economic nature. So, I mean, ultimately this was intended to support some of council’s priorities where you seem relevant, but certainly, you know, if the will of council is to put that into a more general fund and have that go to the operating budget contingency reserve fund where there is no potential parameters around it at all so that should you need to support something in the future that you want to use this money for to support our community as we come out of COVID. We’re going to have a long climb out.

It will not be done at the end of this year and I think there will be impacts you will see. Still in early 2022, that may require other actions to be taken, but I don’t have the crystal wall at this point to be able to definitively tell you what those are going to be, but I believe there will be needs and I think we’ve heard that from our community as some businesses struggle and some of the community struggles that you may wish to have some flexibility to advance. I’m trying to keep my questions short. I’m still not, and I don’t want to belabor this, but what I want to understand is if another city owned asset similar to the convention center comes forward and says we are in trouble, we need money.

Is that money going to be available through this fund that we’re topping up to with an additional five million or do we have to go somewhere else to find that money? That is my question. So through the chair, certainly through council, our first choice would be as we have brought forward the convention center, sorry, the RBC place ask, we would go through our operating budget monitoring first and we would look at mitigating the costs through that projection through year end. So if there was another border commission, we would do that through our monitoring first and then would go through the operating budget contingency first.

It was not intended that if we were supporting a border commission, we would go through the economic development reserve fund if that is more clear. Okay, then my second question is, and I must have missed this, but I’ve always understood that we were allocating five million dollars to people bringing forward community projects. I’m just, I’m still at a bit of a loss from my point of view as to why there is this necessity, if that’s what we’re going to be funding to put another five million dollars into that fund. We spent 1.9 million, are you suggesting that we’re going to have community projects coming forward that are going to be, take that up to 10 million dollars?

So through the chair, I don’t know what the cost of those programs are going to be, but certainly we are forcing that as the city of London tries to emerge from COVID, there could be other needs that may come through other potentially even service areas that would identify their programs we may wish to put in place to support our community as we recover from COVID, social or economic. So we do not expect them all to come through the LCRN, we do expect there could be other things council may wish to consider on a broader economic level as we go through to assist in recovery. Thank you, I have no other speakers on the agenda. I’m sorry, Your Worship, I’ve had my hand up, but maybe I’m off your screen.

You were off my screen, but you’re back on. Go ahead, Councilor Van Halston. Thank you very much, I have a few questions, but I also wanna thank staff and my colleagues for the questions that have already been answered. I get just bouncing off of what Councillor Squire has said, what would be the process for us to take money from the LCRN, reserve and put it someplace else if we decided.

I’m sorry, could you repeat the question, Councillor? Well, we’ve got $10 million in the LCRN, reserve fund, if we decide that’s too much, what’s the process to reallocate that funds? So through the chair, if that full $10 million is not spent, it would remain within the economic development reserve fund and would be there potentially for the council to consider other uses and would be part of that balance going forward. So council could at any time allocate those funds in accordance with that policy at any point in the future.

Although if you wish to reallocate it elsewhere, we could certainly do that at any time also if the council’s so wishes. Okay, thank you. Oh, may I proceed, Mr. Chair?

You’re having a conversation, go ahead, please. Okay, thank you. On page 37 of the original report, we see that there’s $18.1 million for phase three funding for transit. And I just wanted to ask through the chair, if what the eligible things are that we could spend that money in, and if there’s anything we can do with that that would provide us a lasting benefit, or are we essentially just covering losses that we incurred with no gains?

So through the chair, the transit money is very, very specific in terms of the transfer payment agreement as to what those funds are used for. The majority of it is very clearly to be able to make up the lost revenues and additional costs that are incurred as a result of COVID impacts on the transit system. However, there is a little bit of money, and I don’t have the TPA in front of me, my apologies, but there is a couple of items included in the transfer payment agreement. They give a little bit of flexibility as the transit is looking in terms of recovery and ability to look at some other system issues that might provide some ability to have a greater amount of flexibility to use those funds to assist the system in the long term.

Okay, thank you. The page 38 talks about the $1.6 million in homelessness prevention, and how much of that do we see allocated already or we got plans for? And I’m wondering if this can be source of funds needed to beef up assisting the community with, say, the warming centers? Perhaps I’m gonna send that one over to Mr.

Murray who can speak about the allocations. Thank you, and through the chair. My understanding and Mr. Dickens could confirm, but my understanding is that the homeless prevention area does have quite firm plans for those funds and has tentatively earmarked those for the various programs and services that they are continuing to deliver in response to COVID.

Okay, thank you. I guess this might be a question for the economists in the room. The our upper levels of government are spending billions of new debt into the economy for these measures. Are we gonna see inflationary pressures starting to bear down on upon us for our future operating and capital budgets because of that?

I would normally intervene, colleagues, but I think we’ll go to the economist and we’ll be able to buy one for that, please. Thank you, Chair. If only I had a crystal ball that I could ensure you of what the inflationary costs were gonna be, we’re monitoring that very, very closely. It certainly, we expect to see some level of inflation to the extent that it’s going to be significantly beyond what we’ve seen historically, still remains to be seen.

Certainly from some construction materials and some of those, we are seeing some uptakes in terms of just of a supply demand, but it’s hard to say at this point, but certainly those are things that as we do our budget monitoring updates, as well as as we redo and look at our capital plan for any future budget updates, we will be taking a good look at that and trying to get a better sense of how that’s going to unfold in the next couple of months and what potential impacts we’re going to see. But our hope is that it will not be significantly beyond what we have seen and projected for, but that certainly we will keep a close eye on it. Okay, thank you. And perhaps my last question, although I do think there’s an almost room for a motion that we get some crystal balls, but when we calculate the operating surplus for 2021, will any unspent amounts of these funds that have been placed into reserves be part of that surplus?

So through the chair, if you refer to the very lies, so we as included as appendix C, I believe it is, at the very last page, you’ll note that based on the financial impacts for COVID that we’re anticipating for 2021 at this point, the surplus that we’re putting into the operating budget contingency, we believe will essentially offset the pressures that we’re going to see to have a wash. So I think certainly to the end of 2021 over the two years, I think we’re very well in a very good position and very well poised, that being said, there could be additional pressures as depending on how long COVID impacts and how significant we’re seeing the impacts of COVID are and how long they stretch throughout the year. So at this point, I would say good news, we’re anticipating to be balanced across the two years, but we will continue to monitor on a regular basis in case that should change. Thank you very much, and thank you to you, Chair.

Thank you, Deputy Mayor Morgan. Yes, thank you, Chair. I have a couple of comments. And first off, let me say this has been a good discussion and an exploration of the key issues on this topic by my colleagues.

I did want to go back to last year because it’s important for the public to understand why we generated a $22 million surplus. So first off, we had about $69 million of COVID impacts and we received $47 million of support from other levels of government. However, the municipality also took about $44 million of actions. So having taken none action, if we took no action and we were able to operate as normal, which was impossible because things had to shut down, we would have been tracking towards a deficit position.

So it was because of the actions we took and why did we take $44 million in actions is because we did not know if we were going to have funding support or the level of that funding support from other levels of government. I remember working through the FCM on this well into the summer, which is halfway through the year, not knowing exactly what the funding allocation would be for municipalities. And so, we took actions that we probably had a choice on last year if we would have known the funding was in place. What our staff is recommending here is putting us in a very good position to have through the operating budget contingency reserve the expectation to cover most of the anticipated costs moving into 2021, which puts us in a much better decision-making position for the level of services to provide Londoners.

Obviously, if restrictions are in place and we’re in a lockdown as we are, there’s only so many services you can provide, but we certainly have more financial choice having some level of certainty on what our position is through 2021 barring any unforeseen circumstances of which we would still face the same sort of options that we had last year of reducing services and the such. So, what I want to say is I like the plan that our staff is recommending here. I think it mitigates some of the challenges that we faced last year of the uncertainty of not knowing what level of support we would be getting and it sets us up for success in the future. On the Economic Development Reserve Fund, I think that is a fine place to put the LRCN money as we have in the past.

It certainly is a space in the municipal budget that there is no shortage of economic development needs in the foreseeable future. And if the money is not spent there, it is a reasonable fund. And as our treasurer said, if there is a significant surplus in that fund, we can reallocate those funds to other sources to meet the municipal needs through decision of council. So, it is a fine place holder as is the operating budget contingency reserve for offsetting the expected pressures that will face through 2021.

So, I wanted to add that context. I do have an economics degree, but I couldn’t possibly answer the Councilor Vanholz question. I think there’s lots of balls up in the air and these are the types of things people will struggle with through what has been a massive change for government and business economies throughout the world. And I don’t think we’ll fully understand how that will play out until it plays out.

Anyways, those are my comments. I appreciate the discussion and I’m fully supportive of the staff recommendation that’s been moved and seconded. Thank you. I have Councilor Squire.

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair. I will be supporting the recommendation also. I just, I think it’s going to be important going forward that we’re able to, at least at some point, identify where the needs are in the community, whether it’s assets that are owned by the city of London, particular business areas that we may have an interest in supporting and I think we need to know that from those people as soon as possible.

I think our staff can only do so much in finding out about these things and they need to be told and Council needs to be made aware at the earliest opportunity where these needs are going to be. And I say that because although we now have $8.1 million left in that fund, that can disappear very quickly. And I would rather, we’d be spending it as a Council on priority items for COVID recovery, not things that don’t have valid business cases or reasons to be implemented. And I was heartened when the city manager talked about proposals coming forward to the, from the public, that they will be required to have a business case.

And I think that’s key. We need to know where the money’s going and we need to know that it’s going to help us cut out of this COVID situation, that it is indeed something that will help us with COVID recovery. And that being said, I think all of us have to have our own criteria for spending money. Mine will be different than other Councillors, but I certainly want to see proper business cases before we spend money.

I would like to see more financial information, quite frankly, than I saw today with regard to the Convention Center, although I trust my colleagues that it is a dire situation. And I certainly want to see things that benefit the broadest group of Londoners as possible. I will not be supporting in the future things that serve limited areas and don’t serve the city as a whole, unless there’s a very good reason for doing that. So I understand from the point of view of staff, I’ve heard the word crystal ball said many times.

None of us have a crystal ball, none of us know. But I think there also has to be a desire in the community to come forward to us with their needs and present them in a comprehensive way so that if they should be approved, that we will approve them. Thank you. Are there speakers on the speakers list?

Councillor Hummer, go ahead, please. Thank you. I wanted to say a very good job to everybody for controlling costs and managing through what was a tremendously difficult year. I know we get these reports every year where we take a look at the financial year end and how do we do versus the forecast part way through the year.

And this year has been a very difficult one. In 2020, we couldn’t possibly imagine what was gonna happen. We just approved the budget a week before COVID pandemic hit. And when I think back even to the report in September, which was talking about sort of where the things stand, at that point, we’re about, I don’t know, 200 days into the pandemic.

At that time, we had about 28,000 cases in Ontario. We now have 450,000 cases in Ontario. That wasn’t really that long ago, September. And a lot has changed between the mid-tier kind of report and what we thought we were gonna need to do.

And now, and I think it’s actually a really difficult thing to try and forecast what are gonna be all the impacts across the revenue and on the expenditure side, across all the different organizations that get consolidated into the city’s financial statements. I know colleagues who have looked over all the financial statements that come in from all these organizations. So once they’re fully consolidated, they’re complicated businesses on their own. And some of them, like the convention center, have been extremely hard hit.

I’m really glad to see the actions that the convention center has taken. I am really heartened by what I hear from the counselors and the mayor who are on the board. And I was certainly not gonna second guess any of the things that they’ve done. It seems like they’re doing a very good job to try and keep control of costs and make sure the organizations in a good position had to come out of the pandemic as strongly as possible.

I do think that sometimes we can get boxed into a very small part of the overall city in terms of reserves and reserve funds. And I think my approach anyway, I’m not sure if everyone on council so it has the same approaches. If we need to mobilize the resources to solve problems during this pandemic, I’m gonna do that and I’m gonna support it. And it’s not just in the economic development reserve fund, across all the various city reserve funds and reserves.

We have over $1.2 billion in reserves and reserve funds, discretionary funds. There’s a lot of funding. Some of it we’re not gonna be able to use for COVID response, that’s for sure. It’s four very specific things, but it’s also a very significant amount of money.

It’s not $10 million. And we have to get creative about mobilizing resources and figure out ways to do that. I don’t think we’re in a situation where we don’t have a lot of options. I think we do have a lot of options.

And the reason we have those options is because we’ve made some pretty good decisions through a very difficult time. Some of those decisions were very difficult. I can’t imagine what it’s like the convention center to be laying off 90% of your staff and realize you’re not eligible for this emergency wage subsidy. So you can’t keep as many people on.

That’s a really tough position to be in. And I’m hopeful that the folks who are laid off are doing okay. That’s a lot of people put out of work. I’m glad the federal government and the provincial government are trying to meet some of those needs from the people who’ve been displaced from the workforce.

But we’ve also been off for a long time now. And I think it’s really a tough situation. I’m glad to see reports like this where we say, hey, we did better than we thought we were going to do. And I’m glad that we’ve got the options at the end of the year to cover off some of these extraordinary costs.

The particular areas are really struggling with. So not everybody is struggling. We’ve been able to manage through in a lot of areas pretty well. But some areas like transit, the convention center, they’re really hard hit.

And I think that the city staff who are managing on the financial side and all the financial people at the various ports and commissions are really doing great work for the citizens of London to try and keep those costs in control and to manage through a really difficult period of uncertainty. So I’m happy to see this report. I certainly support it. I look forward to future discussions about how we’re going to support the community through recovery.

Thank you. Councilor Plosia. Thank you, Your Worship. And just a few brief words on this report.

Grateful for staff and all the people behind the scenes making this possible. We made some really tough decisions in March and cutting city services, reducing staff as helped in it come until August. So we budgeted appropriately and that’s seen here in the surplus before us of 22.3 million. And as we move through 2021, we realized we’re still in the third wave and I believe we’re not to recovery yet.

That’s already been said as well. And right now we’re looking at a loss of revenue of 41 million additional costs of 17, funding of 45 and potentially a bit of a loss this year. So putting that money away now will help to mitigate any impacts to Londoners and the service levels and be fully transparent with the finances of the city. And we realized that going into 2022, that’s when we’re going to start to see some funding issues with the London International Airport Authority.

And as Londoners know, the city owns a bunch of assets being RBC place. We have funding impacts with the airport. Deerness Home has seen lots of impacts as well. The Covid Garden Market is great and operating if people can get down and they’ve had drastic impacts as well.

And certainly LTC as well. And I appreciate these updates. I know Council likes as much advanced notice as possible when there’s problems and opportunities and these reports are part of the check-in balances to make sure where we’re going is the right direction. And I look forward to these updates and in the fall when we meet again to discuss where we’re going next.

Thank you. I have no one else on the speakers list. We’ll call the question. The question we are calling, colleagues to be clear, is A through F with the exception of D1.

That’s been duly moved and seconded. We’ll call that question with the exception of D1. Closing the vote, the motion’s passed 14 to 0. Now we will put D1 on the table.

Closing the vote, the motion is passed 13 to 1. Colleagues on your agenda, just as a reference point, we had an added from Mr. Chris Butler, which went into the first vote of 4.2. And as that was on your agenda, I did not mention that, but I’m referencing that to the benefit of the public.

Colleagues, I’ll turn your attention out of 4.3, the 2020 Year End Capital Budget Monitoring Report, COVID-19 Financial Impact. So to open up discussion on the recommendation from staff, I’ll look for a mover and a seconder. Is there a mover, please? Mr.

Palosa, seconded by Councillor Cassidy. Any comments or discussion? I see none. We will call the question.

Closing the vote, the motion’s passed 14 to 0. Thank you, colleagues. We now have, we’re now on item 4.4, the Greater London International Airport Authority, Board of Directors, you’ll see in your package, specifically on page 96, a letter from the Chair of the Board of Directors of London International Airport, Michelle Faisal. And it has to do with the current status of positions on the Board of Directors.

I know you have read the letter, and they’re looking for the benefit again for the public. They’re looking to provide to us some potential for recommendations for us to consider at a future date, still within the timeframes associated with, with one particular retirement from the Board. So we’ve been asked to receive the letter as presented. Councillor Van Wertz, seconded by Councillor Van Wertz, and thank you.

Comments or questions? Councillor Van Wertz, do you have a question? No, Your Worship, but I didn’t want to extend my thanks to Mr. Graham for serving on this, this Board.

I’m quite proud of the London Airport, and although it’s certainly been challenging for them this past year, but that’s also a great asset to the city. And I’m sure we’ll receive some great nominees to look at when this process is completed. Thank you for the benefit of those who do not see this letter. Mr.

Wilgram, this is intended to step down May 6th, so there’s still a bit of time. Your point, sir, acknowledged, Councillor Van Wertz. Seeing no other comments, we’ll call the question. Closing the vote, the motion’s passed, 14 to 0.

Your attention to the deferred matters in addition to the business item 5.1, an added item regarding COVID-19, and our City of London services update. Pardon me just a moment, please. Thank you, dealing with the time frame spring summer 2021. So in front of you is the executive summary, and we have a motion to open up the discussion on this.

This is a motion to receive. The information seems a little, well, it’s clear, so I’ll look for a motion to receive, and then we’ll see if there are questions, or if the City Manager wishes to comment. Councillor Layman, seconder by Deputy Mayor Morgan. Comments, questions, or again, I will turn it to Ms.

Livingston if you wish to make any comments on this. Thank you, Your Worship. This is the fourth such report that we provided during the COVID pandemic. It’s our attempt to be clear with Council and the community about the services that we are able to deliver within, of course, all of the health and safety and COVID precautions.

Also with this report, because we have a clearer sense of our finances, we are trying to convey a better sense of stability and the level of service that we are able to provide through this period of time, unlike some of the ups and downs in the service delivery last year, what prevents us from full service delivery will largely be COVID restrictions, and we will work within those, but I think the report gives you a fairly comprehensive sense of what Council and the community can expect through the next number of months, and I’m happy to try to answer any questions. Any comments or questions for Ms. Livingston? Let’s start with Councillor Turner, please.

Thanks, Your Worship. I was a little late to the meeting. So I’ll declare a conflict of interest on this item as the service area I’m responsible for at the Middlesex Line and Health Unit has a lot of intersection of the city and Western interpretation of the provincial guidance. Thank you for that, Councillor.

Thank you, Your Worship, and through you to our city manager and apologies, I didn’t have a chance to let her know that I was going to ask this, and I realize she may not have all of the specifics right at her fingertips, but hoping she can provide a little response, and I suspect that the answer is yes, based on what I’m reading in page 4 with the seasonal workforce coming back, although it will only be at a 75% level, would that mean that residents can expect to see a little bit more attention this year paid to some of the cleanliness and basic maintenance issues with regard to things like roadways, boulevard grass cutting, parks maintenance, sorts of issues. I know that was a concern raised multiple times last year, and we certainly had limited resources to deal with those things. Recognizing we still will have some resource limitations will those things be addressed more readily this year. Good, Ms.

Louis, and we’ll have a conversation. Yes, thank you, Your Worship. The short answer is yes. Legendors can ensure they expect to see a level of service that they are more accustomed to.

In those areas, you’ll recall that last year we had very few temporary workers, we were unable to do that, and it impacted the level of service. And so this year, our intention is to deliver it at a level as best as possible within the COVID restrictions, and we will prioritize the work to best meet the service levels that Londoners normally expect. I say that with the qualification that we still need to deliver that service within all of the health precautions, which is why you’re seeing a slightly lesser number of temporary workers that we’re able to bring on. But we have a commitment to try and deliver the services best as possible with the resources we have this year.

And just a short follow-up through you, to Ms. Livingston, or if this is something more appropriate for another staff member to answer. Recently, we went through the Earth Day weekend and we would typically have the London Clean and Green and the 12-minute makeover activities happening in the community. And for the second year in a row, those haven’t been able to go ahead because of public restrictions on gatherings.

And I know that we’re operating within the provincial restrictions, so I appreciate that. And I know we can only follow those as a municipality. Are there plans for the sake of the public? I know Mr.

Stanford shared a little information with us last week. Are there plans when restrictions lift to proceed with sort of a community cleanup, particularly in our parks areas, where there seems to be an urgent need in terms of the level of cleanliness in some locations? Mr. Mayor, I’d like to refer that to Ms.

Cher, please. Good. I thank you. There’s two parts to that answer.

The first part is that we will be having our parks temporary starting or have started fairly shortly. So the work that is done by our staff will be underway and will be underway to a much better level than last year. On the community cleanup side, yes, right now you can only do that work with members of your immediate household. We do have some supports available for folks who are choosing to do it.

We remain optimistic that we can get some of our folks who go out and really do the Atler River cleanup and some of those great projects that are community led back out doing that work later this summer. It’ll all depend on what happens in COVID restrictions. But we absolutely do have plans to proceed. Great.

Thank you. Through your worship, then, I just want to thank Ms. Livingston and Ms. Cher for those answers.

And to everybody who’s dealing with this on an ongoing basis, I know you sometimes have to pivot on Thursday and Friday to deal with changes that you’d only established on Monday. And I know that’s a lot of work. So I know that you’re dealing with this as best your able in a changing situation. So thank you for the extra work that’s been going into this.

Thank you, Councillor Cressy. Thank you, Your Worship. I just have some comments. And I just want to start by saying thank you to staff.

This has been a really tough year. And they’ve pivoted a number of times, you know, putting services in place with changes, taking them back, making more changes, virtual, not virtual. And it’s been a constant change, 12 months of really constant change. And I really appreciate city staff and starting with Ms.

Livingston and the incredible job that they’ve done in responding in real time as things have happened. I also want to say thank you to Londoners. I too have had, you know, calls, requests, questions about when is this going to happen? When will the parks get cleaned?

When will we get the garbage cans back? Things like that. And every time we responded and said, you know, listen, we didn’t hire the park, the same park staff that we did this year, that we normally do, you know, people were overwhelmingly very understanding of the situation. It goes back to a comment that Councillor Helmer made with staff that were laid off at RBC Place.

These are real people and, you know, our temporary staff that are hired every summer. These are people that, you know, count on that employment. They’re saving money for school. They’re doing any number of things.

And a lot of people’s lives were disrupted. So my thanks to London for their patience as we’ve responded to the pandemic. I also want to say a big thank you to Londoners as well, the overwhelming response we had here to the vaccine. Middlesex London helped you to combine with LHSD staff who’ve been delivering vaccines and running the mass vaccination clinics delivered over 150,000 vaccines this week, which is incredible.

We haven’t, I don’t think, noticed locally the kind of vaccine hesitancy that other communities are experiencing. Londoners want to get their shot and that is really heartening because it will be that kind of mass vaccination that is going to help us to get back to normal. We’re seeing evidence in other areas where people are still catching COVID until it’s an idea of herd immunity as kind of a distant faint hope. And what we’re really need, because what these vaccines do is they prevent death.

More than anything else, they present death. And we’re seeing the results in that because we’ve seen the numbers of people dying going way down. And Mr. Mayor, I want to thank you, especially for advocating some strongly on behalf of London, which has been a hotspot, which has seen our numbers soaring over the last few weeks.

And you continue to advocate very strongly and forcefully to make sure we continue to get the doses. We did see a reduction from about 12,000 to about 9,000 doses this last week, which is not great. But hopefully, when we see this influx of vaccines coming from Pfizer, in the next few months, it’s going to really help to keep turning things around in London. I had my vaccine last week.

I had the AstraZeneca shot. My family doctor was one of the family health teams that is administering vaccines. And luckily, I was able to book a shot there. So I encourage everyone to get vaccinated, keep yourself safe, keep your loved ones safe, and we will continue to get out of this together, and we’ll continue to move forward.

Thank you. Thank you. Definitely remember. Yes, thank you.

And through the chair, I think this report is linked very well with the previous report. And the final slide in Ms. Barbong’s presentation, which showed the net projected COVID impacts in 2021 at 12.4 million and the contribution to the operating budget contingency reserve at 12.3, which leaves a gap of just 0.1. And I think that’s important because that level of stability in being able to project forward will help Ms.

Livingston and her team deliver on providing some much clearer expectations for the public about the types of services we will be providing this year, how we’re going to provide them, and alleviate some of the what Councillor Cassidy described as, oh, I can’t remember how she described it, but everything’s changing. It’s all over the map. And it can get frustrating for people, and that’s the case. So in the report, when it says the civic administration has focused on delivering as many services as possible.

So as many as possible, they may be modified, they may look different, but we’re moving back to be providing the services that Londoners need and expect as best we can, given the restrictions in place. And having that financial stability and expectation of knowing that we’ve set some of this surplus money aside allows for a level of predictability that I hope Londoners will appreciate. On the staff side of things— and I know a couple of colleagues have said this— I would say it’s amazing the work that our staff are doing, particularly through this exact time. If they’re like me, and they have four kids out that door, three of them doing online learning at different times of the day, and still providing services for Londoners remotely at home, that is an amazing amount of work.

I can barely juggle these balls. And our staff are providing these services through this challenging time. So kudos to them and Ms. Livingston and her team.

This looks like a great report and the level of predictability that you’ll be able to provide in the coming months, I think will give great comfort to Londoners who are also like me at home, just trying to figure out how each day is going to run. And knowing that the city is there for us is really helpful. So thank you. Thanks very much.

I wonder if I could ask the— I’m sorry, Councillor Lehman, did you wish to say a word? No, I’m sorry, I missed that then I have Councillor Miles, go ahead, please. Thank you, Your Worship. I’m not happy with the provincial restrictions, but very pleased at how conscientiously our staff deals with those.

And looking through the report, I just wanted to flag one of the things that was on its way. And that was the free emergency child care for school-age children starting April 19, 2021 for eligible health care and other frontline workers, so dependent on available spaces in licensed child care centers and home child care. So I think that something is certainly in light of the comments that Councillor Morgan made will be a very valuable service. And I see a number of things there that are coming back that we missed out on last year.

So pleased to see those things. And I think people will be happy that this summer will be a little better than the last one. Thank you. Thank you.

I have Councillor Square. Yeah, I just— I have a question, Mr. Livingston. And it relates to how we deal with enforcement in terms of getting back to citizens.

I’ve had a number of people who I’ve given the COVID hotline to, and I’ve given them the email address. And often they come back to me and say, well, we reported what we thought was a COVID violation. We never heard back. So I just wonder, are we busy to the extent that we’re not replying to citizens to tell them what the outcomes of these investigations are so that I can advise my constituents that, although they may not hear back, doesn’t mean nothing happened?

Good, Ms. Livingston. Through your worship, we receive— and I don’t— I’m sorry, I don’t have the numbers, but we received a significant number of both phone calls and emails, and I think what we can do is assure citizens that each and every one is reviewed and forwarded for the appropriate response. We’re not in a position to respond to each and every complaint, but we do, especially with complaints around gatherings and all those other things.

They are followed up, but we’re not in a position to circle back each and every time on what has happened with a specific complaint. They are logged, we run them to ground depending on the nature of the complaint and follow the appropriate path. Some of them are people just sharing information. Others are things that require specific action, but each and every one is paid attention to.

We’re just not in a position to circle back on every single one. Thank you, that’s very helpful. Thanks very much. I see no one else on the speaker’s list, but I will ask the deputy mayor to take the chair, please.

Chair, and I’ll go to the mayor. Thanks very much, colleagues. You know, there’s an irony that today we received this report from our city manager. It wasn’t one person that I know that wasn’t deeply affected by the loss of a little 13-year-old girl in Brampton the other day, and how that drove home, how real this is.

And just even a couple of short days before that, Londoner and Olympian Alex Kopach was interviewed from his hospital bed in LHSC, and he talked about what he felt was this near-death situation he thought he was going to die, and how we all need to take this so seriously and try to drive home the point for all of us how real this is. And I look at today, and the absolute irony of this report, colleagues coming out today, is today London hit the 10,000 mark. It’s not a number to be proud of. Today, 10,000 people have been infected by COVID-19 in London in Middlesex since the pandemic began.

It doesn’t get any more real than that. And of that, almost 200 souls lost, and we’ve already had a moment of silence on the first anniversary of the first death here in London Middlesex. And it builds on a couple of comments, one that Councillor Cassidy made a reference to tonight when she said it’s been a really tough year, what sure has for a lot of Londoners. And we know that we empathize, and we as a Councillor, doing what we can do to help support those needs.

But I would also say that as tough as it’s been, it’s shown that there’s been a resilience, we’ve shown that Londoners can come together for greater good. I remember Councillor Hummer once talked to me about the urgency of now, he called it, and now is the time for those who are eligible to get their shots. I’m told the reason that we had a reduction this week in shots is because at the federal level, I’m told by the provincial government that there was somewhat of a decrease and may perhaps a reallocation. I can’t tell you that.

But that those numbers will be going up significantly. I’ve heard that from Minister just even today. And they’ll go up dramatically over the next number of weeks. And that should give us some cause for hope.

But it only matters if those who are eligible will get their shots, please. So I would like to salute the library working with Middlesex London Health Unit. And I would like to acknowledge faith-based leaders and community group leaders and all of you who are encouraging your eligible constituents, our eligible Londoners, to get their shots, please, for everybody’s sake. There still be some frustrations we know as not everyone will be able to get them immediately.

But I am confident with the emphasis that the senior levels of government are putting on trying to drive home the need for vaccinations to come to our community and across the country. Just get the job, that’s what we’re asking people to do. So with that Deputy Mayor, I’ll pass it back to you. Thank you.

Yes, and I will return the chair to the Mayor. I have no one else in the speakers list that I see. So with that, we have a motion that’s been moved. And second, it will call the question.

Closing the vote, the motion’s passed 13 to 0 with one recuse. Thanks very much, your colleagues. Councillor, pardon me, City Manager. I’d like to thank Ms.

Livingston for that very thoughtful report. You’ve been very consistent. And that helps provide us with information that we need. And that’s great for acknowledge.

And as we acknowledge that report, we’ve heard several times today how council members have been absolutely relying on our staff for the great work that they do and the efforts that they put in. And Ms. Barbara, under trying circumstances into all of your staff, we just want to acknowledge your efforts as well, particularly because there’s a tremendous amount of focus on the financial aspects of going forward. So to all of our staff, clerks, our administrative folks, our folks who work outside and inside City Hall, and in some cases at home.

We thank you all on behalf of council. I know I speak for all of you. And with that, I think we’re going to do a hand vote, Clerk, if you don’t mind. It being 552, I look for a motion to adjourn.

I see Councillor Lewis, seconded by Councillor Hopkins. Thanks very much. Let’s show those hands, please. All those in favor?

Clerk? Motion’s passed. Thanks. Have a very good evening, ladies and gentlemen.

Thank you.