May 7, 2024, at 1:00 PM

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The meeting is called to order at 1:02 PM; it being noted that Councillors P. Van Meerbergen and S. Hillier were in remote attendance.

1.   Disclosures of Pecuniary Interest

That it BE NOTED that no pecuniary interests were disclosed.

2.   Consent

Moved by E. Peloza

Seconded by H. McAlister

That Consent items 2.1 to 2.5 BE APPROVED.

Motion Passed (15 to 0)

2.1   2025 Annual Budget Update Process

2024-05-07 Staff Report - 2025 Annual Budget Update Process

Moved by E. Peloza

Seconded by H. McAlister

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Finance Supports, the following actions be taken:

a)    the report providing an overview of the 2025 Annual Budget Update process BE RECEIVED for information; and

b)    the Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to make the following amendments to the Council approved 2024 Council and Committee Calendar to accommodate the budget process timelines prescribed by “Strong Mayor” legislation:

i)    reschedule the Budget Committee meetings currently scheduled for November 28th and 29th to November 21st and 22nd to consider Council amendments to the 2025 Budget Update; and

ii)    schedule a Special Council meeting on November 27, 2024 to formally adopt Council amendments to the 2025 Budget Update.

Motion Passed

2.2   Update on Anti-Hate Pilot Project

2024-05-07 Staff Report - Update on Anti-Hate Response Pilot Project

Moved by E. Peloza

Seconded by H. McAlister

That, on the recommendation of the Acting City Manager, the report entitled Update on the Anti-Hate Pilot Project BE RECEIVED for information.

Motion Passed

2.3   4th Report of the Diversity, Inclusion and Anti-Oppression Community Advisory Committee

2024-05-07 Submission - DIACAC Report

Moved by E. Peloza

Seconded by H. McAlister

That the 4th Report of the Diversity, Inclusion and Anti-Oppression Community Advisory Committee, from its meeting held on April 11, 2024 BE RECEIVED.

Motion Passed

2.4   Request for a Shareholder’s Meeting - London and Middlesex Community Housing

2024-05-07 Submission - LMCH Shareholders Letter

Moved by E. Peloza

Seconded by H. McAlister

That the following actions be taken with respect to the 2023 Annual General Meeting of the Shareholder for London & Middlesex Community Housing:

a)      the 2023 Annual General Meeting of the Shareholder for London & Middlesex Community Housing BE HELD at a meeting of the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee on June 18, 2024, for the purpose of receiving the report from the Board of Directors of London & Middlesex Community Housing in accordance with the Shareholder Declaration and the Business Corporations Act, R.S.O. 1990, c. B.16; and

b)      the City Clerk BE DIRECTED to provide notice of the 2023 Annual Meeting to the Board of Directors for London & Middlesex Community Housing and to invite the Chair of the Board and the Chief Executive Officer of London & Middlesex Community Housing to attend at the Annual Meeting and present the report of the Board in accordance with the Shareholder Declaration;

it being noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee received a communication dated April 18, 2024, from P. Chisholm, Chief Executive Officer, London & Middlesex Community Housing with respect to this matter.

Motion Passed

2.5   Confirmation of Appointments to the Hamilton Road Business Improvement Association

2024-05-07 Submission - Hamilton Road BIA Appointments

Moved by E. Peloza

Seconded by H. McAlister

That G. Gardner, Director, Gardner Galleries and A. Tsiga, Director, The Fix Inc. BE APPOINTED to the Hamilton Road BIA for the term ending November 14,2026; it being noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee received a communication dated April 17, 2024 from C. Luistro, Executive Director, Hamilton Road BIA with respect to this matter.

Motion Passed

3.   Scheduled Items

3.1   Presentation - Ward Boundary Review - Watson & Associates Economist Ltd.

2024-05-07 Presentation - Ward Boundary Review

Moved by P. Cuddy

Seconded by H. McAlister

That it BE NOTED that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee received a presentation from Watson & Associates Economists Ltd. with respect to the revised ward boundary review, as appended to the added agenda.

Motion Passed (15 to 0)

5.   Deferred Matters/Additional Business

5.1   (ADDED) Request for One-Time Funding for Ark Aid - Mayor J. Morgan and Deputy Mayor S. Lewis

2024-05-07 Submission - (5.1) Request for One-Time Funding for Ark Aid-Morgan and Lewis

That, the following actions be taken with respect to providing shelter and support to our homeless population:

a)         Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to extend one-time funding in the amount of $687,000 to Ark Aid Street Mission Inc. for an additional 61 days until July 31, 2024 to be funded through the Community Investment Reserve Fund and for staff to engage with Ark Aid Street Mission Inc. to review its most recent communication related to a year round strategy; and

b)         that consideration of the existing Municipal Purchase of Service Agreement with Safe Space London for a total estimated increase of up to $130,000 (excluding HST) for the period of June 1, 2024 to July 31, 2024, to continue temporary day and overnight drop in space to be funded through the Contingency Reserve fund as per the Corporation of the City of London Procurement Policy Section 20.3 e) BE REFERRED to the May 28, 2024 meeting of the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee;

it being noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee received a communication from Mayor J. Morgan and Deputy Mayor S. Lewis with respect to this matter;

it being further noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee heard a verbal delegation from S. Campbell, Executive Director, Ark Aid Street Mission Inc. with respect to this matter.

ADDITIONAL VOTES:

Moved by J. Morgan

Seconded by A. Hopkins

That the delegation request from Sarah Campbell, Executive Director, Ark Aid Street Mission Inc. BE APPROVED to heard at this time.

Motion Passed (15 to 0)

Moved by S. Trosow

Seconded by A. Hopkins

That the motion be amended to include a part b) to read as follows:

b)     the existing Municipal Purchase of Service Agreement with Safe Space London for a total estimated increase of up to $130,000 (excluding HST) for the period of June 1, 2024 to July 31, 2024 BE APPROVED, to continue temporary day and overnight drop in space to be funded through the Contingency Reserve fund as per the Corporation of the City of London Procurement Policy Section 20.3 e):

Moved by C. Rahman

Seconded by D. Ferreira

That part b) of the motion BE REFERRED to the May 28, 2024 meeting of the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee

Motion Passed (8 to 6)

Moved by C. Rahman

Seconded by S. Trosow

That the Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to extend one-time funding in the amount of $687,000 to Ark Aid Street Mission Inc. for an additional 61 days until July 31, 2024 to be funded through the Community Investment Reserve Fund and for staff to engage with Ark Aid Street Mission Inc. to review its most recent communication related to a year round strategy;

it being noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee received a communication from Mayor J. Morgan and Deputy Mayor S. Lewis with respect to this matter;

it being further noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee heard a verbal delegation from S. Campbell, Executive Director, Ark Aid Street Mission Inc. with respect to this matter.

Motion Passed (14 to 0)

Moved by S. Trosow

Seconded by D. Ferreira

That the Committee recess at this time, for 10 minutes.

Motion Passed

The Committee recesses at 4:00 PM and reconvenes at 4:11 PM

4.   Items for Direction

4.1   Request for Implementation of a Fare Free Day - Councillor S. Franke

2024-05-07 Submission - Fare Free Day-S. Franke

Moved by S. Stevenson

Seconded by S. Franke

That the communication dated April 29, 2024 from Councillor S. Franke with respect to Fare Free Day for the general public BE RECEIVED;

it being noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee received the following communications with respect to this matter:

  • D. Stanford and M. Robinson, Co-Chairs, Working Group for Car Free Day 2024;

  • L. Derikx, Interim Executive Director, London Environmental Network;

  • M. A. Hodge, Climate Action London;

  • C. Dyck and the London Greens;

  • C. Murphy, Board Member of London Cycle Link and London Resident;

  • A. McClenaghan, Co-Owner, London Bicycle Cafe;

  • M. Blake Rose;

  • M. Sheehan;

  • B. Samuels, Chair, Environmental Stewardship and Action Community Advisory Committee;

  • S. Sponseller;

  • E. Blokker;

  • L. Wall;

  • AM Valastro;

  • M. Bloxam; and

  • Councillor S. Franke.

Motion Passed (13 to 0)

4.2   Consideration of Appointment to the Kettle Creek Conservation Authority Board of Directors (Requires 1 Member)

Moved by P. Cuddy

Seconded by J. Pribil

That John Joseph Strybosch BE APPOINTED to the Kettle Creek Conservation Authority for the term ending November 14, 2026.

Motion Passed (13 to 0)

VOTING RECORD:

Consideration of Appointment to the Kettle Creek Conservation Authority

Majority Winner: John Joseph Strybosch

4.3   Resignation from Eldon House

2024-05-07 Submission - Resignation from Eldon House

Moved by S. Stevenson

Seconded by S. Lehman

That the following actions be taken with respect to the Eldon House Board of Directors:

a)  the communication dated April 24, 2024 from B. Duncan BE RECEIVED;

b)  the resignation of Bruce Duncan from Eldon House Board of Directors BE ACCEPTED; and

c)  the City Clerk BE DIRECTED to advertise in the usual manner to solicit applications for appointment to Eldon House Board of Directors, with applications to be brought forward to a future meeting of the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee for consideration.

Motion Passed (13 to 0)

4.4   Request for a Review of the Code of Conduct for Members of Council - Councillor S. Stevenson and Deputy Mayor S. Lewis

2024-05-07 Submission - Code of Conduct-S. Stevenson and S. Lewis

Moved by S. Stevenson

Seconded by S. Lehman

That the following actions be taken with respect to the Code of Conduct for Members of Council:

a)    the Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to undertake a review of the Code of Conduct for Members of Council and report back to a future meeting of the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee, including the following components:

i)    an environmental scan of codes of conduct for elected officials in comparable municipalities, with consideration of specific or general provisions related to “social media”, email, and communications with the public;

ii)    review of the Ombudsman Ontario “Codes of Conduct, Complaint & Inquiry Protocols and Appointing Integrity Commissioners: Guide for Municipalities” with consideration to limit the Code of Conduct for Members of Council to the four prescribed subject matters required pursuant to Regulation 55/18 of the Municipal Act, 2001; and

iii)    review of the Code of Conduct for Members of Council using the Anti-Racism and Anti-Oppression Framework and Equity Tool, as required by the Policy for the Establishment and Maintenance of Council Policies;

b)    the Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to consult with the City of London’s Integrity Commissioner regarding the Code of Conduct for Members of Council;

c)    the Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to review the Code of Conduct for Community Advisory Committees contained within the General Policy for Community Advisory Committees for general alignment with the principles of the Code of Conduct for Members of Council.

it being noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee received a communication dated April 25, 2024 from Councillor S. Stevenson and Deputy Mayor S. Lewis and a communication dated May 6, 2024 from AM Valastro with respect to this matter.

ADDITIONAL VOTES:

Moved by A. Hopkins

Seconded by H. McAlister

That the motion be amended to include a new part c) to read as follows:

c)   the Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to review the Code of Conduct for Community Advisory Committees contained within the General Policy for Community Advisory Committees for general alignment with the principles of the Code of Conduct for Members of Council.

Motion Passed (14 to 0)

Moved by S. Stevenson

Seconded by S. Lehman

That the motion, as amended, BE APPROVED.

Motion Passed (14 to 0)

6.   Confidential 

None.

7.   Adjournment

Moved by D. Ferreira

Seconded by A. Hopkins

That the meeting BE ADJOURNED.

Motion Passed

The meeting adjourned at 5:01 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 (4 hours, 17 minutes)

read my email. Thank you. We need major teams. It’s very nice.

Major teams. You’re going to be big? We’re going to be big? Nothing?

It’s up for time. We’re down with my house. Yeah. We’re going to bring up on today.

Don’t care. I own it. I own it. No.

No. You don’t know. You don’t know. You don’t know.

You don’t know. You don’t know. You don’t know. Yeah.

But there’s nothing to debate. There’s nothing to debate. Wait, wait. I’ll take that day back.

All right. I’m going to ask Councillors to take their seats. We’re going to call the meeting to order, please. Good afternoon, everyone.

Welcome to the ninth meeting of the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee. Going to begin by acknowledging that the City of London is situated on traditional lands of the Anishinaabek, the Haudenosaunee, the Lene Peiwok, and Adawanderan peoples. And we honor and respect the history, languages, and culture of the diverse indigenous people who call this territory home. The City of London is currently home to many First Nations, Métis, and Inuit people.

And as representatives of the people of the City of London, we are grateful to have the opportunity to work and live in this territory. The City of London is also committed to making every effort to provide alternate formats and communication supports for meetings upon request. And to make a request specific to this meeting, please contact sppc@london.ca or phone 519-661-2489, extension 2425. As always, colleagues, I’m going to look for any disclosures of pecuniary interest before we begin.

I see none. I want to acknowledge that Councillor Van Meerberger and Councillor Hillier are with us online via Zoom. And we are going to move into the consent agenda. I’ve not been asked to pull anything from the consent agenda.

However, I do know that the annual budget update process timelines are of interest to many individuals. And so I have asked our City staff to give us a brief presentation on the budget timelines moving forward, which will hopefully provide clarification to members of the public, those who may be watching our boards and commissions, as well as members of Council who have had an opportunity to review the agenda. As Councillor Palosa is the budget chair, I’m going to ask her to take the chair for this portion of the meeting. Sorry, you just need to see if anything was pulled for consent, or if either breathing is on the floor.

So far, we are dealing with all items of consent, but we’re just going to have you take care of the 2.1 Q&A in presentation. I’m happy to move all items of consent if it’s of assistance against going. I’m going to look for a seconder for that. Councillor McAllister.

Okay, so that’s been moved and seconded, and I will turn the chair to you now. Thank you. Looking to staff to give our overview of the 2025 annual update budget process. And just want to thank colleagues as the budget chair for those who have given feedback and taken their time to do so.

Behind the scenes, staff was made aware of your feedback to help inform this overview and presentation. And so once staff is done with their overview of the process, I will turn to colleagues for questions to ask of staff. Mr. Murray.

Thank you through the chair. I don’t have a formal presentation, but I appreciate the opportunity to say a few words, a few comments on this report in front of you today. So this is intended as the formal kickoff to the 2025 budget update process. Excuse me, we wouldn’t typically bring forward this type of report in an annual budget update year, but given that there have been significant changes to the budget process as a result of the new strong mayor’s legislation in the past year, we thought this report would be beneficial this year in particular.

So the report in front of you today provides a refresher on the strong mayor’s legislation and specifically how it impacts the budget process. You’ll recall from last year’s process that there are very prescriptive timelines under this legislation. And these are outlined in the report, but the legislation says that the proposed budget must be prepared, presented to council and made public by the mayor before February 1st of each year. Council can then make amendments to that budget within 30 days.

And after the expiry of that council amendment period, there is then a 10 day window for the mayor to veto council amendments to the budget. And then that then opens a 15 day window for council to potentially override a mayoral veto with two thirds majority. So the report outlines the proposed timelines for the 2025 budget process under this legislative framework. And taking a bit of a step back, I guess, our goal in the second and third years of the multi year budget cycle are to have the process completed before the end of the year.

So in other words, our goal or our aim is to have the 2025 budget approved before the end of December 2024. That will be the same for the 2026 budget update process as well. So working backwards from that goal, we anticipate that we will be releasing the budget on October the 28th as part of the added agenda for the October 29th SPPC meeting. I think it’s important to note that unlike last year when we had a civic administration draft budget and then a subsequent mayor’s proposed budget.

The intention this year is to simply release one version of the budget that being the mayor’s proposed budget on October 28th. We’ll then have the budget release presentation on October the 29th at SPPC, at which point the budget will then be referred to the Budget Committee. That will then open our public engagement period covering October 30th to November 18th. So that will be the window for budget information sessions.

If counselors wish to hold ward meetings or town halls, that will be the window for that as well. We’re also planning a public participation meeting at the Budget Committee on November the 19th and then Budget Committee deliberations will follow on November the 21st and the 22nd if needed. Council will then formally approve any amendments to the mayor’s budget on November the 27th. That will then lead into the next step in the process and we’re anticipating that the mayor will provide his intentions with respect to whether he intends to veto anything in the budget or any amendments that council has made to the budget.

And he will provide that intention by December the 2nd at which point that will then open the 15 day window for potential council override of the mayor’s veto. That 15 day window would then conclude and correspond with the council meeting on December the 17th. So we’ve tried as much as possible to leverage existing committee and council meeting dates wherever we can. But the 2024 council calendar was set prior to the introduction of strong mayor’s powers being introduced.

So a couple of changes are required to the council schedule of meetings to accommodate the new legislative timelines. And those are specifically the requirement to reschedule the Budget Committee meetings that are currently on the calendar for the 28th and 29th of November. We need to reschedule those to the 21st and 22nd of November to consider council amendments to the budget. And then we need to schedule a special council meeting as well on November to the 27th to formally adopt those council amendments to the budget.

So in a nutshell, that is the process we’re anticipating for this year and how we anticipate it transpiring, but we’re certainly happy to answer any questions as well. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Murray for walking us through that process as noted, our calendars will be updated with these dates once we finish approving them.

And as you heard, and this is the timeline, if you’re thinking about any award meetings, joint together, otherwise virtual in person to just look at the calendars and plan what might work for you as we are on that really tight timeline. And staff have also confirmed that some counselors did take advantage of the budget drop in session upstairs. That was just for us to go through some numbers with staff in person and they will offer that again for us. And those dates will come out once we get closer.

So starting my speakers list, looking to see if there’s any questions from colleagues. I know this is really early in the process, but it gives you a good idea of the timeline and we can get into details as the dates come closer unless you had something now. I will start my speakers list and I am timing with council purple. Thank you very much, Mr.

Chair, to the staff. By the way, thank you for this. And I’m so happy it’s coming so early so we can really discuss it and potentially make certain changes if needed. If you look at page five, the what and when the second and third, can you please give me kind of more in terms of the budget guidelines that will be given and kind of amendment submissions kind of an example that will be going to ABCs.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Murray. Thank you through the chair.

So our budget guidelines package is really kind of the internal package that aligns a lot of different elements of the budget in terms of planning assumptions that are to be used, process timelines, templates, that sort of thing. As this is an annual update, the intention is that the focus will be on significant material amendments to the budget that fall into the categories of new or changed regulations. New Council direction that has transpired since the approval of the multi-year budget or cost or revenue pressures that were not envisioned or anticipated at the time of the multi-year budget approval. So that is really what a multi-year budget update encompasses.

That will essentially be the direction that is reiterated in the budget guidelines that will be released later this month. And really emphasizing that again, it’s about material significant amendments that need to be made to the budget that was just approved a couple months ago through the multi-year budget process. Thank you, Mr. Murray, do you know when and where that the budget update stuff is coming later this month is going to land.

Thank you through the chair. So our anticipation would be to have the budget guidelines distributed before the end of May. So that’s our objective. It will be distributed both to civic service areas, as well as agencies, boards and commissions.

Thank you. Councilor Pribble. Thank you. Follow up on the same era.

So we have a four year strategic plan for your multi-year budget plan. We did introduce an additional step to the strategic plan, which is the implementation plan. And I know from previous from a couple of months ago that we will get more detailed implementation plan June of this year. But how is this going to be with the updates?

Because again, implementation plan, you know, doing one year in advance. A lot of things happen within the world, within months, not even, you know, four years when we are talking about. How is this going to be coordinated with the strategic plan and implementation plans that will be presented either to the SPPC or to the council? How is going to be the coordination on annual updates?

To staff? Thank you. Through the chair. So the implementation plan that as you have alluded to will be brought forward in the coming weeks is intended to reflect the approvals that were obtained through the multi-year budget process.

So that will include any necessary adjustments to the previous implementation plan to reflect funding decisions that were made. So perhaps there is a need to accelerate some things based on the funding that was approved. Perhaps there is a need to delay or defer things for which funding was not approved. That will be reflected in the implementation plan as well.

Similarly, in future budget processes based on budget decisions that are made. If there are future impacts on the strategic plan implementation plan, those will be reflected through future updates and iterations and reporting on the strategic plan progress. Thank you. The last question for the chair.

So even though I don’t need again, we are talking about 2025, but that’s why I’m glad we are talking about it now. So the implementation plan will be incorporated with the financial budget updates in 2025. Mr. Murray.

Thank you to the chair. So the implementation plan coming in the next few weeks will reflect the financial decisions made through the multi-year budget process. If there are further updates that are then required coming out of the 2025 budget update or the 2026 budget update or the 2027 budget update, those would be reflected down the road in future strategic plan reporting updates. Okay, Councillor.

Thank you. And there was the answer I was hoping to hear. Thank you very much. No more questions.

Thank you. Next to my speaker’s list. I have Councillor Hopkins and then Councillor Ferra. Thank you, Madam Chair and thank you to staff for the brief presentation.

Really appreciate it as this is quite new to all of us. And I know we’ve just gone through the main budget a few months ago. We’re changing the dates on the Budget Committee deliberations right now here at committee. I can understand why we’re doing that.

My question through you, Madam Chair, to staff would be, are there opportunities to extend those dates if needed? Or maybe I don’t know who can answer that one. And the reason I’m asking that is just having gone through the amendments and the time that was needed. If we do have enough time with these amendments as opposed to quickly rushing and making putting amendments that haven’t been really filtered or thought through and just to meet those timelines.

Thank you for that. I know we’re a 30 day legislative timeline looking to finance staff as well as the Mr. Sultas might have something to add about if we’ve advertised a meeting or not if we’re allowed to host another one if we need more time. So I’ll start with Mr.

Murray. Thank you through the chair. So I’ll start. I think we are the challenges under the new legislation.

We are very much constrained by the timelines that are in the legislation. So it is very clear that after the budget is proposed by the mayor, there is a strict 30 day window for council to make amendments to the budget. So there is no flexibility, unfortunately, to extend that. If that 30 day window expires, the budget is simply approved as proposed by the mayor without any amendments.

So those timelines are unfortunately very prescriptive and very short. And there’s not a lot of flexibility. In fact, little to no flexibility within those those deadlines, unfortunately. Thank you, Mr.

Sultas. I don’t know if anything to add on. I know the budget deliberation dates for the 21st and 22nd. If needed, if counselors had a long list of amendments, we needed more time.

If you just want me to comment on that. Thank you through the chair. I have nothing to add to what Mr. Murray said about the timelines and our old reg 580 22.

It’s a 30 day prescribed timeline. And there’s no flexibility within that regulation to extend. We, of course, would have noticed provisions that we would need to comply with pursuant to our council procedure by law as well. Councillor Hopkins.

Thank you for that. I do have one further question. And it is about the public engagement process. And I understand from the report that we are still developing that if.

Through you, Madam chair, if I can get a little bit more information on when we can expect to get the full information for the public, Mr. Murray. Thank you through the chair. So, yes, we are still very much in the process of developing the details and the specifics around our public engagement plan.

Having said that, excuse me, I would anticipate that the plan and the avenues for engagement and the channels for engaging would be very similar to what we’ve used for previous annual budget updates. So there will be obviously a mix of both virtual and in person opportunities for everyone to engage. We will use extensive use of various means of advertising, whether that be digital print. We will be making extensive use of social media once again as well to to spread the word.

So there will be plenty of opportunities and a variety of different channels as part of that process. We will be closer to the release of the budget. Later this year, we will be updating our get involved page that will have full details, full specifics around what engagement opportunities will be available, what those dates will be. And of course, we will certainly reach out to all of you around the council horseshoe as well.

For those of you who are interested in scheduling war meetings or town halls with your constituents. Very happy to support those events as well. So, full details, full specifics are still being developed, but it would be very similar to the means that we’ve engaged with the public in the past. Thank you.

I have Council for next, and then anyone else who would like to, and I would just ask the clerks if there’s a colleague online who hands up raising their hand just to make me aware. Council for thank you chair. I only have one question. Oh, I appreciate to say, you know, thanks to staff for the presentation and laying out all the details and what to expect for the schedule, especially with the dates.

I do like that. So I’ll be using that to kind of schedule my own community engagement meeting myself. I just had one question, and that would be for the two separate categories of budget amendments. We have the mayor will be the mayor’s proposed budget will be included, and then those that are referred to the budget process.

So I wanted to know if we could get some more details on what to expect regarding that. And just a confirmation, it does look like they’re going to be released together at the same time, but I want to know if you could just touch on some details of what we would expect with those two components. Thank you, Mr. Murray.

Thank you and through you. This is definitely a new area for this year’s budget update process is not something that we’ve had in the past. Typically, you know, we would have had amendments in some cases that were perhaps recommended or others that are for consideration. This year with the new process, the new strong mayor’s budget process, I guess.

Ultimately, it’s up to the mayor to decide what is included in the budget fundamentally. So there will be, we envision a number of amendments that the mayor will support and choose to include in his proposed budget. We are envisioning, however, that there may be other things that the mayor is perhaps not supportive of. However, in the interest of full disclosure, false and public engagement on the budget, those should be presented as well to give counsel the opportunity to hear from the public on those potential things and to potentially make amendments with respect to those potential things as well.

So we’re envisioning kind of two categories of budget amendments within the budget document itself, those that are included and supported by the mayor and included in his proposed budget, and those that are presented for information purposes to facilitate full some input on the process. Thank you. Follow up, Councillor. No follow up.

Thank you for that. Thank you. Looking for further questions on item 2.1. You could always think of something in a few minutes.

But in the meantime, I’ll return the control back to the chair. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. I’ll resume chairing the meeting.

I appreciate you taking care of the budget section of that for us. Looking to see if colleagues have any questions or comments on anything else on the consent agenda before we call the vote. Councillor McAllister. Thank you.

Just a quick comment on 2.5. I just want to thank the two business members who have volunteered to join the BIA really appreciate them volunteering their time and I look forward to working with them. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor McAllister.

Any other questions or comments on other consent items? Councillor ramen. Thank you. And through you, my question relates to item 2.2, the update on the anti-hate pilot project.

I just wanted to comment or question whether or not we’ve received any additional correspondence from the federal government. The funding that flowed for the anti-hate project flowed before they formally announced a special envoy on anti-Semitism. And within the content of our documentation here provided, it does not explicitly, although it does say, and other mention anti-Semitism. And I do think that being that the federal government has put an increased special envoy and funding towards and support and that they’ve done that clearly as an acknowledgement of the increase in anti-Semitism in our community and elsewhere across the country.

I do think that we need to explicitly look at how we’re addressing anti-Semitism within our anti-hate pilot project. And we will go to Ms. Smith for that, for any comment that you might want to add. Actually, Mr.

Chair, it’s a report that came through me while I was acting as city manager. I do have both Mr. Govindaraj and Ms. Chansley here who might be able to provide some insight as to what correspondence we’ve received with respect to the special envoy since the report was drafted.

Certainly, so we’ll go to them for a comment. Through you, Chair, just to follow up on that question, we are expanding the anti-hate project to cover all issues of hate, including anti-Semitism, xenophobia, LGBTQ and trans-hate. We will be exploring to see how we continue this project. And at this point, we haven’t heard any direct information of additional funding from the federal government at this point.

But we are looking at continuing to see where we can continue to do this important work in London. So, Councillor Ramen. Thank you and through you. And I’m just wondering if perhaps at a further time, we could have a further discussion on whether or not the city needs to as we as Council need to direct some additional support as well as update our language to be more inclusive of addressing that specific hate in our community because I do think that the community is looking for that response.

And I think it’s important that we validate that we understand and with the money that we’ve been given by the federal government that we make a commitment to address it with those funds as well. And within the pilot project is explicitly. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor.

Mr. Senji, did you have any additional comment that you wanted to provide in response to that? No additional comments, but we will be really trying to expand the language and how we kind of further expand the hate work. Thank you for that.

Thank you, Councillor Pribble. Thank you, Mr. Chair, to the staff. This was awarded by the province last year, half a million dollars for two-year pilot project.

I see the next step is $90,000. And I was just wondering, what is the balance now and what are the plans, if there is a balance, what are the plans to do with the remainder. And the reason we’re masking is because we just want to do multi-year budget and we are certainly allocating certain amounts to certain initiatives to address these issues. And I certainly want to make sure that we use up 100% of the provincial funds.

I know the staff. I know the staff. The pilot project through your council, through your chair. We will be looking at using 100% of the funding.

We might have to use a little bit of the funding in the last year because we are delayed in developing some of the resource materials that would be more used towards the first year. But we might need to kind of continue the work. And we will be exploring some additional funding sources to transition both from internal, but also looking at other sources. Councilor Perbal.

Thank you, and I’m glad that we are going to use up all that funding. If there are certain items and issues that we introduced in the budget, if there is room for it, it certainly would be great if we can pay for it from funds from the higher levels of government. I think we all know that I don’t think I have to mention it, but thank you very much for the answers. Thank you, Councilor, any further questions or comments?

Seeing none, then I’m going to ask the clerks to open the vote on the consent agenda. Trust votes, yes. Councilor Perbal. Boarding, yes.

Thank you. Closing the vote, motion carries 15 to 0. Thank you, colleagues. Before we move on to scheduled items, Mayor Morgan just wanted to update us on his schedule and attendance this afternoon, Mayor Morgan.

Yes, I just wanted to let colleagues know, I do have to leave at about 245. On behalf of the big city mayors, I’m presenting to the standing committee on finance and economic affairs on our feedback on bill 185, which is the bill that essentially starts to pull back some of the decisions the provincial government made around development charges phase in and other things. So it’s important for us to reiterate some of our making it whole, making municipalities whole strategy. So I’ll be leaving for that.

I’ll return as soon as that has concluded. I just want to let colleagues know that I’ll have to step out for a bit. Thank you, Mayor Morgan, and I would just thank you for actually following council procedure 9.17, which is informing the chair and the committee when you have to leave, but do plan to return. So thank you for that.

And moving along to scheduled items. Our next item 3.1 is the presentation on the ward boundary review from Watson and associates, and I understand that they are joining us virtually to provide a presentation. Mr Spicer, Mr Williams, we see you online. So if you would like to proceed with your presentation.

Thank you, Chair Lewis. Yes, I’d like to begin. We have the presentation ready to go. So we will jump right into that and be prepared to take some questions at the end.

So if I could ask staff to start that presentation, that would be very helpful. While we’re doing that, I’ll just indicate, you will see on the second slide reference to Jack M. and Dahlia, who is, who’s the managing partner at Watson, who has a lead on this particular project. Mr.

And Dahlia has a conflict at the moment. So he’s left. Dr Spicer and I to provide this presentation. And there are a couple of other staff from Watson available.

And we need that assistance further on through our presentation. So I’m not seeing the presentation on mice. Yeah, I’m going to ask you to bear with us for just a moment here because we did have a revised presentation in our added agenda, but it is in PDF form. So just give us a moment on the technology side, please.

We’re getting used to that. Okay, we have one of the clerks able to share the screen. So we can proceed now. All right.

Thank you then. Obviously, this is an introductory council workshop, which is intended to begin the process and there’ll be other steps along the way so we can move on to the next slide. We’ll be the one I referred to a moment ago that Zach Spicer and I are here for this presentation and we will involve our other team members as needed. So the next slide basically is just a quick overview of what we intend to cover in this section, or in this session rather an introduction to the 24 wardbound review.

We haven’t been one in a while in London. So we want to bring you up to speed on what this entails. We’ll talk a little bit about the city of London and how that fits into what we try to do. There is a general process.

But obviously we need to tailor that to London and it’s, it’s particular needs and requirements in this exercise, and we’ll then provide you with some quick overview of the next steps we intend and to take in this discussion. So I’m going to turn things over to Zach Spicer for the next slide, and we’ll alternate back and forth as we, we’ve worked through this material. Thanks so much Bob, definitely appreciate it. So as we begin today I want to add a couple of questions for council to consider.

Again, this is a introductory meeting and as we’ll discuss later on there will be an opportunity for each member of council to me with us individually we’re interested in your impressions about the word system along with your individual awards, but for now we have a couple of key, key questions that we would like council to consider as we move forward. The main one is how does the award system and the electoral arrangement in the city of London currently measure up what does it do well and what does it not necessarily do well. The goals of award boundary review, and what information does council need to make an informed decision at the conclusion of study. At this point, I also wanted to emphasize that the word boundary review isn’t necessarily about any one individual counselor or council as a whole, but really about the system itself.

I’m interested necessarily at, at reviewing the performance of council or anything along those lines, but, but really about the performance of this system as a whole, and that I would emphasize that this is a healthy process something that is done regularly throughout the city. And it’s similar to, to having a sort of check up with a doctor in the sense that we are checking in on the health of your local democracy. I’ll hand things over the blog the next slide. Thank you Zach.

So, why do you undertake a review and we’ve hinted at that a little bit already. There are a couple of things in this slide that are worth emphasizing. What we’re trying to do under this contract is to prepare council to consider and discuss whether to maintain the existing ward boundaries, or to pursue an alternative arrangement, as we’ll point out a little later. This is not an obligatory responsibility.

You can do the check up as, as we just suggested, and decide in your own judgment that everything’s fine we can leave it the way it is, or make some other changes as needed. And that’s where we get to this latter, latter part of that left side of the slide but it’s, it’s council that makes the final decision. And, and our role is to assist council by bringing in our expertise by bringing in perspectives from the community to help council make that decision, which as we’ll suggest later on we want to see by the end of the calendar year. There’s other review are generally threefold and they’re listed there and we could take those apart further if need be.

But what we’re looking for is what we might call fair representation. We’re looking at the electoral arrangements to help ensure equal representation to all of the residents of London. So that’s the individual side individual residents are treated equally under the system, but also to give communities within London a equitable voice, a fair voice in the decision making process. So they’re in a sense two parts to what we want to look at in terms in fairness, the individual resident, and the communities themselves.

The second part of that is to recognize that communities change the city itself is changed. The population and demographic changes since the wards were put in place. I think a chance to review and decide whether the boundaries do reflect those population shifts, and to better serve the evolving community distribution of interest I dare say there are neighborhoods within London that have been established since those boundaries were created. How well are they reflected in the in the old in the existing boundaries.

And can we realign things to help them better, you better represent it. And then the final part is that this is about democracy. And the part that’s important in that I think is that this is an independent review. The team at Watson and Dr.

Spicer and I are not part of the civic structure, we confer with staff, we will confer with you in Council, but we will be conducting this review independently in a way that we hope will promote transparency and accountability in the whole process to bolster trust in the democratic system, and increase civic engagement. The cliche might be what we want to do is avoid the appearance that this is a gerrymander that it’s Council deciding where to draw lines, or their own individual benefit come next election. That may, there may be changes that are beneficial to elected officials, but the maps and the ideas will come from an independent source that Council can then way up and determine whether to to adopt them. Part of this will be to provide education to the community and indirectly to Council.

And we are working on a number of tools and materials that will be on your website that people can examine at their leisure, and use to help understand the process, and to help contribute to what we do in our evaluation you’ll notice a reference there to a survey, for example, and there’ll be various opportunities to get involved, including educational videos that start from the basic assumption that residents may not even know what award is, but if they do there are things to consider so that’s again a part of what the team is providing at Watson and they will be available fairly soon as part of the materials on the website for this process. This slide is simply a quick reference to the current system, the map is there, which I believe lists the various planning districts that are part of that I believe there have been some suggestions that we needed to tweak that list and, and this will be done. It would be an idea though of reminding you that each of the wards is a combination is a grouping of other neighborhoods communities within the city, and our one of our examinations is to look at how those fit together in a ward system. Are they the right groupings again given population change and other development, or are there things that that really cannot be changed in the way things are grouped together so that’s again.

Again, what we will be working with as our starting point. The next line, Mr Williams sorry to interrupt you. Sorry to interrupt you, but we’re a little over seven minutes. And I know that there’s going to be questions for you afterwards.

So I’m wondering if we can just sort of move quickly through the presentation so that we can get to the questions from counselors. Okay, I’m sorry, I wasn’t aware that there was a strict time limit on this. All right, I’ll, I’ll talk faster. Okay.

So the next slide. Again, and because you will have had access to this I don’t need to go through it in great detail. I’m thinking more of viewers, but the next slide is basically setting out the legislative basis for this activity. There are things that council can do, and they are fairly straightforward on on the next slide.

They talk, we talk about changing the size of council, which is not a part of our mandate to whether you’re going to change to another form of election. The authority to divide or redivide the wards, and those are the things we’re going to be dealing with. So I think if we skip across to a couple more slides over I’ll ask Dr. Spicer to jump back in again.

Thanks very much. We’re conducting the review of four guiding principles, the first being balancing the current population distribution amongst wards and we’re looking for a variance of no more than 15%. We’re also working on this going up to three terms of council. So, towards that 2030, 2034 council term, in doing so we’re also balancing respect for established neighborhoods, and we’re different geographical features and infrastructure boundaries across the city, such as roads, roads, valleys, highways, railways, things of that nature so we’re not disrupting existing neighborhoods and communities.

In the interest of time we can go towards the next slide. So why do a review? Well, basically things change. We have a population influx coming from outside the city, but also migration within the city itself.

Again, this is a natural process as the city grows and matures and changes. And new new residents come to the city seeking new opportunities. In the interest of time we’ll go to the next slide, and I will highlight some of those changes. The city of London is indeed growing and these are some are some stats, Canada census figures from 2011 and 2021 going forward we will of course be using the most up to date demographic information, but looking at the city’s growth within that time period.

It’s about 15% growth and over 56,000 residents. This population grows growth of course have it hasn’t been evenly distributed across the city. And from from from the maps provided we can see that there is substantial growth in some of the awards to the north and the west of the city. I’ll hand it back to my colleague bot.

Sorry. And I’ll just jump in here quickly. We’re looking at a continuous process of change in London, maybe intermittent might be a better word. But the electoral structure that we’re thinking about begins in 2005 when when London shifted from the system of two members per ward at seven wards to a single member system that followed in 2010.

And then with the elimination of the board of control, and the council structure that is now in place. In the inter interval after 2010 there have been some reviews by the civic administration in advance of municipal elections, as we say here based on population data and guiding principles. This is what’s different in 2024 in that this is to be an external review to to those processes to look toward an arrangement for the 2026 election. And as we just suggested for two elections beyond that.

The next slide is is essentially context piece obviously the left side. That’s familiar that’s I don’t think is on the agenda to change a mayor and 14 members of council in 14 wards with a deputy mayor appointed or selected from within council. The chart on the right is simply a context piece that London is one of a number of large urban centers in southwestern Ontario. And that’s just to help understand what how it’s console size and it’s, and it’s, it’s representation pattern relates to those other municipalities.

It’s a case of, of information rather than any direction, but it’s important to see that that in many of these cases there has been change in the time we’re talking about. And the growth will obviously have to be reflected in that. So to jump into the next steps, very quickly, this introductory workshop is just simply to provide that background to stimulate some discussion. And, and we’ve already done that and we’ll do it again to provide you some questions to consider in the next few weeks, we will begin to engage with members of council.

We will interview each of you individually to help us better understand the way the system is currently working what you like what you think could could be improved. And, and we will then reach out to the community as well, to examine some of those questions, the core review themes and considerations. We are the current words meeting the guiding principles that were set up. And if not, why not, there will also be what we call background papers prepared and posted on the website which will examine each of these questions independently for the community to better appreciate the choices that are possible for council to make in the fall then and we will do some public consultations by the way later in June those are are in the works and will be available with the information will be available shortly.

And then by the fall we’ll be able to come back to council to build on what we’ve heard from the community to build on our own evaluation of the boundaries and to develop some alternatives that that could address the problems that have been identified. And by the end of the fall or in early winter, again, with other consultations in the community on the, if you will, the draft boundaries. Then community members of the community will be able to provide with us further insight into what they like and don’t like about those arrangements. And on that basis, we will provide recommendations to council on it could be to say, you don’t need to change, but if you do need to change, here are a couple of ways that we think would would be worth considering to be able to improve where that is necessary.

Let’s back finish off from the next slide. Thanks very much. Very quickly Mr. Chair, I just wanted to highlight some of the questions that we’ve been curious when we meet with the individual members of council through the clerk’s office will be reaching out.

We’re hoping to have an opportunity to meet with each and every one of you to learn more about your questions about the work system but also your individual work. So we’re interested in what the current wards do do well and what they perhaps are not doing as well as they could. Where some of the challenges and potential pressure points live for the current for battery system. We’re also curious about your impression about those guiding principles as we mentioned earlier, there is a potential for tension between them.

So we like to know where you place priority upon them in which you feel are potentially less important to yourself and your constituents. And then finally we’re interested in areas of the city that you believe may be underrepresented or over represented that can be from a geographical context but also different communities, different age groups, different age cohort senior students, perhaps the different ethnic groups. Whose voice is not being heard on council currently and where could it be potentially amplified. So, thank you for your time today.

I know we’re a bit short on time. So why don’t we kick with the presentation there and open the floor questions. Thank you very much. Well, thank you both for that presentation and you did a very thorough job of walking us through.

Councilor Palosa. Thank you, Mr chair through you to our guest presenters today. One question and a couple comments. As you were looking at the population distribution throughout the wards.

Will this report or any future report consider what’s been approved for population increase through planning applications realizing some areas have great intensification coming as that will drastically change the population within the word boundaries. And Mr. Spicer Mr Williams. Yeah, if I made Mr chair that is precisely what Watson and associates bring to this review and the other folks on this in this call who are invisible but population data is very important and as you’ll notice in those principles a system that can be applicable over time.

And so the collection of accurate and as comprehensive a set of data as we can it deals with those very fundamental things building permits other other technical information if you will, would be built into alternatives that we prepare for Council. So this is, I’ll make this point and I may repeat it elsewhere. When we when boundaries are reviewed at the federal level they happen after each census. And the new boundaries basically catch up to what’s happened in between.

We have a bit of that mandate in here to catch up to where you were when the current boundaries were created but also one of the guiding principles to think ahead to what’s going to happen over the next three to four to five years, so that in a sense you don’t have to go through this exercise right away you’ve got something that you can grow into. So yes, that’s an important part. And as I pointed out earlier, there’s a balance. Do you want to build a ward system around potential growth, or do you want to just catch up and leave it at that, or do you want to pay little less attention to population itself and put more emphasis on the other questions?

Yeah, thank you. So I was looking for more concise answers today so just a nod from our presenter that that will future reports will incorporate what population projections are, and they will actually have access to the data of planning applications and the intensification coming through. The answer is yes. Thank you.

As for the preliminary report. I’ll just highlight that in the planning districts listed neighborhoods not completely accurate. This city does have a website as we tend to do our neighborhood identifications. Some are just not in my area there listed in the area and I will expose that I have the third largest geographical size and population so come at this data a little bit differently.

Also would prefer to see in future reports as it would help the public, the ward actual residency versus the ranges 5000 people is a big variance as we look at how many we’re representing. I’ll leave my comments there. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Ploza, Councillor ramen.

Thank you and through you. I just wanted to check in about the percentage of variance. I kind of missed that number as it was being said, but I do know that in our governance working committee, when we first started discussing this, we talked about the fact that based on applicable case law and past tribunal decisions that population variation of up to 25% or above was considered or below, I should say, the optimal word size and I just wanted to check in and see if we’re working under that same assumption of the 25%. Because I think that that will significantly influence our decision making on this.

So I’m wondering if they can comment on that first. Yes, and Mr Spicer. I think you provided a number, but there was a little bit of a glitch in the zoom call. So if you can clarify that for us, please.

Certainly chair, apologies for that. The number that I stated was 15%, which is part of our of our mandate. I would say to 25% has been used in the past, but 15% is as it is a parameters for this particular project. Councillor ramen.

And so when we say 15% is that for 15% on projected growth or actual growth right now. Mr Spicer. Yeah, whichever one of you wants to answer. We would apply that in both.

And that that’s part of where the options come in. We’ll try to aim for 15% as close as we can. And that would apply to both a pop current population and future projections, which may mean that maps that are placed one emphasis on present population looks different than a map that places it on future growth. 15% is part of what we’ve been asked to to consider.

Councillor, thank you. And just to follow up with regard to the consultation, I look forward to engaging with your group on this and this topic as I think it’s very important that we do right size Council. Looking out at the population projections within my word, for instance, where it’s upwards of 56,000 based on the report that we were provided when we were making this decision. I’m wondering how we might go about doing engagement.

If engagement will look differently by ward, depending on how much of an impact there could be to that particular ward. And we’ll go to our consultants through you, Mr Chair, that process, we are developing in consultation with your staff to determine the right way to do that. Where to locate meetings, how much of it is done virtually and so forth. So, and we work closely with with city staff to address those very questions.

And some of that may also come up in our interviews where we could take some advice from each individual Councillor about about how that might be best handled in a particular ward. Councillor. Thank you. And, and just to follow up on that, I appreciate that.

One of the things I think as we know we’re a fast growing city. Some people probably have moved here in between election cycles and, or even before that, didn’t know what ward they’re in. So, I think there’s a lot of education that we have to do on this and look forward to hearing your ideas on how to tackle that engagement. Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Ramen. Looking for other speakers on this item, Councillor Pribble. Mr. Chair, to Mr.

Williams, and I’m very glad you said not just catch up on the think ahead as well. And I actually had a question for you, but you actually answered that you are going to be working closely with our staff. Because I think that that’s a secret of the success because our staff is not just the building permits that we have issued, but our staff has the bigger picture, the bigger vision. So, I’m glad to hear that.

So, you answered that. But in terms of the big cities, when I look at that page, when you are comparing it to us other municipalities, we are actually the largest one there. And I was just curious if there’s a reason why there’s no Hamilton, Mississauga, Ottawa, et cetera. Is there a particular reason?

And if there is not, can we add those in, please. Chair, if I can. I believe that was simply a geographic reference. At some point, the other numbers we could provide if we think it’s of some value.

Yes. That would obviously include Hamilton, Ottawa, Toronto, Vaughan, Markham, some other large cities. The problem is that some of those are our single tier and others are lower tier, but we can certainly provide data of that sort, which we can access easily. Councillor Pribble.

Thank you, Mr. Lawrence. No more questions. Thank you, Councillor Hopkins.

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Spicer, Mr. Williams, for the presentation. I think this is going to be a conversation in our city as it relates to not only civic engagement, but really the importance of our democracy and getting voted turnout as we work towards the next municipal election.

And I think it will be a great conversation to be had in our community about how awards work. And for me, it is all about balancing the population. Thank you for the revision. As I represent Ward 9, it is a high growth ward.

It’s really going to be important for me to express my thoughts and share my comments on what I see in the community. I am hoping the engagement. I’ll just make some comments, Mr. Chair, through the public consultation process.

You mentioned about online website surveys, all very good. I think the public engagement before and after when you present the changes is also going to be important for the feedback. So just expressing a few comments right now and really looking forward to the conversations going forward. Thank you.

Thank you, Councillor Hopkins. Councillor Truss out. Thank you very much. And thank you for your presentation and your assistance in this matter.

London has not been through a comprehensive reevaluation of the ward system since 2005 when we adopted our current system as you pointed out. In my opinion, having been a somewhat of a participant in that process back in 2005, I think that we can learn a lot from some of the things that the city did that can be done a lot better. And the most, and I’m not placing any blame here or anything, but I think we should air if we should air on the side of early public participation throughout the entire process. And I see on, I see on the next steps project timelines.

When it says information collection, it says interview and engage with members of Council and I think that means to say, and other members of the public, I was going to make an amendment, but I think it’s been explained to me that that’s your intent is, is that right. Mr Spicer or Mr Williams. I was just going to say, yes, that is our, our attention. We’re working with staff right now to confirm the dates.

We’re looking at dates in June, and then later in the fall, but there will be, there will be multiple rounds and multiple opportunities for, for the public to provide their input, as Council. That, that’s excellent. Sorry if I would just add that we would certainly be working with senior staff on some of this in terms of gathering data and other forms of insights, communication, whatever, and also to reach out to other relevant organizations or interests within the city to gather that information. And that probably would have to take place into the summer, but the public sessions will do by the end of June, I think the June 19th and 20th or the tentative dates for those events.

Thank you, Mr. Williams. And between the city staff and the ward counselors, you can be provided with the list of the existing neighborhood associations and where they’re, where they’re located. I think it’ll be very important to have them in this, in this process.

Now, last time I checked the municipal act has not changed in this regard. And I want you to correct me if I’m wrong, but the provision, the provision for citizen petitions presented the city council, which is what happened in 2005 has, has not been taken out. Is that correct, that’s still there. Mr Williams or Mr.

Chair, that that provision is still there, but it is not pertinent in this instance, because the, the idea of the review has been generated, as far as I know from staff and approved by council. So this is not in response to a petition that to initiate a project should. Well, there, there are certain unfortunate scenarios that might lead to that kind of thing later on, but our goal is not to. Our expectation is not that this is in response to a petition.

And that it is basically being driven on, on the initiative of the city itself. Thank you. I, through the chair, I fully understand that there’s not been a petition yet, but I want everybody to understand. And this is, this could become an issue.

And this is why I think showing a lot of respect for public participation is crucial early. A petition can come at any time. You don’t need that many signatures for the petition and a petition can be presented to council at any time. And there are very strict rules in the municipal act that say the council has to do certain things with that petition and deal with it within a particular time.

Otherwise, it goes, it can go up to appeal right away, which is, which is what happened in 2005. So I think it might not be bad for, even though this is not generated by a petition, and I don’t know of any that are out there. And I hope, I hope that the public has a lot of confidence in this process. We should have a contingency plan, though, that if we do receive a petition, we will have to deal with it rather immediately.

In very short, in very short order. So that’s one thing I wanted to put out. My call for earlier participation, you’ve responded to. I think in addition to equalizing the population, and I think 15% is a good goal.

I know that under the case law, we could go up higher than that in terms of the variance, but I think 15% at the municipal level is a very reasonable goal. We should get it as close to zero as we can, but if we try to get it too close to zero, then we might violate other principles of fair representation, and we might have to start doing strange things geographically, which is another point you might want to talk about a little bit is we should avoid strange maps. You look at some of the congressional districts in the United States, and they’re squiggly little things that just go all over the place. We don’t really have a lot of that in our maps right now, but there are two or three instances where the borders do look a little funny.

And I think as much as possible, you want to regularize the borders using railroad tracks, using rivers, using the large thoroughfares is always a good idea. I guess my main concern here, my number one concern here is if we can get through this process without generating a large protest from any number of groups, any number of citizen groups, I think it will be a success. Well, we have to have our process done by December 30th before the election. That would include any LPAT appeals, which is why I’m glad that we started so early.

So with that, I just want to wish you well. I’m looking forward to speaking with you. I think counselors have a lot to add to this, but we shouldn’t be taking this from the point of view of the word we’d like to see. We should be going from the first principles, which is effective representation, fair representation under the case law.

That’s time, Councilor. So thank you for coming, and that’s it for today. Any other speakers? Seeing none, then we are just going to need a motion to receive.

Oh, Councilor Cuddy. Sorry, you’re moving the motion to receive and Councilor McAllister’s seconding, so we’ll just have a motion to receive the presentation from our guests, and I will echo the thanks you heard from other counselors. We appreciate your time today, and we look forward to connecting with you in the near future. Thank you, Mr.

Chair. And we will ask the clerk to open the vote. Closing the vote, motion carries 15 to 0. Thank you, colleagues.

That concludes our scheduled items. Section 4 is our items for direction. There’s a number of things in there. That will include a couple of potentially some rounds of voting on appointments to board some commissions, resignations.

However, we do have a deferred matter additional business. And I know that we have a considerable number of individuals in the gallery who are here interested in that particular item with regard to arcade. And I’m wondering if any colleagues would object to a change of order. We would deal with 5.1, our additional business, and then we would move on to our items for direction.

So I’m going to look to see if there’s any objection to a change of order, or if we want a formal motion. I’m not seeing any objections. So from the chair, I’m going to approve the change of order, and we will deal with 5.1, the deferred matters and additional business. We do have a request for delegation status from Ms.

Campbell from arcade. So I am going to, first of all, ask the mayor if he will. Councillor Tussow. Sorry, so I’m just going to excuse me.

I am dealing with a little bit of seasonal allergies. So forgive the raspy throat and the runny nose. But I’m going to see if the mayor would like to, as he was this primary signer on the communication, if he’d like to move the request for delegation status. And that’s a yes, and do we have a seconder for that?

Councillor Hopkins, so we will ask the clerks to open the vote to receive the delegation. Supposing the vote, motion carries 15 to 0. Okay, colleagues, so we will proceed with the delegation, and then we will deal with the communication from the mayor and myself and motions related to that. So Ms.

Campbell, we’re going to invite you to the microphone. I know that you have presented to us before, so I know that you are familiar with, you’ve got 5 minutes. The floor is yours, and I will turn it over to you now. Well, thank you very much, first of all, for this addition to the agenda.

I can’t overstate how meaningful it is to the people in this gallery, to the city of London, the people who are living on the streets of London. I’d like to acknowledge the people in the gallery. There’s a number of staff, board members, supporters, and some of our residents that have been utilizing the spaces that we’ve offered this winter. So I just want to thank you all for coming, and I hope that I represent your voices and your intentions and the work we’ve been doing together very well.

Many of you counselors have visited our site, the various sites, in fact, four locations that were operated over the past six months, where we were able to, with your financial support, open 120 night beds, as well as in partnership with CMHA, have day services at all of those four locations for 24 hours a day. There were times that we needed to close for cleaning and things like that, but we had 24/7 services at four locations across the city of London. This is an incredible feat, given the hunger strike that took place and the call to action that said that we needed multiple 24/7 drop in locations across the city of London. We knew this council made that happen.

Because of those services, we actually were able to implement some of the things we’ve been working on together as a whole of community through the hubs and encampment strategy tables. Some of the ideas and suggestions of having a series of spaces where people could access a front door where people can get basic needs and system navigation. We were able to implement that, all of these locations. We were able to invite people inside, whether it was for 15 minutes or 24 hours.

We were able to help folks where they were at with the needs that they had day to day. Having five months of service under our belt and being able to hire 100 staff, train them, align those services, motivate all of the food resources and donations from our community. So many elements it takes to create these services, but after four years of doing this in partnership with the city of London, everything from the wish trailers in 2020, all the way to what we did this past year. The demand for services has continued to grow and the number of people living on the streets of London, commiserate to that.

We estimate that there’s over 2,000 people who are living on the streets of London. Today, what we are talking about is a response to the direction you gave the day that you approved the winter response. I heard loud and clear from counselors that they did not want to continue to hear short term solutions for what is a growing problem in our city. That there needed to be a ongoing strategy to address these needs and that we needed to work together as a community to find those solutions.

I’m here speaking about the services of arcade street mission, but I am acutely aware of the fact that there are many services in our community that are looking at an end of funding. And frankly, for those who are living unsheltered, unhoused in the city of London, the referral as of May 31st is to a curb, a tent and a park. That’s what we have. Our shelter system is at capacity and has been for many years is the same size that it was in 2020 when the number that we were responding to was about 400 people.

Today with a number that we estimate to be about 2,000 people and that’s based on the fact that we served over 1,000 unique individuals data collected information gathered. We know who these folks are and what their circumstances have been. It is unimaginable that here in the city of London, we can’t offer services to these folks. We know that it’s going to be more than what we can address with 120 spaces or really anything that can be stood up overnight.

The challenges of standing up these services, as I said, are very heavy. It’s expensive and difficult. I’m grateful to be presenting to you a year-round strategy. I’ve sent it to each of your inboxes as I was encouraged to do today.

You know, it’s difficult to know how to navigate these political waters. We’re looking at a high acuity system, a whole of community response to high acuity folks. That’s one piece of the puzzle. We have an already existing system in our community that needs support and, you know, we are finding the expenses to serve folks more and more, you know, it’s costing us more to do those things.

But we are in a completely different environment with 2,000 people without care. I’m not sure where this request belongs, but I’m bringing it to you and hopeful that by demonstrating our accountability in not only providing these services, but ensuring that they were used, sharing the metrics and the outcomes, 30 people housed, 15 reunited with natural supports and moved back into their families. We believe that we can continue to deliver those services at a reduced cost of 25% if funded year-round. That’s a $6 million cost in the year.

And we recognize we’re in a very constrained environment. We are willing to work with civic administration, yourselves and any partners to ensure that we have continued care and access to services in our city. And we thank you for considering this funding extension. Thank you, Ms.

Campbell. So I know we have, I’m sure some questions from counselors. I know that at least one counselor has indicated that they also want to move an amendment to try and keep things orderly. I’m first going to see if we can get the mover, Mayor Morgan, if you want to move the original motion, and then we can have some questions of our delegates.

And then if there’s any changes, we can entertain those. So I’m going to ask if someone else can move the motion, not that I’m not willing to, but as I indicated to committee, I have to present to the provincial government at 245. So I don’t want to leave the room in the middle of the bait and have you have to find a new mover, not that I’m not completely willing to, but I want to ensure that you don’t have to do anything procedurally. And Councillor ramen, are you willing to move that?

So we have a mover. Do we have a seconder for the, well, I was the seconder on the letter, but as I’m chairing, I’m going to keep myself off the second or two. So Councillor Trust, I was willing to second. Okay.

So the motion, just so that folks are aware, it is in your eScribe, but I’m going to take the opportunity to read it out just so that everyone in the gallery is aware as well. And the clerk has advised me that they just fixed a piece of the language. So I’m going to read the most updated version that civic administration be directed to extend one time funding in the amount of $687,000 to arcade mission street mission for an additional 61 days until July 31, 2024. And for staff to engage with arcade mission to review its most recent communication related to a year round strategy.

And then we will have it being noted that a communication was received from the mayor and myself with regard to this matter. So that is the motion that’s moved and seconded at the moment. And I’m hoping we can perhaps move to some questions on the main motion. While Miss Campbell is in the gallery so that if there are questions that you want to direct to her, she’s there to answer them.

Of course, our civic administration is here as well. Mr. Dickens and Mr. Cooper are here.

So if there are questions to direct their way, we will proceed on this. I do know that Councilor Trussow did circulate a proposed amendment. So before we go to any vote, I will go to you, Councilor, but I’m going to look for some questions and debate on the main motion first. So I’m looking to start a speaker’s list on that.

Councilor Layman. Thank you. So as we’ve looked at solutions for a very complex problem. I think for myself personally, I look at a number of things.

I look at what is the cost? What’s the form of shelter? And what’s the transition to move from 24-hour existence into a more long-term path forward? Now, for the cost side of things, I always like to do a cost per bed analysis because it gives me some benchmarks that we have seen with other forms of help.

So if I do my math correctly and correct me if I’m wrong, staff on this, it looks like we’re asking for $687,000 for approximately two months at 120 beds, overnight beds, and correct me if I’m wrong there. That works out to $34,000 per bed annualized. And that compares to, and I think it’s for our shelters like men’s mission is $40,000, our hubs is $100,000 per bed, and the mental health bed at LHSC is half a million. So that just gives me some context on the cost perspective of this request.

Then we look at care. So here’s where I have a question, either to staff through your chair or to the presenter. What services in terms of mental health or addiction services are being provided through arcade at your facility and through your chair? Thank you.

Mr. Dickens, did you want to start? And I can go to Ms. Campbell or did you want me to go to Ms.

Campbell? Okay, we’ll start with Mr. Dickens. Thank you.

And through you, chair, just for a point of clarification, I’m not entirely sure that the motion before us, the funding amount of $687,000 is to cover all 120 beds. It would be a reduced number of beds at two primary locations. We’d be looking at services offered at Bishop Conan Church, as well as the continuation of services at arcades, primary location on Dundas Street. So just to help with some of the clarity on the number of beds and the math that is being done.

As for the question around the number of the type of services being offered, I would defer to Ms. Campbell. So we will go to Ms. Campbell on those types of services.

Thank you. And through the chair, the number that we would propose for everything, all of the services is closer to $500,000 a month for services, just to be clear that that’s, that’s what the, and that’s a 25% reduction from what we had during the winter months. As far as the number of spaces that we were proposing for the amount that’s being proposed, we would add to that donated funds arcade has historically run on donated dollars. We would seek to add to this number.

The minimum number that we feel we can operate at is 452,000 to deliver the night spaces that you’re talking about. So we would have to add donated funds. We’d also add to that. The virus volunteers and the in kind donations.

So the cost per service realistically is higher than what you put forward, but we add our own contributions to that. Additionally, the services, you asked what is available at these locations. So we take care of all of the basic needs services, you know, a warm place to be some recreational activities, the opportunity for connection, but we do the paper readiness. We’re just in the process of getting onto HIFAS, which is the shared database and we’ve been working with our partners at the city to make sure that folks are getting involved with the HIFAS system so that they can be considered for housing.

We have our income support folks working with people, both remotely and on site. We work with coordinated access and we also work with coordinated informed response. So CIR for people who are continuing to be outside. We have a relationship with CMHA that has proven to be very fruitful.

And in fact, we don’t believe that having one door open is safe. We would look to have two doors open for drop in services in our partnership with CMHA at London Coffee House. It’s very important that we have that because sometimes we need to divert people from one environment to another. So these are some critical pieces and as we provide the basic needs services, CMHA has in agreement offered to provide those mental health services in our spaces.

Further to that, we’re in a conversation right now with LHSC to see improved health care. That’s on top of what we already do with let an inter-community health and the use of the home bus. And additionally, we have seen some great synergies come out of the whole of community and this comes from the relationships and the conversations happening at those tables where we have a lower limb preservation clinic. Opening up in our spaces as well as ongoing work with the London Middlesex Health Unit where they come in for various clinics, whether it’s for testing or any other kinds of services for our folks.

So we’re getting that primary health care through inter-community health and the home bus. We’re getting the additional mental health services and then we have our own recovery groups that take place at both locations. We have seen a number of people complete the gains assessment with CMHA. And in fact, one of our greatest successes from the winters that we have three people in recovery homes now doing 12 months of recovery home living.

So we’re very excited about some of the outcomes that we’re seeing with the community members that are engaging with these services and where folks lives are making change. Councillor Lehman, thank you for the clarification from staff and the numbers. I think we’re probably looking a little closer to double more than double the cost for bed, which is getting up closer to a kind of the cost in our hub system. The final question I have is just to elaborate a bit more through your chair to our delegate about the transitioning of folks from living on the street into your facility and then further on.

As opposed to continue to live there and then back on the street, if you could just kind of highlight maybe and for numbers, a bit more of the experience. Thank you. Ms. Campbell.

Thank you. And through the chair, I think it’s really an important thing for us to be talking about. You know, if we just do those transactional outreach pieces outside and we don’t have a place to bring people in to do the paperwork and the elements that require that people are required to have to move towards housing, then we have an incomplete system. If we just have inside spaces without the outreach components, we lack the opportunity to build a relationship with the mass numbers that are out there so that they will come for services.

It’s really critically important to recognize that we are paying for responses to homelessness, whether we do it through these services or other ways. You know, one of the things that we’ve noticed is that police can respond to these things, but they’re looking for a place to refer people to. Right now, we don’t have that. So at the arc, when we respond, we build the relationship out in community, we have outreach teams.

The spaces that we’ve offered have different focuses. So at London Coffee House, it was truly dropping. So 22 spaces throughout the night were rotated through people. We had high numbers of usage there, and it meant that if spaces were available at any of the other night locations, we would go to London Coffee House and say, “Who needs a night space?

Who needs to come inside?” And so that’s how we got 110% utilization of our space. Not only do we offer the service, but those spaces were filled. And I think that that’s really important learning that we had this year is that by having different modes of care, even when we were full, all of our spaces were full, we could say, but there is a place you can go get warm. You can get a drink of water.

We can help you with emergency access to a phone or some support. There is a place. And if we close all of these things, there will not be a place. We additionally kept emergency beds available, so people who aren’t went to the hospital for care.

The volume of what we’re talking about, 120 spaces, certainly does not address 2,000 people, but the pathway that you’re talking about. So people go to emergency room. Now they need a tour of treatment. They can come inside and get that tour of treatment.

We had people do chemo treatments. We had people come in and have wound care, have their cellulitis addressed, have multiple health issues addressed because they had a consistent place to be. And then we did everything we could to make sure they were paper ready, appropriate for housing, matched as these awesome supportive housing spaces become available. We really worked hard with our system partners to ensure that that happened.

It’s not a perfect system. We’re going to be stogged because there isn’t affordable housing out there. It’s really difficult for people on O.W. to find something like it.

It’s not simple, but this is certainly a pathway. And some of the places people went from our shelters were to other shelters because their acuity level dropped and they were able to manage those spaces better because they had an everyday meal and they could start to think about what’s next. I look to the people in the gallery. There are some Warner residents right here.

And the fact that they’re even engaged in this civic process tells me about the opportunity for people to have like a totally different way of looking at life. It’s helpful when people have hope for the next step. And that’s what these system of beds, this drop in respite transitional space provides is that if I can do this for a little bit, maybe that can open up. And if I can do that, what else could happen?

And we are committed to these folks to walking the journey. If we close our doors, we don’t ignore them. We’ll find a way, whether it’s with my fund raised $1.5 million or our collective money to make it a better response. We’re not ignoring them.

So it is a process as a commitment to people first and using what we have in our system to make that pathway accessible. Councilor Lehman. Thank you, Chair. Hey, I do have a speakers list building.

I’ve got Mayor Morgan, who although he didn’t move the motion wants to speak to the motion that’s on the floor. And then I have Councilor Stevenson and then Councilor Hopkins. Yes, I’m going to make a few comments first through you. I just want to say thank you for all of the engagement that you’ve done and the information you provided.

It’s always quite helpful. I also want to thank you for as we did the winter response over delivering on what Council’s expectations were. You, you filled your space to a greater capacity than you anticipated. You, you maintained it to a level that, you know, we, you know, we’re, we’re, we’re very proud of when you issue dollars.

You want them to be spent really effectively. And so I just want to off the top through the chair say, thank you for the work that you’ve done. You know, I know when we debated the winter response initially, there’s a lot of questions usually at the start of it and not a lot of answers. And it takes, it takes a little bit of a leap of faith to put that out there and then, you know, hope it goes well.

And so for, for all of the information you’ll be able to provide and the engagement you’ve done, I just want to say thank you for over delivering on, on your commitment to us with the dollars that we’re given. I want to make some comments about the motion before us. So, first off, there, there is a communication related to a year-round strategy. It is most appropriate for that to be dealt with through the proper processes of Council, whether it relates into some level of procurement or whatever.

I’m not sure. But that’s why you see us not talking about a communication on a year-round strategy that that has to be referred to our staff to ensure that we deal with that properly and through all our proper processes. In the meantime, there is this desire from the organization to say, for all of the things that you’ve heard in the presentation, that those pieces are pretty critical and are likely to align with some of the work that will come out of the whole of community response in the next steps when we get to the pathways from encampments to housing document or report that we’ll be able to consider in June. So, what that looks like, I don’t know exactly know yet, it’s being worked on.

What I do know is that, you know, our whole system is geared around an intentional contact to move people who are on the streets into housing. There will be multiple pathways through that. We know for the highest QD individuals, we’re looking through the hub space system into supportive housing, but we know that there are many other individuals who are not necessarily high QD on the street who are looking for pathways into housing as well. And I think our gate has had some success in moving people through their particular suite of services into that.

So, giving this 61 days to maintain the type of level of services relatively for arcade will set us up for doing that analysis. When we know what that next phase of the whole of community responses, which will be the first piece that kind of branches beyond just the highly, the high QD individuals into, you know, encampment type, pathways to housing for a wider population. I’ll be honest, I don’t know what role, what role arcade will play in that. Like, I don’t know yet.

I don’t think we can presume what that is. But there’s probably, you know, there’s probably we can assume that we’re going to have to have some of these pieces of transitional spaces that people will pass through into that more permanent housing. And that does involve likely a range of services being available to them, much like what arcade has suggested that they’ve been able to offer by partnering with others and pulling those services into their space. So, that’s why, you know, when the deputy mayor and I chatted about this, we were willing to, based on all the information that was given and all the engagement that was happened to put this motion before council for their consideration.

But I just want to be very clear, like, I can’t possibly be supportive of, you know, a larger, longer strategy until I know how this fits in with what is the transition of the overall system. Hence the, again, temporary nature of this in this proposal that hopefully leads us to a place to move to what will ultimately be what everybody wants. That’s a year round strategy where we’re not moving into ramping up significant services ramping them down, but actually having a range of pathways from people on the street into the proper types of housing that that fits the supports that they need. And the, and gives them the supports that they need along the way to be successful in that housing journey.

So, so, you know, thanks to colleagues for considering this. I know there’ll be lots, lots of debate. As I said, I do have to step out for testimony to the provincial committee for a bit. And I’ll return as soon as I possibly can when that’s done.

And I’ll look forward to the discussions that I hear now and then the ones that I’ll follow up on later with colleagues. And it’ll be a quick follow up because you’ll have 20 seconds when you return. Moving on in the speakers list, I’ve got, and just so colleagues are aware, I’ve got Councillor Stevenson, Councillor Hopkins, Councillor Pribble and Councillor Ferrer now on the list. Councillor Stevenson, you are next.

Thank you. I just wanted to start with a thank you to the mayor and the deputy mayor for their leadership on this. There’s a real tragic need out in our streets right now, and I was really appreciative of seeing this come on to the agenda. I also wanted to say thank you to arcade because we took a leap pushing for the 120 beds because we knew the need was there.

And thank you for rising to the challenge and meeting some of the needs there. The other thing I want to say thank you to arcade for is for, I think, embodying what was intended with the whole community response, because there has been a commitment to work with the old East Village BIA to deal with some of the negative impacts that do just naturally occur. There’s been a responsiveness to the community. There’s been empathy to listen to the very real concerns facing the neighborhood around, and there’s always been a willingness to listen and to try new things and to do this well in a way that we’re not taking away negatively impacting one group and serving another.

So I did really want to heartfelt gratitude all around for that. I do have a couple of questions. If through the chair, if arcade could talk a little bit more about the concerns and the safety issues around only one open door for service when we have 2,000 people on our streets and, you know, a very small number of beds available or resting spaces. Ms Campbell.

Yes, it’s been our experience going back to the COVID period when many doors were shuttered that having one door does create a safety concern. And this goes to any time that there’s a scarcity environment that people have to buy for those resources that can be difficult. And so we have a philosophy as an organization to always work in partnership. We like to refer to our partner organizations.

We work closely with them. Our outreach teams communicate with one another. And that’s why I had mentioned though this funding request does not cover the full amount of all services that we had done during the winter months. We would be working with our board to find those donated dollars to backfill some of these other things so that we can have two doors.

We’re well aware of the stresses that our partner organizations are going through. And as I mentioned, we’re in a strategic partnership with CMHA right now. We will be looking to ensure that there’s at least two doors critical to our community that we consider more than one area of our city having access. This is one of the things that the Hobbes model anticipates well.

And I think that we can pivot to in the meantime, we must keep sensitive to that issue. >> Thank you for that. And as a follow up, I mean, the biggest concern that I hear in oldest village is the surrounding encampments that surround a location that is providing service that is desperately needed that doesn’t even come close to meeting the demand that is there. So through the chair, I’m not sure whether arcade or city staff can talk about what can be done to mitigate the safety concerns that are happening in the back parking lot, which is in the municipal lots and on our all throughout that area.

So any suggestions there on what we can do or what might be coming that is going to support that? So we’ll go to Mr. Dickens first, and then we’ll go to Ms. Campbell for comment from the arc, Mr.

Dickens or Mr. Cooper. >> Thank you, Chair, and through you, part of our previous Council approval was the expansion of the Coordinated and Foreign Response Program for additional staffing resources to address some of those hotspots and more populated areas where there tends to be more complaints that work continues to occur. The CIR team is out in all these village multiple times per day to address some of those concerns.

Some of those responses and interventions have been documented for those that reach out with service challenges or service complaints, noting that we do try to support folks every morning. As they wake up, we try to find a more appropriate space for those folks, try to connect them to indoor services and recognize that sometimes folks do return back. Council may recall as part of the hubs plan. It was clearly articulated that any hubs that operate need to have a plan for both the operations inside their space and outside their space.

And that’s why you see hubs having clear parameters and protocol in place for limiting the encampments around their locations, having strategies in place around managing lineups, and having not a front door as it may be considered off of main sidewalks, but rather having rear entry to those spaces. That is what the hubs plan articulates. These services that have been temporary up to this point through the cold weather have not been part of that plan. They’ve been operating as they get in out of the cold strategy to try and help address the acuity of the individuals we’re serving in the harshest months of the year.

So not exactly equivalent to what we’re doing and taking other measures around safety. And Ms. Campbell, did you want to add anything? I think there’s two key points.

You asked a council, you asked us to engage civically with constituents in the neighborhoods where we provide service and we certainly have done that. I think that when the neighborhood and the community knows what’s going on and how to provide services, we added an outreach contingent to our work that had a phone number that people could call from 7 a.m. until 2 a.m. and get responsive service.

If they had difficulties and we feel that that added a lot of safety measures to our neighborhood. But further to that, we learned something critical about the front door services, the lineups, the things that Mr. Dickens talked about, and we moved our front door to the back door at Arcade in response to the request of the BIA. We’ve noticed that that has had a significant impact on our neighbors.

Additional to that, we have learned that you don’t want the front door services, those drop in things happening at the same place where the stabilization is happening. And that’s why I think Corona Warner has been so successful is that that’s by referral only. And so it’s a closed community of people caring for one another. And that has created a lot of safety for that environment and the neighbors, the people who live in the apartment building attached and so on.

In fact, we’ve had no complaints about that location. In fact, all four locations had no complaints through the city of London portal. I’m told by my colleagues and that, you know, it is the back parking lots and some of these other areas that cause significant struggle. The solution to this, frankly, is more services.

We have to have, you know, these hubs, like we’re working towards it. Unfortunately, we’re not going to get it all all at once. So what we have to do is pick that highest acuity group and have some solutions. I think the encampment table is also working towards some discussions of how we might provide support outside of these areas, these hotspot areas and where their supports people will will tend to go.

And so we hope that that will be part of the solution overall. Councilor Stevenson. Thank you. A follow up to staff because I know we were, I was very excited about the extra CIR team.

But from what I understand, there is no place for them to go. And there are no services. Everything is full and we have hundreds, hundreds of people in all these village. Hanging out, hoping that there’s going to be a space for them or something.

And so I really think this needs to be addressed. We’re talking about closing. Or, or, or lending cares will be closing their showers and bathrooms and spaces, but lending arcade is the only place where people can knock on the door and go in and get a shower in a bathroom that’s open to all. And so to have CIR do wake up calls and ask them to move along.

We’re, we’re, it’s a problem in the area. And I’m, and I’m wondering, are there any plans to address that? Or are there any plans coming? Because that neighborhood needs to know that there is a plan coming.

Thank you, Chair. I think we’ve presented those plans already numerous times to Council. We have a roadmap to 3,000 affordable units. We have Council approved multi million dollar strategy on housing allowance and red subsidies.

We have a plan to create highly supportive housing units of which nearly 70 are online now and we anticipate to bring more forward in the coming month. We have a plan to create more than the two hubs that are currently in place. We acknowledge that there is a significant health care and housing crisis in our community. We’ve articulated that in a number of times and we’ve brought forward a number of plans to address that and we continue.

We did not get into this crisis overnight and we’re not going to get out of it overnight. But we’ve been very clear on what that plan is. Council’s made some significant investments into those plans and we’ve done advocacy based on those plans. So I’m not sure what other plans we’re anticipating.

Other than we continue to house hundreds, hundreds of individuals every single year through our housing stability services, we continue to divert hundreds of individuals every single year from experiencing homelessness. And we continue to try to be as proactive as possible with the resources we have to prevent evictions and to prevent people from experiencing homelessness in the first place. There are many plans at place in play right now in this community and a number of community organizations that are doing everything they can to help house people as quickly and as effectively as possible. Councilor Stevenson.

Thank you. I’ll be more clear. The plans for where CIR can take people or what services are available because right now there isn’t any place, even with our gate if we if we continue this. There’s no place for CIR to refer people that I’m aware of.

So how do we address that that we’ve got teams of people out with nothing to offer anyone. I will go back to Mr Dickens if he has anything else to add. But I will say that I think he’s answered that in that we aren’t going to have a place for everyone right away. But Mr Dickens, did you have anything further to add?

Through you, Chair, just to clarify, CIR does not take people anywhere. We don’t round people up and take them to different locations. We acknowledge that where they may be located, where they are surviving the night is not safe or appropriate. It may not be safe for that individual being in an area that might have construction work or environmental concerns.

It might not also be safe for the general use of the public, be it on a public sidewalk or things like that. Teams are like all organizations with frontline staff that do this work. Our CIR teams are faced with this moral dilemma every single morning and every single day. Understanding that there are people that are struggling on our streets and there in fact is no place for them to go.

That is the problem we have all acknowledged and that is why we acknowledge we’re in a crisis. So there is no easy solution to this, but that is a dilemma our team struggle with every day. I’m going to go back to Councillor Stevenson. I’ll let you know you got 45 seconds of your time left.

Okay, well, just listening to the list there. It’s an emergency. It’s an emergency. We have an emergency planning.

We need an emergency response. I said this a year ago. We cannot just keep wandering around telling people that yes, they’re unsafe and the neighborhood’s unsafe and we’re working on a plan for one day. We need something now right now this summer in a few months.

We are capable of serving these people and serving this neighborhood and it’s incumbent upon us in my opinion to do that with lights and sirens going on this council to figure out all hands on deck. What do we do for these people and this neighborhood that is in complete and utter distress? I’ll leave it there. Next on the speakers list is Councillor Hopkins.

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Chair. And thank you, first of all, to the Mayor and Deputy Mayor for bringing this motion forward in particular the review and the engagement with staff with Arcade as we go forward. I think that is a really important part.

I know thank you to Arcade for the work that you do. I do have a question. You spoke about the funding requests that is in front of us. It’s not enough.

You’re going to be backfilling that as well through donations and contributions. A question about the backfilling. How will you manage that backfilling to meet the demands? Ms.

Campbell. Thank you and through the chair. We are a fundraising organization. We’re a charitable organization.

We are grateful for our donors. However, like every other organization out there, this is a challenge. We will do everything that we can as we have. And I want to just point out again the historical.

We are here at this moment because an organization that was historically a soup kitchen with five staff stepped up year over year over year to meet this burgeoning demand. That’s how we got here today. In the same way, our donors have stepped up and we have increased our donors by 300% since 2020 as well. So we’re grateful for that.

And at the same time, the amount of growth we have had this level of service cannot be backfilled by donations alone. It just isn’t. And that’s why the funding request is in front of you today. And I also want to say this is a whole of community.

There’s these two things going on. The whole of community, which is this high acuity response, health and homelessness. And then there’s the all of community, which is you, me, our neighbors, the people outside, our kids playing in parks, everyone who’s wondering about coming to downtown festivals. That’s the all of community.

And this, what we’re talking about right now is the all of community response. That’s why the proposal, the year round proposal talks about services that that move between indoor space and outdoor services. They move between having hub locations or depot locations, depots are what the language of the encampment strategy from last year that are physical and in space, but also that can move so that we aren’t having it all in one neighborhood. We do need to have a very flexible environment to serve a population greater than our resources.

And every year, you know, I will say we, we kind of hit above our weight. We do more than what we think we can do because the demand is so high. I believe is that as we work with our partners and we actually maximize those services together, we can make a meaningful difference. And if I had had just a little more time than one day, I can tell you that our police services have offered a letter of support telling us that having to refer makes a difference that CIR, our partners.

I mean, we work daily with this team. I can, I can speak very positively about the work that they do and how much they do need a place to refer people to. I can tell you that together, we can make it a better impact. Resources are tight.

I understand that. And I appreciate that council is trying to figure that out. One of my concerns with this, you know, as much as I’m grateful for extension of funding to serve. It’s important to recognize that there needs to be direction given to find that funding source moving forward that if we figure out with civic administration, what that right sized response is what can we do that there is actually the imperative to find the funding source and recognizing you’ve been through a tough budgeting process.

And, you know, I want to, I want to say thank you to you as a council. I know that this is difficult. You’re holding so many important pieces together, but we will pay for it one way or another. We will pay for it whether we pay for it with policing services, which we saw a huge increase to waste management.

You just heard about CIR. If it’s the BIA’s and the businesses that are going to pay for it, it does get paid for the emergency rooms, the EMS, I could go on and on and on. And so I stand here, not just for myself. I stand here because there’s many people who will come forward, but that’s how we plan to backfill.

We will backfill with donated dollars. And there’s a one runway on that. There’s a point at which we simply can’t. And so my commitment to you as council, but also to the city of London is that arcade is here to serve.

And we’re here to see all of our community come together and be successful together by doing our part very well, while other parts can can also come to the table and do well because we’re taking care of our piece of the puzzle. Councillor Hopkins, anything further? No, you’re good. Okay, just before we move along, because the funding piece was raised and because I know that Miss Barbone needed an opportunity to speak as well.

So I’m going to go to Miss Barbone just to talk to the funding piece. Thank you through the chair. So the original winter response that was funded in November was funded through one time federal funding that we don’t have any, there isn’t any additional funding available. So council will need to approve a source on a one time basis to support the additional extension that is before you in the motion.

We would recommend because there isn’t a really great reserve fund to and that there is additional funding available in the community investment reserve fund to support this initiative should council wish to proceed. Okay, so hearing that, I’m just going to look to the mover and seconder to see if you’re amenable to include in the motion that civic administration be directed to extend one time funding in the amount of 687,000 from the community investment reserve fund, and I’m seeing nods from both the mover and seconder looking to see if any member of council objects to that being added without a formal motion. I’m not seeing any objection. So Councillor Trussa.

It’s not an objection, but I’m just confused because I did speak with other staff and I thought it was coming from a contingency reserve fund. If that was the title that I was given by Mr. Dick. Ms.

Barbong. Well, that’s that’s a question. So let’s direct that before we change the motion. Ms.

Barbong. Thank you for the chair. The operating budget contingency reserve fund was utilized to support some of the contracts that for the shortfalls that had come forward for under a different that was earlier this year. So the reason we went to that, that’s not normally a source that we would use.

That is kind of our last resort when there isn’t any other source available at the time. So if you’ll recall the community investment reserve fund did not have funds until the most recent year end operating monitoring report was brought forward. Given that fund now is replenished, that is what we would recommend as the most appropriate source in this case. I’ll see if there’s any other questions from Ms.

Barbong on the recommended funding source. Councillor Ferrer on the funding source. Thank you, Chair. Thanks for recognizing me.

What would be the balance in the community investment reserve fund after, I guess, this withdrawal, this funding? Ms. Barbong, do you have that number? Thank you to the chair.

So approximately the balance right now is about $7 million. Councillor Ferrer, you’re good. Okay. So I now have Councillor Pribble, Councillor Ferrer and Councillor Frank on the speakers list, Councillor Pribble.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, to actually have a few questions to Ms. Campbell. I want to ask you, so 687, if this approved with together with your 452 up to 452 commitment, we would have the same services as for past month and there would be continuation of same, correct?

To be clear, we would not operate. Sorry, thank you and through the chair and I’m sorry about that procedural error. To be clear, my sister’s place is owned by CMHA and we would not be operating those 12 women’s beds. We haven’t negotiated that.

That would have to be another conversation if we needed to do that. We would also be considering, we would have to look at how far we could make these dollars stretch. We would be considering whether we would keep London Coffee House open as that second door for night space, that rotational night space, and then continue to make sure all the spaces were filled at Colonel Warner, or if we would look at the Arc location, we would not be able to keep both locations open each and every night. And the difference is staffing numbers.

One is 30 people, one is 22, one is drop in space, one is resting space throughout the whole night, so those are the changes. But what it does give us is two locations for drop in or front door service, a nighttime support system, as well as those everyday beds at Colonel Warner where people can both stabilize and get those emergency beds as necessary. Thank you for the answer. Second question, you mentioned that you worked with the neighborhood of all these village and you introduced certain initiatives, just like the phone number calling, etc.

Do you go back to the neighborhoods and have you spoken to the neighbors and what kind of feedback did you receive after these initiatives were introduced? We’ve had very positive through the chair. We had very positive feedback and a lot of appreciation from our community. Our phone is actually answered like 24/7.

We just don’t have a team to go out between 2am and 7am. Those services have been really responsive to emergency, you know, hospital, getting people from one location to the other, making sure, like I said, all the spaces are filled. And then inviting people inside if there is, you know, indoor space available. So that service has been very good.

And with the neighbors, you know, we have had complaints called into us and we work very hard with our neighbors and our communities to resolve those. Some of the successes have been working with our neighbor right beside us. There’s a TNC mark where we’ve had to, you know, put up fencing and do different things to support them. We do a cleanup every single day.

I take photos three times a day. Our outreach team does an environmental cleanup. Our community members at Corona Warner have initiated themselves, a neighborhood cleanup a couple of times a month because they want to make sure they’re welcome in that neighborhood. And so we see these initiatives taking place.

We photograph them. We document them. And it’s part of our checklist daily to make sure that we are supporting our neighborhood. Councilor Pribble.

Thank you very much. And through the chair again, I know you’re to mention some, but would you like to add something or give us more information about your responsive services if there’s any additional information? Yes. Thank you.

Oh, thank you. And through the chair, the year round proposal. So that that’s not really what’s on the floor right now. But I do think it’s important to recognize that when we talk about these responsive services or what the right sizing of a year round response should look like.

You know, again, I’m proposing what the arc is able to do and you’ve all received it in your inbox. I think it’s very important to have that flexibility while having the service outcome metrics attached. So I’ll say that again. So if we’re setting up contracts for this kind of interim because we’re in a flexible environment.

It’s really important to demand the accountability. And that was one of the reasons we had the tours through the spaces for each of you and to share the metrics. Although we were not in high fees, we wanted you to know the numbers of people, the details where people went, what kind of system navigation took place. This is important, not only because it’s important for the individual served, but it’s important as we learn how to respond to a demand greater than what we can actually address through the physical spaces.

We have to be addressing it through the service interactions. You know, we are delivering more than a thousand service interactions day at arcade. It’s very important that we maintain that because people will have to find those services other ways. Otherwise, council approval.

Thank you for the answer. And I’ll get no more questions. Thank you. But I would like to make a comment and thanks to all community organizations at arcade for past few months.

And I have to state and there’s not this really through my own personal beta in terms of the downtown streets, all these village. There has been a really tremendous, tremendous improvement. And we know the number of homeless people. Individuals are not increasing, they are still increasing, but compared to last couple of winters, no doubt there has been an improvement.

So thank to all community organizations. I believe that Corona and Warner was a game changer. And thank you for stepping up. And honestly, with our decision, what I call five to midnight, you delivered and thank you to you and to the other organizations.

Thank you. No more questions, comments? Thank you, Councilor Pribble. I have Councilor for our next.

Thank you, Chair. I guess I’ll start with, you know, thanks to you and the mayor for bringing this for us to discuss and just highlighting these important issues and extending the funding because we have seen a significant difference in the word specifically. I did have a list of questions. Some of them have been whittled away, so I will ask what I have remaining or just something that I wanted to get into, and that would be with respect to the locations again.

So from what my understanding is, is the funding will be for the location at the location of William and Queens and then with the possibility of the coffee house and possibly the arc’s main location on dentistry. So why don’t we just maybe get that clarification from the delegate? Certainly. We’ll go to Ms.

Campbell to just clarify again what this extension would cover in terms of locations. Thank you. And through the chair, we own 696 Dundas Street. That is our core location.

It is the only certified industrial kitchen. So in terms of the meals and things like that, we must fund that location for those types of services, as well as it is the known resource to our community members that that trust that we’ve built over years. It stems from that location. And so yes, that location is covered as well as the Corona Warner location.

I would be looking to my board and to my partnership with CMHA to ensure that we also open London coffee house to ensure that there’s two doors for safety and also for that continuation of services. Hopefully, another night location is what’s in my mind and heart. But as said, this is responsive service. One of the things I think is critically important as you guys are considering the locations is also the timing.

So there’s a 61 day extension before you. I wonder if something should go into the motion about coming back with that plan before. I don’t want to have to beg again or find someone to put a motion on the floor before that date. I don’t know what the process would be, but just thinking about these locations, these neighborhoods and how we actually keep the community informed about what’s available to them.

I guess I’m asking you a little bit. What can we do about that? So that these neighborhoods know what’s going on. So I’m actually going to go to Mr.

Dickens with the motion. That’s before you directing civic administration to review the communication that has been submitted. Do you need a specific date or is it your understanding that the expectation of council would be to come back before the expiration date on July 31st through your chair. Thank you for that question.

Really, this all hinges on funding. So we can go and work with Ms. Campbell in the arc. We can review her communication and we can determine what’s in scope, what’s out of scope, what’s feasible, what’s the continuation, what’s new, all of those key variables.

It will ultimately come down to what funding is available. So two part answer. One, we can do that work and be in a position to bring back something to council in July. The second part is we may still not have the resources to be able to bring it to life.

Thank you, Mr. Dickens. And I’ll go back to council for air. Thank you for that.

That was leading into my other question of what are the plans after, but I do understand that some discussion needs to be had before we could answer that. So I guess I will go kind of back to the location. So the location, the church is 60 beds, plus five emergency and the coffee house is 22, 22. Okay.

And those, so for sure, it’s the 60 plus five, possibly the 22. Or possibly 30 more. Possibly 30 more with the Dundas location as well. Okay.

Depending on what I can get in donations. Yeah. And that would be, I just, I just ask we get the statements and then the responses, please, instead of cross debate. Apologies.

Okay. So that’s it for my questions. So this is what I’m going to say. You know, I’ve been watching location very, very, very closely.

And I was involved in the community engagement piece that the executive director set up at our request without direction, which was, I need to bring that to know. We had a good positive conversation. Very, some questions were quite tough, but answered. And from that information session, I, I got a pretty good feeling of what we were to expect and what we saw from them until now.

I do have to say, Ms. Campbell is right. There has been no service requests submitted for the arc. And I only had one item come to my desk, which the arc has been very graciously willing to, to help me work with that.

So in the end, there’s a pretty positive experience. I watched the area all the time. I do speak with residents in the area. And I don’t really have anything, any concerns, anything negative to say.

I feel like, you know, the arc has showed that they are able to do this work and they have done good work. So I am going to recognize that because, you know, historically, in the last couple of votes that we had on this issue, I voted against the location. But here I am changing my vote because I will be supportive of the motion right now because I have seen the difference. And I did say to Ms.

Campbell yesterday, you know, keep it up and you’ll see me continuing to support. I don’t want to be coming back again and again and again. I do want to see an interim strategy until we can get to our whole of community response. And I do appreciate staff telling us about the plans that we have will be experts by the end of everything with what our plans are going to be.

So that’s, yeah, that’s where I’ll keep it for now. So I do appreciate the delegation. I appreciate the work and you’ll see me supporting this one. So for I’m going to go to Council Frank next.

Thank you. I want to start by thanking the arc. I was able to go on a tour and see the facilities and I’m very impressed with the work that you’re doing. So thank you to staff and volunteers and to residents of that space.

I also want to say thanks to the various social agencies who are providing services to those who are experiencing homelessness and other issues in our community. Thanks to the mayor and deputy mayor for bringing this forward and thanks staff as always for doing what you’re able with the resources that you have. I just want to encourage Councillors if they are identifying other issues to bring solutions to Council is I think that it’s incumbent on us to be able to bring new ideas and we’ve heard a lot from what the community can offer and again thank you arc aid for coming forward with a proposal. But I think it’s incumbent on us as Council to come forward if we want something different as well.

I think there’s reference to where the sirens and the lights and I think we spent most of that budget on police services. So I think if we want to find more and new and innovative ways to deal with this emergency response we’ll have to continue to find funding with provincial and federal government. Thank you, Councillor Frank. I’m going to acknowledge I’ve got Councillors trying to get on the list a second time.

I’m going to the Councillors who have not spoken yet before I entertain second rounds of speakers. I’ve got you, Councillor Tresso, but I’ve got Councillor McAllister first. Thank you and through the chair. Also echoing the thanks that have already been said around the horseshoe.

Thank you to arc aid in terms of the services you were able to provide through the winter. I also appreciate you reaching out and allowing us to tour the facility. I think we’ve provided invaluable services to folks in need. I think in terms of like I’m supportive in terms of the two months and to a lot of comments have been said in terms of a lot of the temporary nature of these things.

I know we are pulling from the community reserve fund. We did just replenish that fund to the seven million dollars sitting on corporate services. I know those discussion we had in terms of trying to get money back into that and I know staff are going to do their best in terms of trying to find that money. But I mean one of the suggestions that I would put forward is that in the interim, if we have to utilize those funds, I’ll be honest.

This is something that is very important to Londoners. I know it’s one time funding that we usually draw from, but I would say that this is an issue that Londoners care about deeply. And if we do have to pull from a community fund to help our most vulnerable, that might be something we have to look at. We might even perhaps in terms of what has been put forward with the hubs with the community foundation.

Those were matching dollars. Maybe we can do some sort of a matching system in terms of pulling money from that and trying to get some more donor dollars raised from that. I just think to everything that’s being said, yes, the need is dire. We have limited resources, but I think the resources we have, we can utilize in the here and now in the interim.

I don’t think the city on its own can solve homelessness. We are doing our best in terms of lobbying efforts with the province and the federal government. We have those long term plans and I’m very appreciative of staff and our community agencies for the hard work they’ve done on that. And those are very noble goals to have in the long term, but I think to what we’ve been seeing in terms of what’s put forward today, the temporary nature of these contracts does require us to give more runway.

And we do need those longer term stable contracts. And I’ve heard that across the board. This is not unique to our aid sector stability is something we hear repeatedly. We can play a part.

We are not the only one in terms of raising that money. We do need to get those dollars from other sources, but I’m supportive of this and I hope to see a more run rate provided in the future. Thank you. >> Thank you, Councillor McAllister.

Councillor Truss, you’re next. >> Thank you very much. I was very pleased to second this because I think it’s totally consistent with the amendment that I also put on the table today. I’ve been to arcade a few times and I’ve been very privileged to spend some time there.

I’ve been more than one tour. And I just have to talk about how impressed I am by the dedication of the staff and the pure joy that I see among your clientele when they’re there. And I don’t think it’s just because there’s Councillor walked in, but it seems like it’s a very happy, well run place. I can’t imagine, we hear a lot of complaints about the street.

We hear a lot of complaints about people congregating. I can’t imagine that this would be so much worse, so much more devastating to the community if you weren’t there. So I think that we can often look at social service agencies that are in a particular location and say, you know, this is attracting problems. But I just wonder how much worse the problems would be if you weren’t there.

So I thank you so much for the work you’re doing. I also want to acknowledge again, and I think other Councillors have said this. I am increasingly frustrated with having to replay this discussion about interim funding. I don’t want to keep doing this.

It takes wear and tear on the staff. It takes wear and tear on the Councillors. It takes wear and tear particularly on the agencies that are involved. And it takes wear and tear on the volunteers.

We need more stability. And here we are again at the very last minute asking for an interim funding request. Another one is going to come forward. We need to build in a better process.

I am very optimistic that we are heading in that direction. I am very optimistic that some of the reports that we’re going to be getting over the next period of time are going to take that into that sort of sector stability space. That so many of us feel are important. So I think in closing, I just want to say thank you so much for your presentations.

And you’ve been a wonderful partner with the city as far as I’m concerned. And I look forward to my next visit to your facility. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor.

I’m going to be very cognizant of procedure here as well. And I want to make sure that if there’s any objections, then they’ll need to be voiced because you have used your first turn. You’ve got about, sorry, you’ve got two minutes and 20 seconds or so left. I know you had circulated an amendment.

Typically an amendment has to be introduced on someone’s first time speaking. We do have two other members, Council who have not spoken on the motion that’s been brought forward yet. I’m willing to entertain not withstanding our policies that we can come back to Council trust out to introduce his amendment after those who haven’t spoken have an opportunity to speak. But I’m looking for any objections to that, because otherwise I’ll ask him to introduce his amendment right now.

But if there are no objections, I will come back to him to introduce his amendment at a later point, recognizing that he still has time left to begin with. So any objections. Councilor Palosa. Sorry, not just an objection.

I’m just not aware of Miss Campbell’s timeline or the people in the gallery who are with her. If we’re, I don’t want to say if we’re done with the Q&A back and forth, just so they can manage their time accordingly. Well, and I was also going to indicate to Miss Campbell that unlike a Council where we may have to stand for a long time presenting committee reports. Please feel welcome to have a seat and come back up to the mic if there are additional questions for you so that you can take care of your own body and well being as well.

But I’m not seeing any objections to returning to Council trust out for his amendment. So I’m going to use that chair’s discretion to come back to him on that because I do have Councilor ramen who has not spoken yet. I have something after his amendment so I can’t speak until he speaks. Okay, you want to, you want to wait until after the amendment is introduced.

Okay, then Council trust out, I am going to come back to you because everybody else has spoken once for those who have been on the list. I did have both Councillor Stevenson, who’s got only about 10 seconds left, and I do have Councilor Pribble who has to be on the list a second time on the motion that’s on the floor right now. But I did stop the Councillor when he indicated he was done and I indicated I would come back to him given that Councilor ramen is not looking to speak right now. I’m going to go back to the Councilor to continue his time so that he can introduce his amendment because that would have been the order in which we are proceeding.

Thank you and again to the chair. I did submit my very short text this morning. I did consult with staff. I think I might have written down the name of the fund wrong, but the request is $137,000 same two month period for the agency safe safe space.

And that is the motion that I submitted to the clerk. I don’t see it yet on the screen. Is that coming up? The clerk will have that up in a moment.

Okay, so I think I just introduced it and there is. Yeah, so I’m just going to make sure that Councillor Hopkins had indicated in the written communication. She was seconding and she’s confirming that. So we’ve got a mover and a seconder.

So if you want to speak to your reason for introducing the amendment, now it’s your time. Okay. And I want to. I understand that there is going to be a request to defer this to the next SPPC so we can get more information and I’m prepared to support that and the agency concurs that that would be a good idea.

So rather than have me speak to the merits of the motion, would may I yield to Councillor ramen just to get this other thing on the table. It could shorten our time here today. It’s up to you chair. I want to be careful about us jumping back and forth.

If it’s going to be referred to a future meeting, bear with me for just a moment to to confer with the clerk. Okay. So we’re going to need a little bit of clarification here because right now we have an amendment that’s just been on the floor. So the first thing I need to understand is are you seeking to refer the amendment or the entire main motion and we haven’t voted on a main motion as amended or the amendment itself.

I am going to go to Councillor ramen for clarification on what she would be intending with a referral. Thank you and through you my referrals only related to the safe space funding to the amendment. Okay. So we have a motion that’s been moved and seconded.

We have had an indication that there’s an intent for a referral. So referrals do take precedent. So if you choose not to address your intent on the amendment, Councillor, that’s fine. We can entertain the referral now.

I’m going to ask everyone to hold for just a moment. I want to be really clear and transparent with folks as well. If you refer the amendment on safe space, the next SPPC is at the end of the month, which means council will not deliberate on any potential extension until after their current funding has expired. Councillor ramen, is that still your intent to refer to that date?

Thank you, it is. And I do have a seconder and I’ll have a seconder to make his comments as well. Okay, so Councillor Ferrer, you’re prepared to second the referral. Okay, so now we’re on debate on the referral.

So looking for speakers, Councillor truss out. I think I mentioned in my last comments that I really, I really don’t like being put in the situation where we’re coming back for short term extensions all of the time and I’m really feeling the pressure of that today. I’m in favor of the referral and I’m going to support it. And as much as I am not happy that it’s going outside of the funding period, I think that’s a small price to pay because I would like to give the opportunity for the agency to come in and make the same request for delegation status, perhaps we’ll get a little bit more information.

I felt under a real time crunch to get this to get this in this morning. And I think the deferral to the next SPPC meeting is very wise. I also want to give everybody a chance to decompress a little bit, cool down a little bit. I want to make sure that I have the designation of the fund correct in the motion.

And I think the motion will probably need to be rewritten a little bit since it’ll be a standalone motion. So this is all very fine. And I’m prepared to talk at length about why I think safe space is a worthy recipient of an extension. And is the board chair here?

Okay, good. But I don’t think we’re going to need to get to her today if we do the referral first. And I think with that I’m just going to hold the rest of my comments until we discuss this on the merits. Thank you, Councillor.

And this is an item for direction. So without a delegation request, we would not be hearing from anyone on this to begin with looking for other speakers on the referral. And I’ve got Councillor. I’m sorry, you both had your hand up when I looked over.

You claim to be quick. Okay, let’s see how I’ll yield the floor. Okay, so we’re going to go. Councillor for error, Councillor Palosa and then Councillor Hopkins.

Thank you for recognizing me. Thank you, Councillor and chair. So yeah, I sentiments from Councillor also exactly are my own. So I am supporting this because I would like to have the agency come and have the opportunity to have the ask answer the questions and just do the process correctly.

So I really only have one question. I guess it would go to staff and it would be with respect to the feasibility of everything. Do we have enough time from now until May 28th, I believe? To do that type of work, Mr.

Dickens. Thank you, chair, and through you, the work would have to be done by safe space. So that’s a question that they would have to answer whether they have the ability to to meet that turnaround time. In terms of the topic of the council meeting being in June, we have just received our interim.

Financials from safe space are actuals and we believe that they are under spent. So if we needed to bridge the time between the May 28th, that’s PPC in the June meeting, we would be able to do that with the funds they’ve already been budgeted and allocated. So the timing piece may not be as big of an impact just so the Councillors were. But as for your question, that would be a question for safe space.

Thank you for that. So we’re good. It seems on the staff side and the safe space side. I’m hopefully, hopefully.

Okay. Good. So, yeah, I’m happy to bring this referral here. And yeah, I guess I’ll leave it there and you can go to the next speaker.

Next speaker would be Councillor Palosa. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I’m fine with the referral.

I recognize that arc aid came to us proactively with a laid out plan. My only concern is if referring to May 28th, that’s great, but making sure that the wording is in there and accurate that they don’t they don’t miss delegation status that’s written in there that they will have delegation status and that they will have a work plan for us versus us just sitting here having the same conversation that they know what we want to see from them so they can come prepared to advocate for what we want. And the proper source of funding of a reserve fund identified. I’ll leave my comments there.

I think the board chair for coming today at the pleasure of meeting with her the other day, but just making sure that we’re very clear in our expectations of what we want to see at this meeting, if we want to have forward movement on this item. Thank you, Councillor Palosa. Councillor Hopkins, you’re next. Yeah, Mr.

Chair. And if I can follow up with Councillor Palosa’s question, maybe through you to staff, will there be a delegation? I think that’s the whole reason of the referral right here, but I would like confirmation. Well, the referral is on the motion that Councillor Trust has put forward.

Certainly safe space can, through the clerk, communicate their intent to seek delegation status. We do not normally embed delegation status into a motion. So that should be a communication that comes from Councillors. Should this referral pass to the organization?

And I know the organization is here. Thank you for being here. You’ve heard loud and clear the importance of a delegation. We do want to hear from you.

And that’s why I’m very supportive of the referral. I want to thank the mover and the seconder. I know I think this is a way going forward in supporting our organizations, but we do definitely need to hear from you and have the discussions like you have seen this afternoon. So thank you again.

Any further speakers? I’m going to ask Councillor Lehman if he can take the chair. Thank you. I’ll go to the deputy mayor.

Thank you. Acting Chair Lehman. So I will not be supporting the referral. And I want to speak for a moment as to why.

All of our service agencies are contracting now from their winter response. Even arcade who has brought forward, who’s done some work and put forward a proposal for us to consider. Well, they provide us a communication to consider and I want to make sure that I actually correct my own language. I’ve mistakenly referred to it as an unsolicited proposal.

Really what it is right now is a communication that has to be referred to our staff to vet and do their work appropriately. But that communication has been very thorough and submitted. London cares will be contracting some of their winter response services. My sister’s place will be contracting some of their winter response services.

The coffee house will be contracting some of their winter response services. That is the reality of our winter response program. If we are going to entertain extending additional agencies, I believe what we are doing is just setting ourselves up for this continuing extension, one after the other of requests for service. I think that we will see additional requests come forward at SPPC for all the other organizations to be extended to.

And as we’ve heard, there’s not a source of funding even for for arcade right now. We are drawing from a reserve fund to keep this going while we can have a look at what they’ve suggested in their communication and see if there’s an opportunity to fund that. We can’t keep back filling with one time funding on every organization in the city. And the difference for me is the work that’s been put in and the proof that’s in the pudding that arcade has shown with the results that they’ve delivered.

And like Councillor Ferriero, I was a no on that in the previous vote and I’ve changed my vote to be a yes. In fact, I cosigned a letter with the mayor in support of it. I’ve not seen that from other organizations. And that’s why everybody has known this deadline of May 31st is coming.

We’ve received no communications in any regard to extending the funding for anyone else either. And I’m not going to start doing these one at a time. So I’m not going to be supporting the referral. I have one organization that has communicated, they’re interested in providing year round service 24 seven.

That’s the organization. I’d like to continue to have some discussions with letter staff have some discussions with to see how that happens. I actually agree with what we heard from his Campbell about the importance of 24 sevens. And so that’s why I’m not going to be supporting this referral because I’m not going to be supporting funding extensions to other organizations from their winter response.

I’m going to report a long term plan. So that’s why I won’t be supporting the referral. I’ll return to chair to the deputy mayor with no one on the speakers list. And I’m going to look to see if there’s anyone else who wants to speak to the referral.

Councillor ramen. Thank you and through you. And I appreciate the opportunity to speak to this motion or referral. Sorry.

That’s on the floor. I think we’ve heard quite clearly that we have a lot of work to do to address the ongoing concerns and issues within our community. So agencies are coming back to us and they’re saying we have needs and we have things that we need to address. And some are perhaps more adjusted to our processes and have come from a different lens this time and recognize that the methodology to receive support is perhaps through a heavier lobbying approach.

And others are becoming more aware of what’s needed in order to be seen and to receive the funding. So I don’t think that we can without full knowledge say that we have all the information in front of us to make a decision today. And that is why we’re looking at a referral. The referral allows our partners, these agencies that are doing the heavy lifting to be able to come to the table and provide the information that we are now kind of giving them a picture of what we’re looking for in order to make decisions.

So I think it’s right now an opportunity to show some grace and to show some understanding around the fact that we’re all trying to find the solutions that work. And so again, we want to know clearly for the next meeting. What is it that the agencies safe spaces in this case are looking to address and that’s why this referrals on the table. I will say with safe spaces.

I haven’t had a chance to have a conversation. I haven’t had a chance to have a recent visit. I hope to do that between now and May 28. That’s part of the reason why I put the referral forward.

Thank you. Council Raman looking for any further speakers. Councilor Stevenson. Thank you.

I will speak to this. I’m with the deputy mayor on this. I won’t be supporting the referral and I won’t be supporting an extension of funding. There is an over saturation of social services in Old East Village.

It was number 69 in the core area action plan. It wasn’t addressed. I hear Councillor Ferris say, you know, that he had concerns, but it’s been good. So now he’s going to support arcade.

Well, the stabilization beds are in ward 13. The chaos is in Old East Village. And I think there needs to be a recognition of that. And I heard someone else say that the neighbourhood is better because of an arcade being there.

I’ll be perfectly honest. I don’t think so. And most of the residents that I talk to do not want arcade there because they know it attracts the vast number of people who are in need of the service. But you know who does benefit by arcade or the people who get service there.

And so it’s a difficult vote for me. I’m going to be supporting the vote for the funding. Even though it’s on the main street of my BIA, the main street shouldn’t be there. There aren’t enough services for people.

And so it is a problem. And to put another agency, another agency across the street, arcade cannot go. They own the building. They’ve put money into the kitchen.

We’ve talked to them about it. There are a lot of people who a lot of counselors here who support safe space, find another location that can’t be in Old East Village. Can’t be on the main. I won’t support it on the main street of any BIA in the city.

No social services should be on the main street of a BIA. There’s lots of other spaces for people. And the experience of the residents that I speak to is it’s not a good neighbour. I don’t hear that there’s attempts to have to reduce the negative impact or have a positive impact in the neighbourhood.

There are a lot of women who are being approached for sexual services that makes them feel very unsafe and very uncomfortable. There’s a lot of condoms found around. There’s a lot of sexual activity behind dumpsters and behind buildings. It makes the neighbours very uncomfortable.

So there are women in this city that need support and service. I agree with that. And there are other women who are negatively impacted in this area. And we can’t just look at one.

We need to hear the voices of all. And so this is not the right space for this. I will not be supporting it or any other social service agency on the main street of Old East Village Business District. And I’m asking my fellow counselors to honour what was said a year and a bit ago that it was a temporary thing.

It was promised that it would be temporary. This is not the correct location for this no matter how much you want that service. So I suggest that the counselors help them find another location. And I’m asking this council to start reducing the load on this neighbourhood.

It needs to be supported by the entire city. The fact that 14 wards are happy that it’s not their ward isn’t OK. And I’m asking for your support on this. Yeah, point of privilege.

OK, Councillor Ramen, you were first. Thank you. Respectfully, I’m going to ask that the counselor withdraw the comment. No one has ever, ever articulated around this table that we are pleased that a service is one place and not another.

Yes, I am going to support that Councillor. I do think that that should be withdrawn. I do think that a number of counselors around the horse, you could point to some of the social service agencies in their own ward. And I do agree with Councillor Ramen that none of us have ever said we’re happy that it’s not in our ward.

Thank you. I’m happy to withdraw that. The thing is the pleas of my neighbourhood and this Councillor is what I’m asking to be heard. So thank you.

Any other speakers on the referral? I’m just trying to track where you were on the speakers list, so on the referral only. Very, very briefly, this motion does not do anything in terms of going forward beyond July 31. If this motion is passed by the SPPC and subsequently the Council, it will have an effect until July 31.

And there is nothing here on the floor that suggests, and I don’t know what their long term plans are, they’ll have to come forward with that. This is speculative. So the objection that we don’t want it here, well, what’s going to happen if they have to shut down May 31 and can’t reopen? My prediction is you’re going to have more trouble on the street and you’re shaking your head.

We don’t, we don’t, we don’t really know. But again, this motion is not about making anything permanent anywhere. It’s a request for two months funding, and that is what is being sent to the next SPPC for deliberation. And I think it might behoove the agency to talk about some of the questions that have come up, but this is not the place for that debate right now on a motion to refer.

So please, let’s, let’s, let’s keep this discussion going. I think for the most part, it’s been a positive respectful discussion, and I think this Council is capable of continuing that. Any other speakers on the referral, noting that we are running out of Councillors to speak on it. Councilor Pribble.

Thank you. Going back to kind of an initiative was introduced to us. We did state, or sorry, it was presented to us as on temporary basis. We have been extending it.

And I am on reg, even though it’s on my ward, I do know people that leave left in all these village. I know that they do, the ones that do business there. And they do keep asking me what’s our plan? Why aren’t we upfront about it?

Are we going to keep extending it and not being kind of upfront with the citizens? Or are we going to say we are making the call and it’s going to be permanent? And I think there is the biggest issue, certainly for me. And again, in terms of the services, I did get to meet some individuals that use the services, and they see it very positive for them.

I do. So there is, I wouldn’t be able to say that they don’t deliver a value. I do believe they do deliver a value. But again, what is our stand on this?

And there’s the thing, I’m going to start with a question to our staff. Is our staff communicating with safe space in terms of looking for a different location that would still be suitable for them and suitable for their clientele? Because if you are doing just a referral, again, to go see their place to ask them a question, and then if you are not planning to move them or such as different locations, then that doesn’t really make sense. So if we do a referral, let’s really kind of come up front to the residents.

Can we get the staff response rather than with all due respect, rather than continuing to repeat? And Mr. Dickens, can you inform us what communication staff have had with safe space, if any? Through you, Chair, we have not had any communication about them relocating, and I think the council answered his own question in terms of it’s a temporary service.

We’ll support the referral. The reason why I’m going to support the referral is because I want us and the organization to have more time, because I do believe they bring certain value to our community and to the clientele they serve it. But I really would like, and I will be talking to them as well, hopefully to our staff as well. We need to include the study and moving to a different location.

We do have to think about, and again, going back to me as a business owner, and having, if I were to have a business there next door or in that area, it is very tough. It is very tough, and I’ve been driving to the area even last two and a half months, even more frequently. Yes, I did say, and I will stand behind it. The winter response have been positive for our city, downtown tremendously.

All these village decreases as well. But again, on a daily basis, we really need to address this, and I really think on the referral, please, I’m starting to hear a lot of repeating. Sorry, I will support the referral. Thank you.

I will support the referral. Yeah, right, Chair. Thanks. Looking for any other speakers, only on the referral, Councillor McAllister.

Thank you. Through the chair, as I said, to our previous discussion on the motion, I’ll support the referral. Just that I do think we need to provide some runway. Not all agencies operate the same way.

I think we are providing more information to these agencies as we go through these conversations. We don’t all have solutions at hand. It takes some of us a bit longer in terms of what we’re able to bring forward. So I do think if we have the ability, we should provide some runway.

Not all agencies will necessarily bring forward things. We have heard from others that, I mean, there’s capacity issues, right? So I think referrals are in order. I think we have to provide them the opportunity to come before us.

If they want to continue their contracts, obviously we’ve provided that direction. So hopefully we can have something brought before us, gives us some time as Councillors to also go and speak with the individuals who run these agencies so we can make an informed decision at the next SBPC. So thank you. I have no one else on the speakers list, so I’m going to ask the clerk to open the vote on the referral.

Closing the vote, motion carries eight to six. Okay, so the amendment has been referred to the next cycle of SBPC. We are now back to the main motion. And at the time, I had Councillor ramen and myself still on the list who had not spoken.

Councillor ramen, if you’d like to speak now. Thank you and through you. And I will try to be succinct. So first, again, thanks to my colleagues for bringing this forward and a big thank you to Arcade for the work you’re doing and the continued advocacy.

I appreciate that we are contained in the letter. It’s stated that we should look at the communication that’s been shared by Arcade, but my concern continues to be that we’re looking at this in almost somewhat of a silo. Even though we have our tables and we have the work that’s being done by the whole of community, it seems as though we now we have the funding to, if we approve today, we have the funding to take us to July 31st. And some and an unsolicited proposal to look at other options going forward annually.

But we also have the June report of the encampment strategy. And I’m having trouble personally seeing how all of these different approaches line up and how they’ll all receive consideration for funding around different cycles and timelines of which they’ll come forward. So I’m wondering if staff might be able to speak to how they may be able to help to address some of those. Let’s call them competing interests, but also so some overlapping funding requests that may come around within, you know, a few weeks of each other, for instance, coming forward.

And I’m just wondering how and whether or not more direction is needed from us in order to help to align the strategies better Mr Dickens. Thank you chair and happy to try to provide some of that clarity for Council. It’s a fair question. A lot of real time moving parts in this work.

The motion that is here would provide stability of service provision through to the end of July. That helps this particular organization and perhaps to retain a number of human resources that they have in place. We did a lot of staffing. This would allow them to maintain most of those staffing levels, if not all for this period of time, and that would also probably provide a bit of a runway for the organization to continue to work with other partner organizations and institutions in the community to look at how they can better align with the whole of community system response, be that through perhaps a hub’s proposal and location to be determined.

But it also it just gives that stability for that two two month period. This motion being brought forward falls within a timeline staff had already been working on just to be clear we’re staff are not introducing this timeline. So the competing issues are one that we’re happy to try and work within and try to address the encampment strategy that comes before you in June is again a policy position for this community to take for Council to take. We would look at bringing before you some key pillars of an encampment strategy that would include what transactional outreach might look like.

So how do we provide services or basic needs to those that are temporarily living in encampments until they can become housed. What are some of those transformational outreach components such as the work we would do to get people moving and unstuck, if you will, from living in encampments into the proper type of indoor services and the indoor, indoor housing. And also in that encampment strategy will be those encampment protocols that we would look to endorse as a community, which will guide the work that partners do. It will also guide some of the safety protocols that we have in place around our encampments.

So that is the work that’s coming before you in the encampment strategy. There may be some longer term funding asset that we make that look to point the system in a different direction that become very targeted around acknowledging the existence of encampments working to reduce the reliance on encampments and how we can increase our foothold in the housing sector. So that is what you’ll see before you this here today is a maintaining of our continuity of services that have garnered some support and have been working relatively well to meet a wide array of individuals experiencing homelessness. Thank you.

I appreciate the answer and I know I kind of put you on the spot there with the dressing that so thank you. I appreciate that. So the way that I am seeing things right now is that we endorse the strategy. And then we around health and homelessness and our hubs and supportive housing model.

And we are working towards our goal building that bridge. And as we continue to build that bridge. Other work is being done in the community and the work that’s being done is supportive of and right now temporary in nature because we’re trying to get other services up and running. However, in filling those temporary needs, we’re finding successes and we’re finding a lot of key learnings.

And so as we’re having those learnings, I’m wondering how we are and how and how we’re working that into to what we’re doing. So I think that there’s more conversation obviously that will happen the next little while. And I think what we need to consider more of is funding what’s in front of us today. We’re continuing the work that’s being done at the arc and continuing to engage in conversations around how we move the entirety of the system and where winter response in this.

What I’m going to call annualized response now. It’s into our ongoing strategy and that it doesn’t seem like an afterthought, but that it is something that we are purposely thinking of and looking at how to continue with as part of our model. So if that requires us to address a change in direction, that may be something that we need to consider as well. Thank you, Councillor.

I am going to ask Councillor Lehman to take the chair. I have the chair and I’ll go to the deputy mayor. Thank you, Mr. Presiding Officer and through you.

The reason I’m supportive of this moving forward now is because I do want to move to a longer term strategy. I want to provide some runway to look at some of the options that have been presented to see if we can. If this is the model and maybe it’s not everything that’s in the communication. Maybe it’s something slightly different.

Maybe this isn’t the model, but whatever it is, the discussion can happen and it gives us some runway and it keeps some beds open to do so. But the reason more than anything else is that for me, the results are in the metrics and honestly, the arc is the only organization that’s provided me the metrics to say this is how many people were serving. This is how many people we have reconnected and have moved back in with family members. This is the only organization that is telling me this is the number of people we have moved into housing.

We’ve helped match them to apartments. We’ve helped match them to opportunities to move out of a transitional bed at corner one and move into an apartment. We’ve been able to help people get back into the workforce, reconnect with jobs. That is where I want to see this strategy going.

I’m not looking for more drop in. I’m looking for more life changing. I’m looking for more pathways to recovery and pathways to housing. And I’m not seeing that coming from anybody but the arc right now in terms of where our winter response was stood up.

Obviously, there are organizations who are doing work year round. Obviously, there are some folks at the men’s mission at the Salvation Army and other organizations who operate year round who do some of this work too. But from what we approved back in November for winter response. And I said then, it was frustrated that we were getting winter response as late as we did that I didn’t want to be back in that position next year.

And what I’ve seen here is an option worth at least investigating that would not put us back in that position next year. I also was was really hopeful that, you know, by this time, we would have an encampment strategy before us. I understand the work is ongoing. We don’t have that yet.

But that has to happen too. And all of these things are going to be competing for a variety of resources that are very limited. So, as I said earlier, last fall, I voted no to Ronan Warner. I am happy to have been proven wrong.

And I thank the volunteers and the staff at arc for the work they’ve put in and for the difference they’re making in people’s lives. We don’t always get it right. And I didn’t get it right on that vote. But I appreciate the fact that you delivered beyond even what you committed to us.

Not 100% 110%. That matters. That matters to me that you’re there 24/7. And those are the kind of metrics I need to see embedded in things moving forward because I’m not going to continue to just fund.

Here’s a granola bar and a bottle of water. It’s just not good enough. We’ve got to fund pathways to recovery from addiction. We’ve got to fund pathways to supports for mental health.

And we’ve got to fund pathways to housing. Otherwise, we are in a funding spiral that we will never get out of. If we are just spending money on, and I don’t mean disrespect to this. But if we’re just supporting money on band-aid solutions, rather than treating the hemorrhaging open artery, we are not fixing the problem in the long term.

I think we’ve had tremendous success with our supportive housing model. So I want to see is to continue along that path, too. And I, you know, our partners at Inwell, the work that London Carris is doing over on down the street with their new supportive housing unit. There is great work happening there, too.

That is the long term goal, though. And I can’t continue to just take one time money and extend and extend and extend. If I’m going to extend, I need to see a model that’s making a difference. And that’s why I’m supporting the arc on this request, because I’ve gone.

I’ve seen it with my own eyes. I’m happy to have been proven wrong on this. And whatever the future holds, I want to continue to develop that partnership to see where we can provide the most bang for our buck. Because there’s not a lot of bucks.

So if we’re going to spend them, we’ve got to spend them very wisely and very carefully. And it’s got to have metrics attached. Turn the chair to the deputy mayor. Okay.

So we’re on the main motion. And I have no new speakers prior to our amendment discussion. I had both Councillor Stevenson and Councillor Pribble looking to be on the list a second time. I’m seeing Councillor Stevenson shaking her head.

She’s okay. Councillor Pribble, are you okay? Or did you want back on? You’re okay?

Anyone else on the main motion? Seeing none, then I’m going to ask the clerk to open the vote. I’m saying the vote motion carries 14 to 0. Thank you, colleagues.

I’ll just ask the gallery to not show any emotions one way or the other. Not everybody always agrees with each other up there or down here. So we want everybody to feel like they can express themselves. So while we appreciate the enthusiasm, we’ll just ask you to curb your enthusiasm.

To take a 15 minute break. Well, you were sort of on the same wavelength as me. I was going to suggest before we move to items for direction that we take a 10 minute recess. Is that amenable?

So we’ll just. I’m going to call the meeting back to order and we now are going to move to items for direction. We did have four items on the items for direction. I want to note that on item 4.1, I’m just going to take the opportunity to let colleagues know that what we will be dealing with now is not a motion other than a motion to receive because the motion that was circulated in advance has been withdrawn.

Those who had sought delegation status, Councillor Frank and I reached out to directly so they were aware that there would be no delegations because there would be no motions for them to delegate on. But I am going to turn to Councillor Frank, just so that she can address the reason she provided the original communication, the reason she’s withdrawing it. Thank you very much. Yes, we’re very excited to share some excellent news in regards to Fair Free Day, which also coincides with Car Free Day.

And I will, after I make remarks, pass it over to Council per bill to highlight. But we, as you probably have read, are very excited to share that Dan Corr has offered a private donation to cover the costs so it doesn’t have to come through City Council or through Reserve Fund. So that is excellent. And a bit of background for those who haven’t heard of Car Free Day or Fair Free activities, two volunteers in Ward 11.

So in my word approached me, they’re planning events for Car Free Day, which is on Sunday, September 22. This is an international event. This city has participated in the past, although during COVID, there was some reductions to that. But it is an international event that encourages people to travel without using their car for a day.

So get around the city, taking the bike, taking the bus, walking. And city staff have already said that they will be supporting this year’s initiative through shared promotions, collaborations and activations within their existing budget in order to make it successful. And I will continue to work with the Volunteer Organizing Committee of Car Free Day to engage more volunteers and partners. For example, as mentioned, the letter doors open is that weekend and what a great opportunity to get people to take the bus or to bike and go to all those locations.

As well, I will personally be offering an activity in Ward 11 to try and get people to fill the bus. And I do know that the volunteers are trying to organize a festival in Wardley, so maybe if people want to encourage their residents to come to Ward 11 on the bus, that would be great. And I encourage all of you to maybe think of offering an activity in your ward either again on walking, busing or biking to celebrate that day. There’ll probably be updates throughout the year on this.

And I just want to thank the residents who submitted the letter. As you can see, it’s quite popular. Lots of people were really interested in this and shared their different ideas for where they would go in the city on the bus. And as well, I want to thank a really big heartfelt appreciation to Dan Corps for recognizing this is a really exciting opportunity and wanting to celebrate in that.

So thank you very much. I know that there’s no motion on the floor, so it’s been withdrawn, but I appreciate your time. And I also appreciate that Dan Corps has saved us an entire debate, so that bonus points for their efforts. And I will pass it over to Council Perbal.

I will recognize Council Perbal as well. Thank you, Chair. I’ll be really brief. I would like to thank David, actually, and David and Marianne, who started to ball rolling on this initiative.

And certainly a huge thank you to the partner, Dan Corps, Sean Ford. And as my fellow Council Frank stated, there’s because of the weekend and the day it’s going to be happening. There are a lot of opportunities and we just have to make sure that our marketing strategy is going to reflect that and we get a true mileage out of it. But thank you.

No other comments and thank you to all. I appreciate when two Councillors can take team on a withdrawal and do it in under five minutes combined. So as we have no motion to approve any level of funding, I’m just going to look for a motion to receive the communications moved by Councillor Stevenson and seconded by Councillor Frank, and we’ll ask the clerk to open the vote. Motion carries 13.0, noting Councillor Palosa is absent.

Thank you, Clerk. And I will note that when we recessed, Councillor Palosa did indicate that she would be going remote and rejoining us when she’s able to get logged in remotely. So she will rejoin us as she’s able. Moving on item 4.2 is consideration of appointments to the Kettle Creek Conservation Authority board of directors.

As is our practice colleagues, the clerks are prepared to have a vote on this. We do have a candidate who has withdrawn, Miles Park has withdrawn as a candidate that is noted in your eScribe, so that leaves us with three candidates for one position. So prior to moving to a vote on our selections, I will ask if any Councillors want to speak to any particular candidate. Thank you, Chair, and I’ve gone through the street.

By the way, I’m a board member of the Kettle Creek as well. I’ve gone through the street applicants and based on the experiences related to this board. I recommend John Joseph’s straw Bosch and I don’t know if my phone counselor board member, Trust, I would like to add to it. Or I can say I discussed it with him and he feels the same way.

Maybe he can confirm it as well. Thank you. Thank you. I would second that if it’s in the form of emotion.

I want to point out that he was selected to serve on. I believe it was lower lower times and then that was pulled. Is that right? He was sort of already selected for one of these committees and I know that he’s given a lot of thought to the kinds of issues we’re looking looking at.

So I’m happy to agree with my colleague. All right, so that is two recommendations for one of the candidates. As we do, we will put all the names on the ballot. Members should select one candidate.

Once a candidate receives the majority threshold that they would be receiving the appointment. So I will ask the clerks unless there’s any further speakers seeing none. I will ask the clerks to open the vote. Opposing the vote, and the result is John Joseph Strybosch with 12 votes, a similar DAPPA with one vote.

Okay, so with the voting results in, I will look for a motion to approve Mr. Stryback as the candidate moved by Councilor Pribble, seconded by Councilor Cuddy, and we will get the clerk to open the vote on that. Opposing the vote when it carries 13 to 0. Thank you, colleagues, that completes item 4.2.

Moving on, 4.3 is resignation from Elden House Board. We have a communication dated April 24th from the Duncan to receive, and that we accept his resignation. The third part of the motion would be that the clerk be directed to advertise in the usual manner to solicit to solicit applications for appointment to Elden House Board of Directors with applications to be brought forward to a future meeting of the SPPC. Moved by Councilor Stevenson, seconded by Councilor Layman, any debate?

Seeing none, I will ask the clerk to open the vote. Opposing the vote, motion carries 13 to 0. Thank you, colleagues. Moving on, we have 4.4.

This is a request for a review of the code of conduct for members of Council submission from Councilor Stevenson and myself. So, I will look to see if Councilor Stevenson, are you willing to put that on the floor? So, that’s been moved. Is there a seconder?

So, that is moved and on the floor. So, now we can open debate on this. So, colleagues, before I entertain any speakers, I want to offer a word of guidance and caution. I know that there has been some heated exchanges on social media in the past few days.

I would really remind colleagues respectfully, we are not debating the content of anyone’s social media posts on this item. We are debating the review of the code of conduct. So, please keep your comments. Should you wish to make them to the motion that’s before you.

And I will now look for a speakers list. If I see none, I will, Councilor Ferreira. Thank you, and through you, I’m going to try to keep as much as I can to the motion. But I am having a little issues wrapping my head around this just from my concern with following the code as it is like we saw.

And this is the only where it’s just for my reasoning. We saw post the photos from the mover with individuals experiencing homelessness, showing faces visible recognizable. And, you know, that as we saw from the Integrity Commissioner was an infringement, an invasion of personal privacy. And we did have that debate.

And I remember there was no real acknowledgement of the concerns for the Integrity Commissioner. Yeah, Councilor, I don’t want us to relitigating a past recommendation from the Integrity Commissioner. I want us to stay focused on putting the code under review. I realize that individual counselors may feel there’s different connections to that past report from the Integrity Commissioner.

But I do want us to focus on, are we putting the code under review or not. Okay. So, you know, I just, I don’t see any material change from this Council if we were to have the review. Councilor Stevenson.

The point is, this is not about me. This is about a review of the code of conduct that has been clearly needed. And this is me bringing it forward to Council to see if they would like to review it. That’s what it’s about.

It has nothing to do with me or my social media, which is a distraction from the actual issues. Okay, so I’m going to roll on the point of personal privilege so if we can bear with me. And as I said at the outset, this is about whether or not we’re putting the code under review. So Councilor, I would ask that you speak to the motion, not to the intent or the conduct of any other member of Council.

It’s not our place to render those judgments. It’s the Integrity Commissioner’s place. And what we’re dealing with right now is specifically asking the Integrity Commissioner to review the code and asking our staff to do some work to review the code as well on the points that are listed in the motion. So if we can, again, I really want us to keep to the intent here, which is to put our code under review.

Thank you. So, I’ll just leave it there then. Councilor Trussow. Thank you.

I have a burning question that I have to ask. And if it’s out of order, I’m sorry, I’ll ask it somewhere else. But we have this code of conduct that’s applicable to Council members. We also have a code of conduct in a different document that’s applicable to advisory committee members.

And what I see as a potential hole here, which might be something that we want to ask the Integrity Commissioner to look at is where do the other appointed. I’m not talking about other boards and commissions because they may have their own their own, but members of the court. What is it? The court of revision, the committee of adjustments.

These are positions that are appointed by us that are not under the jurisdiction of someone else. They should be somewhere. And where are they? So can we include that to be considered here?

So I think that that is relevant. It’s not out of order. I am going to ask the clerk to respond to that. Certainly.

Thank you. And through the chair, there are some entities that the Councillors mentioned that may be covered under existing policies. But as part of the review that we would regularly take of our policies, we would ensure an alignment with current policies. I’ll give you an example of that.

Recently, there was a respectful workplace policy that came before Council. That was very recent. We need to ensure that our policies are in alignment with that. If there are any gaps who identify as part of that review, then we’d make sure that we bring that to Council for consideration.

As far as the matter before this committee, the current motion, should it be a will of committee for us to engage in a review that goes beyond the Court of Conduct for members of Council? We could certainly do that. We could look at the Court of Conduct for members of local boards, for example, to ensure alignment. Thank you, Councillor, through the chair.

Thank you. Thank you for that. And as long as we’re doing an environmental scan of other agencies, I think it would be a good time for us to look at that question, because otherwise I do feel as if we have a gap. And this is not geared to anybody.

It’s not geared to any committee. It’s just part of the scan. Okay. Bear with me for a moment.

I’m just going to consult quickly with the clerk. I’m going to ask the clerk to just share his comments. Thank you. I would suggest that a formal amendment would be preferable, and I’ll tell you why.

Well, the analysis and the environmental scan may involve reaching out to the integrity commissioner in a larger scope may involve doing larger scan and, of course, engaging with the local boards in a different way. So it’s going to take a bit more more time and energy, but certainly we can do it. I would just ask that that be added to the motion. Should that be the will of Council?

Also, thank you. Thank you for that. And in order to make this motion is narrowly as narrow as possible, other than the committee of adjustments. And I believe we have a court of revision.

Are there any other such entities that would be captured here? We will go to the clerk for that. Through the chair, a court of revision and committee of adjustments are quite different. I would suggest than local boards and Council and committees of municipal council.

So in that regard, that may be a different part of civic administration would be undertaking that review. I would also have to be a consideration as to whether the integrity commissioner even has jurisdiction over a adjudicative board, such as, say, a court of revision and committee of adjustment. I don’t know if our city solicitor would be willing to share some additional pieces of information on that point. Can you expand on that any further for us?

Thank you and through the chair. There is some conflicting case law on what is within the jurisdiction of the integrity commissioner and whether things such as the court of revision may be in there. So I think we would have to take a look and see whether we may need a different sort of policy with respect to those types of entities. So trust which thank you, which suggests maybe not not make a motion today, but just sort of think think about it for the future.

Yes, sir. The clerk is suggesting they’d be happy to have a chat with you offline first and provide some direction if you wish to pursue that direct that route in the future. So thank you. I have Councillor Hopkins next.

Yeah, thank you, Mr. Chair. And just as a follow up to Councillor Trissell’s question, I understand the courts are a separate issue, but could we not have advisory groups and committee of adjustments included in our code of conduct through this review? Is that going to take place or do we need a motion?

So as was indicated, although the court of revision has the court language in its name, the committee of adjustment is also a quasi judicial review panel. And so they are separate from say our advisory committees or boards and commissions. This motion does not include our community advisory committees, but I can get the clerk to speak to the code of conduct that is in place currently for our community advisory committees. Thank you through the chair.

So currently under the general terms for advisory communities, they have a code that’s built right into the terms of reference and the general advisory committee terms. If there is a direction to include advisory committees as part of that, this review, I would also suggest that that be an amendment to this because it has a different flavor to it. And again, I would perhaps ask the city solicitor to comment on that piece as well. But before I do, I also want to just remind members that the terms of reference for the community advisory committees is actually on the deferred matters list of the governance working group as well and is due back for a report in June.

So there is a discussion around the terms of reference happening there, but I’m not sure with regard to the code of conduct, what steps might be there, so we’ll go to miss Paul for that. Thank you and through you. I would suggest because there are different codes of conduct for the advisory committees, local ports and council, it would be probably beneficial to take a look at them holistically to make sure they’re all aligned and making sense with each other. So, so Councilor, if that’s helpful, perhaps an additional clause that recommends a review of the code of conduct for advisory committees is aligned with these codes.

I would like to bring that motion forward. Okay, and we’ll get the clerks to make sure we’ve got that word Smith properly, but do we have a seconder for that? Councilor McAllister and Councilor Hopkins, the floor is still yours. If you want to speak to that while the clerks get the language.

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you for bringing this forward. I know it’s been a conversation to review this code of conduct for quite a while. I do have maybe a general question as to how much can be changed or reviewed given that we are a creature of the province and a lot of the code.

Maybe this is going to the clerk for a response is dictated provincially as opposed to what we can do, municipally, I think just a broader conversation around that. Certainly, and I’ll share as one of the authors of the communication counselor. That was one of the reasons that a clause two is in there, the review of the ombudsman’s code of conduct. Because it was important to me to that those aligned, but we’ll go to the clerk for some further details on what we actually have jurisdiction over versus what’s required by the province.

Thank you, and through the chair, I’ll start by by referring back to 2021 when AMO was providing some recommendations to the minister. And at that time, as the counselor will recall, AMO was making some recommendations as part of a 90 day consultation period in regards to strengthening codes of conduct throughout the province. Then Mayor Holder at the direction of council sent a letter to the ministry in support of the recommendations of AMO, and that was re reignited, I suppose, in 2023, where AMO’s board reaffirmed that commitment. And the reason I say that is because as part of the recommendations from AMO, they were talking about changing the types of things that a municipal code of conduct could include.

There are limited penalties or sanctions rather that are permitted under the Municipal Act. And one of the things that they are recommending that the province change is to allow municipalities to apply to a member of the judiciary to remove a sitting member, which is an extreme measure that is beyond the current jurisdiction of a municipality. So that’s an example of the types of things that cannot be in a code of conduct currently because it’s limited by the provincial jurisdiction. There are a number of things set out that are required under Regulation 5518 over the Municipal Act.

And those are the items that the movers of this motion have referred to. Those are for the benefit of members of committee. A code must address gifts, benefits, hospitality, respectful conduct, including conduct towards officers and employees, confidential information, and use of property of the municipality of the local board. Beyond that, there are a number of things that municipal councils can include that are optional, and those are set out in the ombudsman’s guide.

I hope that that addresses the councilor’s inquiry. Councillor Hopkins. I do, and I really appreciate the comments coming from the clerk and a little bit of the history. I think it’s important as a council that we understand a little bit of the history where we’re being being on the AMO board.

This was quite a discussion a number of years ago, and we did make recommendations. I was glad to hear that the mayor did support that, but we have not heard back from the province. And I think, and maybe just as a follow up to that, just in case we do hear back from the province with changes, how will that influence the review that we’re going to be going forward? Would there be another review done?

I just want to understand the process going forward a little bit more, and how can we expect the review and the timelines? I just want to kind of tighten it up a little bit, knowing that there could be other moving parts as well. So the mayor is actually indicated he can provide some information, so I’m going to go to him. Yes, so I’m going to provide just a little bit of context for council.

So, further to what the clerk said, Mayor Holder wrote a letter. I was actually asked to go to the actual consultation on behalf of municipal council to share our position, which we actually aligned with AMO’s position, like we didn’t carve out our own independent position. We just said we passed a resolution supporting AMO’s position at the time, which is still the standing position of council. Further to that, I know AMO, OVCM, and others supported an opposition bill.

I think it was Bill 5, if I remember, that never actually came to fruition, but the government basically said we’re going to not pass this, but we’ll bring forward our own legislation on this. There are no specific timelines that I know I’m aware of. I can tell you, though, as recent as the most recent OVCM meeting that I was at in Burlington for the AGM, we actually reiterated our position of support for the government moving forward on this as soon as possible, including a conversation with Minister Klandra, who is still going to bring forward something, but hasn’t identified the timeframes on that. One of the pieces that I just want to share that was discussed amongst mayors, although there’s no formal position on this, was if we’re going to move to more, I don’t want to use the work stream, higher level of punitive measures all the way up to potential removal from office, that there may need to be a harmonization at the base level of the types of things that are in codes of conduct under the province that are expanded beyond that, because if you’re going to have a judicial review process, if it’s going to be applied consistently across the province, there’s probably a consistent baseline that happens to happen within codes of conduct, of which that would be applied to.

So although there’s been no formal agreement on whether or not we’re all going to get together and try to harmonize a base level of code of conduct, it’s most likely to come through whatever process the government does to add to maybe through the ombudsman’s items, that baseline of things that were required to put in may be elevated through a decision of the provincial government when they move forward with this, if they’re going to increase the punitive measures on behalf of councillors to provide some consistency across the province. So irrespective of the review we do now, I think to get to your question, we’ll probably have to do something else if the province moves forward in that way and increases the baseline across codes of conduct to require all municipalities to provide a level of harmonization for some basic things that should be in all of them. But again, there’s no timeframes on that, but I wanted to add that context so that colleagues are aware that I think we should conduct our own review, but there may be other things that are just going to happen across the province, should the province move forward with that increased punitive measures in any sort of legislation related to codes of conduct. Yeah, through the chair, thank you Mr.

Mayor for that update. I think it’s important that we all know that there could be other moving parts going forward and definitely supportive of us going forward as well. Yeah, so, and I’m going to just to provide some further information for you, Councillor, and for all Councillors. I’m just going to go to the clerk to speak to the timeline that they anticipate on this, and I will also add from my own perspective, on the date that we submitted this letter, there was no provincial legislation on the docket to consider an update from the provincial level.

And I’ll go to the clerk now for… Yeah, and just on the clerk, there’s not yet either. It’s just a reiteration of municipalities’ desires for them to move forward. And so, I’ll go to the clerk for the anticipated timeline to come back to us.

Should we approve this today? Thank you, through the chair. I think with an aggressive approach to this with our resources, we could turn this around fairly quickly, I would think, within a few cycles. I just wanted to add to what the Mayor has indicated, and indicate to the Council that should there be some legislation come forward if there’s some changes, we would, of course, hear about that through our municipal associations, and we would come forward to Council to seek direction as to how you wish to proceed with the changes and bring it to your attention.

That’s what initiated the original code of conduct was a legislative change. So, certainly, we would do that again. And just so colleagues are aware, Councillor Hopkins, the language that the clerks have, and I view as the mover and Councillor McAllister, as the seconder, reads that the motion be amended to include a new Part C to read as follows. Civic administration be directed to review the code of conduct for community advisory committees contained within the general policy for community advisory committees for alignment with the code of conduct for members of Council.

And you’re both okay with that language, seeing nods. So, that amendment is now on the floor. And we’ll look to see if there’s any speakers to that amendment. Councillor McAllister.

Thank you. And through the chair, I think I’m on the regular speakers list as well. But just quickly to this, happy to second it. I do think we should, excuse me, have alignment in terms of the advisory committees.

And then the community advisory committees, and is this also sorry for, like, committee of adjustment in those ones, or do we take those out? No, the Court of Revision and the Committee of Adjustment, as was indicated by the city solicitor, wholly separate entities, they are not advisory committees, nor are they boards and commissions. They are quasi judicial bodies. Okay.

I hope they also have their own code of conduct. But I’m happy to support this as I do think that we need alignment with those as well. Thank you. Mayor Morgan.

So speaking to the amendment, I actually don’t support the amendment. Not that I don’t believe in the good intention of it, but I’ll tell you why. I actually don’t think we need to align it with our code of conduct. Remember, our code of conduct, and our position as a council, is that we feel that it is not strong enough, and we’re asking for the province to strengthen it.

There’s nothing stopping us from setting the code of conduct for advisory committees at a level that we feel is appropriate for them, all the way up to the potential of removing an advisory committee member for some sort of egregious behavior. And so if the intent is to align with our code of conduct, like, I actually don’t want to bring down the protections for anybody, whether they’re a member of the advisory committee or a member of staff going to them, because the current code of conduct for members of council is not sufficient. If it’s general alignment of the principles, I’m fine with that. But I actually don’t want alignment as a straight up piece because I don’t want staff to interpret that as kind of bringing it back down to say, you know, if there’s an action that, you know, we’re kind of restricted to the actions that we can take in our code of conduct through a similar process.

So maybe the word general alignment with the principles would make more sense. But like, I’ve just worried about the kind of open-endedness of alignment with our code of conduct, given the standing position of us, an AMO, an OCCM, is that municipal code of conduct, there are some deficiencies to where they can go and to hold people to account across the province. And so let’s not align to that lower standard. Let’s set a standard that makes sense, because probably we know our staff are held to a much higher standard than we are, right?

Like, that’s just the way it is, because there’s a whole process for staff to be held to account for actions that may be taken against members of the community community or against other staff members. So let’s set the bar at an appropriate level where we can, knowing that we’re advocating for the things that we don’t have control over ourselves for municipal councilors. So I support this in principle, but I need to know how staff are going to apply it, because I don’t want to lower a standard that should be higher, you know, generally, because we want to raise our standard as well. So to perhaps shorten our debate on this, hearing what you said, your worship, if the counselors are amenable to language saying, because the clerks did draft this up on the fly for general alignment with the principles of the code of conduct for members.

Councillor Hopkins, would that be acceptable to you? It would be acceptable. And I do want to underline the word review and how it aligns. I think there’s still work to be done.

I’m hoping we can get support for this. And Councillor McAllister, you’re okay with the slightly changed language. I’m seeing a nod there. So we’ll just get the clerk to alter that in eScribe so that I will say community advisory committees for general alignment with the principles of the code of conduct for members of council.

Any further speakers on the amendment? Seeing none, then I will ask the clerk to open the vote on that. Motion carries 14 to 0. And now on the main motion as amended, first of all, Councillor Stevenson and Councillor Lehman, are you okay remaining the mover and seconder on the as amended?

Seeing that you are, Councillor McAllister, you were indeed both on the main list and the amended list. So on the main list, we are to you. Okay. Thank you.

And through the chair, I think some of my questions are probably to Councillor Hopkins, really, because I know we’ve talked about in terms of code of conduct review. I mean, is this just another thing that’s going to end up in limbo? Essentially, it’s my question. I know there’s been hard advocacy in terms of getting the province to act on this, but do we see any traction?

Has there been any discussion about social media? I know there’s a lot of discussion, obviously, about like harassment. So Councillor, I’m just going to bring you back to the motion that’s on the floor. What the province is or isn’t doing really is outside of our control.

This is about our review of our code of conduct, not what the province may or may not change. So I’m wondering if we can bring it back to our code of conduct, not whether or not the province might be bringing forward changes or not. Well, to my point, I just feel like it’s a toothless effort. I just don’t see we can do the review, but if we have no mechanism for implementing this, I don’t want to waste staff’s time.

I don’t want to waste our time. This is where I’m at with it. I appreciate why the Deputy Mayor and the Councillor brought it forward, but in terms of what I’ve heard today, I just don’t see a path forward for this going anywhere. And that’s just the unfortunate reality.

That’s why I was speaking to that. Like when we have the ability, if we can bring it to governance and have a discussion, I’m fine with that, but directing civic administration to do something that is a dead end. Personally, in my opinion, right now, I don’t see the point. I’m going to ask Mayor Morgan to take the chair because he took a break this afternoon, so we’ll put him to work for a minute.

Hold on, I’ve got to get my timer. I have Deputy Mayor Lewis. I promised to be under four minutes and 59 seconds. And I just want to take the opportunity to share very quickly.

And this actually goes to the concern that Councillor McAllister was just raising. I think we heard loud and clear without relitating the report that came to us in January that our integrity commissioner has advised us that the process is set out in our own code of conduct right now. And it was described as clunky and that they needed an update. And so that’s why I think it’s worthy of our reviewing this to see if from a process review so that everybody understands what the process is.

When a complaint comes in, how the integrity commissioner approaches counselors approaches the complainant to get information back and forth, whether complaints are bundled together, or whether they’re dealt with separately. I think those are all things that arose out of questions from what we were dealing with in January. And so that to me is what part of what I want to see out of this review is the process that we have in our own code. So we’re all clear on what the process is, both ourselves and members of the public moving forward, and that I don’t think requires any intervention from the province.

I think our integrity commissioner identified that other municipalities have some variances in their code of conduct, which they found to be more streamlined in their process. And so that’s the kind of thing that I’m interested in hearing back from our integrity commissioner. That’s why I’m supportive of moving forward with this. Thank you for that clarification, because I think my issue with this was, is your end goal to change something, or are you just looking for that review for clarity of process?

And I think from what you’ve just said, that you’re just looking for the process to be laid out for, which I’m fine with, because I’m not trying to be a cynic, but I just feel like it’s another thing that we’d be advocating for that I don’t know if there’s a lot of traction on. I think there’s value in doing the review, and I’m happy to do that, but in terms of pushing this forward to change anything, I’m a bit more skeptical about that, but I’m willing to do the review if it helps alleviate concerns from counselors in terms of what process they have to follow. Thank you, Councillor, and you still have lots of time left, so a good minute and 40 seconds. Councillor Hopkins.

Yes, thank you, Mr. Chair, for allowing me to speak. I would like to respond to Councillor McAllister’s concerns. As an AMO board member, I will continue to advocate on AMO’s recommendations to the provincial government.

They are sound. There was a lot of work that went into that. That needs to continue, and we’ll continue just waiting for the province to respond to the recommendations. So this is a separate review.

I think it all works together eventually, but I like the word clunky. We haven’t had a review done for quite a while, and I know the integrity commissioner did suggest that we review it. Thank you, Councillor Hopkins, Mayor Morgan. Yes, through the chair to the Councillor.

So I think there’s two pieces here, and I don’t want them to get conflated. Municipal councils can set the code of conduct as the rules that they operate under. And we can set that to whatever threshold we want as colleagues agreeing to work together in a certain way and act in a certain way and be held to account in a certain way. Where the province steps in is the province sets the process at which, you know, here are the punitive actions at the end of the process that you’re only allowed to take.

And so when you look at across the province, some actions that have been taken and the gross, you know, misogyny and sexism and the types of things that have precipitated this call for strengthened punishments across the province. You know, those things can be set by the province, but that’s independent from what we want to do with our code of conduct, either clarify processes, set different thresholds and levels at which we’ll hold ourselves to account and we can do that. But the piece we have to wait for is no matter what happens through however we set those rules, it’ll all come back to the process of the integrity commissioner producing a report and then basically a recommendation on one of two things at the end of it, right? That part might change by the province, that part involves advocacy, but the rest of it can all be set by us to the standards that we feel are appropriate as a collective group of counselors.

I have no other speakers on my list. So it’s, oh, Councilor Robin. Thank you and through you. I just had some questions around the interim period.

If we move forward in this direction at SPPC, and then it goes on to Council in the interim period, how we engage with our code of conduct. And I want to be very clear that I think it’s important that although we’re looking at it, we are entertaining the idea of a review that generally speaking, what we see in the code of conduct is what we’ve all agreed to adhere to at this point. And therefore, it is wholly and does stand as a document, a merit that we have agreed to, that we are agreeing that we will act in a certain way in accordance with as of right now. So I think that one thing we have to continue to look at in our framework and our principles, and this is actually, I think, a guiding principle portion from the province is the interpreted broadly piece in the key principles.

Because from my understanding, and especially when we’re alluding to things like where we’re talking about the environmental scan around social media, email and communications with the public, and other pieces of those legislations that are mentioned with our code, they do refer to email and social media. And then the other thing I’m not clear on which I think maybe we need to consider is after our integrity commissioner makes a ruling and deems something within reason of being looked at so let’s say in this case social media has made a ruling. At what point does that then become part of the code of conduct because our integrity commissioner has now set almost a precedence as to what the integrity commissioner will consider as jurisdictional. So how does that not apply when we apply that same principle on a number of matters.

And I wonder if we need some language to speak to that. So I’m going to have the clerk speak to that in general terms to respond as best as possible. Thank you through the chair. So the principle of a general applicability in relation to codes of conduct has been addressed by a few major municipalities that I’m aware of Toronto, for example, in Ottawa, for example.

Although they don’t include to the best of my knowledge, social media specifically within the code they have issued interpretive bulletins or guidance that inform that code. The code stands separate and to the counselor’s point should an integrity commissioner make a ruling or a finding rather. It does not necessarily become part of the code, but it’s certainly informative for instructing future behavior by counselors, where you still have the same integrity commissioner appointed. So it would be much like a court.

There would be some stability in the rulings from the same integrity commissioner going forward. Whether there needs to be some specificity put into a code that may not be necessary, where there is a clear ruling or decision made by the integrity commissioner and certainly integrity commissioners can also provide advice before an action is taken by a counselor. So should there be some concerns about a particular activity, a communication with the IC can inform the interpretation that may be applied. I hope that addresses the question.

Thank you. Councilor. Thank you. And through you, it did.

Specifically, I was going to mention the next part about having the opportunity to seek advice from the integrity commissioner. Should there be any issues while we’re going through this update? I think that’s also really important that we have that option available to us that we continue to utilize that. And so I am wholly supportive of moving forward with the review and continuing to abide by the code that’s in front of us until that time as we do so.

Thank you, counselor. Any further speakers? Seeing none. So I’m going to ask the clerk to open the vote.

The motion carries 14 to zero. Thank you, colleagues. So that concludes our agenda for today, other than looking for a motion to adjourn. Councilor Ferreira got his hand up first, but Councilor Hopkins was close behind to second, and we can do this one by hand.

All those in favor. Motion carries. Thank you, everyone. We’re adjourned.