February 24, 2026, at 1:00 PM

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The meeting is called to order at 1:00 PM; it being noted that Councillors P. Van Meerbergen and E. Peloza (at 2:39 PM) were in remote attendance.

That it BE NOTED that no pecuniary interests were disclosed.

Moved by S. Stevenson

Seconded by S. Hillier

That, pursuant to section 27.6 of the Council Procedure By-law, a change in order of the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee Agenda BE APPROVED, to provide for Item 6.1 in Stage 6, Confidential, to be considered before Stage 2, Consent.

Motion Passed (12 to 0)

Moved by S. Hillier

Seconded by S. Franke

That Consent Items 2.1 to 2.2 BE APPROVED.

Motion Passed (14 to 0)

2.1   Corporate Asset Management Policy Review

2026-02-24 Staff Report - Corporate Asset Management Policy Review

Moved by S. Hillier

Seconded by S. Franke

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

a)    the proposed by-law, as appended to the staff report dated February 24, 2026 as Appendix “A”, BE INTRODUCED at the Municipal Council meeting to be held on March 3, 2026, to amend By-law No. CPOL.-389-123 being “A by-law to adopt a Council Policy entitled Corporate Asset Management Policy”, by deleting the current Schedule “A” and replacing it with a new Schedule “A”; and

b)    the Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to implement the updated Corporate Asset Management Policy to ensure alignment with Ontario Regulation 588/17 (O. Reg. 588/17), Asset Management Planning for Municipal Infrastructure, as amended.

Motion Passed

2.2   Amendment to Consolidated Fees and Charges By-law

2026-02-24 Staff Report - Amendment to Consolidated Fees and Charges By-law

Moved by S. Hillier

Seconded by S. Franke

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Neighbourhood and Community-Wide Services, the proposed amending by-law, as appended to the staff report dated February 24, 2026 as Appendix “A”, BE INTRODUCED at the Municipal Council meeting to be held on March 3, 2026 to amend By-law A-62, being “2026-2027 Consolidated Fees and Charges” to establish an increase to user fees as outlined in the “Business Case P-19 – Recreation & Sport Additional User Fee Revenue Generation” included in the Mayor’s 2026 Budget.

Motion Passed

2.3   2026 Assessment Growth Funding Allocation

2026-02-24 Staff Report - 2026 Assessment Growth Funding Allocation

Moved by H. McAlister

Seconded by S. Hillier

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Finance Supports, the 2026 Assessment Growth Funding Allocation Report BE RECEIVED for information;

it being noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee received communications dated February 20, 2026 from C. Butler and February 19, 2026 from J. Bates, General Manager, London Region Manufacturing Council with respect to this matter;

it being further noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee heard a verbal delegation from C. Butler with respect to this matter.

Motion Passed (14 to 0)

ADDITIONAL VOTES:

Moved by S. Stevenson

Seconded by S. Trosow

That the delegation request from C. Butler BE APPROVED to be heard at this time.

Motion Passed (14 to 0)

None.

4.1   London UNESCO City of Music Action Plan 2021-2025 Update

2026-02-24 Staff Report - London UNESCO City of Music Action Plan 2021- 2025

Moved by S. Trosow

Seconded by A. Hopkins

That the following actions be taken with respect to London UNESCO City of Music Action Plan 2021-2025 Update:

a)   the above noted report BE RECEIVED;

b)   the Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to align future planning and implementation efforts under the new Economic Development Strategy and the new Downtown Plan to identify and advance opportunities for better leveraging London’s UNESCO City of Music designation as a catalyst for downtown vibrancy, creative sector growth, cultural tourism, talent attraction and diversification of the regional economy through strengthened partnerships and coordinated investment; and

c) the Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to report back to a future meeting of the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee regarding the London UNESCO City of Music Action Plan and the preparation of the 2027 renewal submission, including the following questions and issues:

i) improving alignment between public perceptions and expectations and the purposes and objectives of the UNESCO City of Music program;

ii) developing a strategy to address the need for additional program space, particularly in light of high commercial vacancy rates in the downtown core;

iii) identifying potential sources of funding to support UNESCO City of Music program activities;

iv) providing further detail regarding the purpose, goals, structure, and implementation of Creative Sector Incubation Hubs;

v) strengthening strategies for public participation and engagement in the Action Plan and 2027 renewal process, including consideration of a dedicated “Get Involved” webpage, public participation meetings, community forums, and other outreach initiatives; and

vi) addressing ongoing governance and organizational matters related to the administration and leadership of the UNESCO City of Music program;

it being noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee received communications dated February 20, 2026 from B. Samuels, February 21, 2026 from W. Thomas and D. Brown, Coordinators, Midtown Community Organization and February 23, 2026 from Councillor S. Trosow  with respect to this matter;

it being further noted that the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee received the attached presentation from the Director, London Music Office with respect to this matter.

Motion Passed (14 to 0)

ADDITIONAL VOTES:

Moved by A. Hopkins

Seconded by S. Stevenson

That pursuant to section 31.6 of the Council Procedure By-law, Councillor Trosow BE PERMITTED to speak an additional 2 minutes with respect to this matter.

Motion Passed (12 to 2)

4.2   Special Meeting of the Shareholder of London & Middlesex Community Housing Inc. for Articles of Incorporation Update and CMHC Affordable Housing Fund Loan Agreement

2026-02-24 Staff Report - (4.2) Special Meeting of the Shareholder of LMCH

Moved by H. McAlister

Seconded by S. Hillier

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Finance Supports and the Deputy City Manager, Housing and Community Growth, the following actions be taken with respect to the Affordable Housing Fund Loan Agreement between London & Middlesex Community Housing Inc. (“LMCH”) and the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (“CMHC”):

a)    the communication from London & Middlesex Community Housing Inc., as appended to the staff report dated February 24, 2026 as Appendix “A”, BE RECEIVED for information;

b)    the proposed by-law, as appended to the staff report as Appendix “B”, BE INTRODUCED at the Municipal Council meeting to be held on March 3, 2026, to:

i)    ratify the special resolution of the sole shareholder of London & Middlesex Community Housing Inc. to authorize the amendment of the articles of incorporation;

ii)    authorize the Mayor and the City Clerk to execute the special resolution of the shareholder;

c)    the proposed by-law, as appended to the staff report as Appendix “C”, BE INTRODUCED at the Municipal Council meeting to be held on March 3, 2026, to:

i)    ratify the resolution of the sole shareholder of London & Middlesex Community Housing Inc. to approve LMCH taking on debt by entering into a loan agreement with the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation for $29,017,950;

ii)    authorize the Mayor and the City Clerk to execute the resolution of the shareholder;

d)    LMCH BE AUTHORIZED by the City, as Service Manager under the Housing Services Act, 2011, to mortgage its property at located 955 Southdale Road to secure the CMHC loan of $29,017,950;

e)    the previously approved and forecasted municipal funding for capital project PH2640 – Regenerating Public Housing Plan BE MAINTAINED, it being noted that the municipal funding freed up through the approval of funding from Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation will be utilized by London & Middlesex Community Housing to advance the next master regeneration plan project: and

f)    the Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to undertake all administrative acts, including but not limited to capital budget adjustments, required in connection with this approval,  it being noted that the City Treasurer has calculated an updated debt and financial obligation limit for The Corporation of the City of London in accordance with O. Reg 403/02, with respect to this loan agreement, and has determined that the estimated annual amount payable does not exceed the debt and financial obligation limit of the Corporation of the City of London.

Motion Passed (14 to 0)

None.

Moved by C. Rahman

Seconded by J. Morgan

The Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee convenes In Closed session to consider the following:

6.1    Information Supplied in Confidence to the Municipality by a Crown Agency of Canada / Solicitor-Client Privileged Advice

       

A matter pertaining to information explicitly supplied in confidence to the municipality by a Crown Agency of Canada; advice that is subject to solicitor-client privilege, including communications necessary for that purpose.

Motion Passed (13 to 0)

The Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee convenes In Closed Session from 1:04 PM to 1:06 PM.

6.1   Information Supplied in Confidence to the Municipality by a Crown Agency of Canada / Solicitor-Client Privileged Advice

Moved by C. Rahman

Seconded by A. Hopkins

That the meeting BE ADJOURNED.

Motion Passed

The meeting adjourned at 3:02 PM.

Votes

3 substantive votes at this meeting (1 contested, 2 unanimous). Procedural motions excluded.

1. Disclosures of Pecuniary Interest

That, pursuant to section 27.6 of the Council Procedure By-law, a change in order of the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee Agenda BE APPROVED, to provide for Item 6.1 in Stage 6, Confidential, to be considered before Stage 2, Consent.

✅ Motion Passed (12 to 0)

Unanimous (12-0)

2.3. 2026 Assessment Growth Funding Allocation

That the delegation request from C. Butler BE APPROVED to be heard at this time.

✅ Motion Passed (14 to 0)

Unanimous (14-0)

4.1. London UNESCO City of Music Action Plan 2021-2025 Update

That pursuant to section 31.6 of the Council Procedure By-law, Councillor Trosow BE PERMITTED to speak an additional 2 minutes with respect to this matter.

✅ Motion Passed (12 to 2)

View roll call

Yea (12): Josh Morgan, Hadleigh McAlister, Peter Cuddy, Susan Stevenson, Jerry Pribil, Sam Trosow, Corrine Rahman, Steve Lehman, Anna Hopkins, Paul Van Meerbergen, Skylar Franke, Steve Hillier

Nay (2): Shawn Lewis, Elizabeth Peloza

Absent (1): David Ferreira

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Full Transcript

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

View full transcript (2 hours, 14 minutes)

time y’all. All right colleagues it is 1 p.m. I’m going to call the fourth meeting of the strategic priorities and policy committee to order and I’m going to begin by acknowledging that the City of London is situated on the traditional lands of the Anishinaabek, the Haudenosaunee, Lene Peiwach and Adawanderin. 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 peoples 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. Colleagues I’m going to begin by looking for any disclosures of pecuniary interest. Seeing none.

At the request of our staff I’m going to seek a change of order. I’m going to look for a motion to deal with the confidential item in camera first. As it relates to an item later in our agenda we should receive the confidential report first. So I look for a mover in Councillor Stevenson and a seconder in Councillor Hillier and I will ask the clerk to open the vote on the change of order.

Councillor Palazzo votes yes. Councilor Hopkins votes yes. Councillor Hillier votes yes. Councillor Stevenson votes yes.

Closing the vote. Motion carries. 12 to 0. Thank you colleagues.

So that means we’re going to deal with item 6 on our agenda first. This is the information supplied in confidence with the municipality by a crown agency of Canada. It’s lists her client privilege advice. So we will ask our guests in the gallery to wait outside.

Those staff weren’t part of this to wait outside. Oh sorry. We do need a vote to move into closed session. So I’ll ask the clerk to open that.

Brandon Josh. Councillor Palazzo votes yes. Councillor Hopkins. I vote yes.

Closing the vote. Motion carries. 13 to 0. Thank you colleagues.

We’ll just get everything secured and then we’ll deal with the confidential item. All right colleagues we are going to resume now with our consent agenda. I will draw to colleagues attention. There was a request for delegation status from Mr.

Butler. So if we want to grant that we would need somebody to pull that item. Seeing Councillor Trussau and Stevenson asking for that item to be pulled. So we will pull that and deal with it under deferred matters.

So that leaves items 2.1 and 2.2 on the consent agenda. Do I have a mover and seconder for those? Councillor Hillier and Frank. So that’s moved and seconded.

Now we will open the floor to any questions or comments. Seeing none then I will ask the clerk to open the vote. Councillor Palazzo votes yes. Closing the vote.

Motion carries. 14 to 0. Thank you colleagues. Moving on that brings us to our two items for direction.

As we have no scheduled items the first item 4.1 the London UNESCO City of Music Action Plan 2021 to 2025 update. We also have two communications to receive and a added from Councillor Trussau. Before we do that I’m going to ask Mr. Crossman to provide us a brief presentation on his report.

If you want to come up to the podium Mr. Crossman will have IT adjust that height for you. Mayor on the on a point of order wanted to know if your UNESCO presentation will be a musical presentation. Did request a walk up song that didn’t come through so I’ll do my best.

Well when you’re ready if you can give us a brief presentation of five minutes or less go ahead. Thank you. Corey Crossman director of the London Music Office and focal point for Canada’s City of Music London UNESCO City of Music. The London Music Office is the Division of Tourism London and a board of the City of London reporting in through City Manager’s Office.

I’m here to update you on London’s UNESCO City of Music Action Plan covering the dates of November 8th 2021 when we’re first appointed UNESCO City of Music through to December 31st 2025. UNESCO Creative City Network UCCN members must submit a quadrilenial report in line with the action plan. UCCN is streamlining that process now to have an intake in 2027 date unknown. This is in line across all Creative City designations.

The action plan is closely linked to Council’s strategic plan so I’m reporting back as promised. Key achievements there have been many. Culture is certainly leading conversations and that is seen in the special events sound policy by-law where we have balanced modernized approach for our special events. London has been recognized for excellence in music city development and music city of the year in 2024 voted on by the Canadian live music industry itself.

Community input and community leaders are taking action and leading by example with this designation such as Paul C to fund via the London Community Foundation which funds live music providing fair compensation and access to events. London created the UNESCO City of Music Host City Award which you can see advertised on a billboard in Sandler Park Turkey which was first introduced in 2024 when London hosted the UNESCO cities of music meeting hosting 31 cities at the time. The metrics and dashboard is a key piece of this so the dashboard it lives at London.ca it’s now home to a live public facing dashboard thanks for friends and economic partnership for the assistance in creating this which is powered by Power BI. These metrics can be updated regularly and adjusted and the metrics are captured based on the established criteria which includes the City of London service area or service staff as led or contributed to the event or project that’s tracking.

The City of your project received City of London funding including municipal grants or municipal city supported funding. Looking at a big part of our exchange is how collaboration is highlighting centerpiece of this designation. Exchanges with fellow UNESCO creative cities are integral to both import and export opportunities. We’ve exported artists to 17 UNESCO creative cities across multiple projects while importing 11 artists from UNESCO creative cities oftentimes multiple returns for some of these artists.

Music is creating opportunities for the broader cultural community and contributors. The debut global forum in South Korea integrated artists media artists from London. The London City of Music conference worked with a graphic designer from Asahi Kawa Japan a city of design is paired up by the UNESCO creative city network. Virtually there’s opportunities existing as well a great example is how London is leading the UNESCO Jazz Day relay in 2025 21 cities participated across 18 countries and a big question is next steps.

So we’re going to continue to implement the existing plan that we have in place until 2027 but based on community fat feedback gathered during the City of Music conference summit in November of last year. There was a clear need for more music incubation spaces in the city. There’s more exchanges that are being requested a need for us to welcome more to London and us to export more to the world. There’s a lot of stories that are being shared but they’re not necessarily reaching everybody and that was something that we heard is that not everyone’s aware of the winds that are taking place even those that are following us on social media channels.

So more engagement is needed the need to break down silos and connect community and sector is going to be key. Connecting the broader arts community will help elevate this. Next there’s a new four-year plan will come with the 2027 to 2030 UNESCO City of Music Action Plan and that will take place upon our next report. So thank you for your time today and the support.

Thank you Mr. Crossman. So colleagues I’m going to we do have the recommendation in the staff report. Council trust how you wanted to make an amendment.

So I’m going to go to you and see if you want to just move the staff report with your clause C amendment at this time. Yes I would do that because I think clause C is consistent with A and B so I don’t think there’s a issue and I think it fits nicely with clause B and I’d like to move them together. I believe the clerk has a current copy of C which could be put on the screen and I’d be looking for a seconder. And we’ve got Councillor Hopkins seconding so we’ll put the whole thing as one motion on the screen.

Of course people can choose to ask for something to be called separately if they wish for voting purposes but that way we’ve got one single motion. We don’t have to go through the amendment process. So the entire thing is on the floor. We’ll just give and it’s now up on eScribe.

So colleagues can see Councillor Trust I did circulate his amendment in advance. So we will open the floor to questions comments debate. Councillor Hopkins go ahead. Thank you.

I’ve got it now. Happy to second this. I know the mayor put up his his hand. I would have been more than happy to to move over this seconder but I’d like to speak to why I am seconding this.

I really want to thank Councillor so he’s done a lot of work on this. Thank you Mr. Crossman too for your presentation and to staff. I know there’s a lot of work a lot of stuff going on in the community but what can we do better.

I think this is a great opportunity. We’ve got an advancement of two more years to work on it how we can align it with our economic development plan and the downtown plan. I think it’s really exciting stuff. I’m very supportive of the more spaces.

Mr. Crossman you did mention it in your presentation as well. We know we have it in our economic strategy plan as well but I think we need to look at the needs of the community and get some more information and an update to this council too. So very supportive of the amendment and the recommendation.

And I’ve got Mayor Morgan next. Sure I’ll say a couple of things. First to through the chair to Councillor Troso I just want to say thank you for a thoughtful amendment with a lot of detail. I always appreciate when something comes that I can read, look through.

I actually don’t have a lot of questions because you’re pretty thorough in your in your report and I’m happy to support the the motion that you put forward which includes of course the staff recommendation which is where I want to turn just to a few comments. I think the city of music has continues to have great potential and I think we can talk a little bit about how we can continue to magnify that and take advantage of that designation and I think some of the clauses here that work towards that. But I don’t I don’t want to shy away that although it’s not maybe something that every individual walking down the street knows that we have this designation. I don’t want to shy away from the fact that I think it has been very successful over the past number of years.

And maybe that’s because I’ve I am members of council have a bit of a window into the activities that are happening but you know from my previous terms on council this term when I show up to an event even at RBC place where it’s a conference. You know the way that music has been integrated into all of the things that we do whether it’s at the airport or whether it’s at a conference or whether it’s when we’re hosting people or whether it’s the way that we even approach having an O Canada singer here in council chambers. The way that you’ve thoughtfully tried to integrate music into as many things as we possibly can across the city I think is very thoughtful and actually breeds a bit of grassroots demonstration that local artists you know they don’t need to be you know superstars to have their creative work recognized celebrated and showcased in our city. Now can we do more for sure we can and I think we’re only at the edges of the potential that we have here but I think what’s been laid over the past couple of years is a nice really real grassroots foundation to say we’re going to actually actively try to incorporate this into as many things as we possibly can.

We’re going to try to think of a music in the activities we do. You know when the city’s celebrating events by centennial you know and even just regular celebrations we have an annual basis you know music has been integrated into a different way and I think that’s actually magnified kind of the creative sector generally in London you know we see the success of the film office and other creative sectors. Having that incubator is pretty impressive and then of course I’ve had the window into seeing some of the activities that we’ve hosted internationally here and the perception that the international participants have about what we’ve done so far you know is well regarded and an example for others. Again I always say Londoners are probably hardest on themselves so we’ll always say yes we can do better but I wanted to make a few comments today to say I actually think we’ve been quite successful in getting this off the ground quite successful in taking some steps in the right direction.

Obviously a lot more that we can do and a lot more that we can go with this but I want to commend all of those involved in the industry particularly the talented artists who you know have this opportunity to showcase you know what is in some cases their life’s passion for many others in our community to see. So thanks Mr. Chair. Thank you Mayor Morgan.

I’ve got Councillor Pribble and then Councillor Stevenson. Thank you. I will certainly support that amendment as well. I’m quite sure Council Trust already discussed it with our staff but I just would like to go through the chair to our staff if there were any points that are included in this amendment that you would like to comment on or potentially question anything.

Through the chair I believe it speaks to itself what’s listed. Nothing else to the amendment. Thank you Councillor Pribble. Councillor Stevenson.

Thank you and thanks for the presentation and thanks to the Councillor for all the work on this. I really appreciated getting this and having the opportunity to support it. I did have a couple of questions in the presentation it talks about the exchanges and the number of those and I just wondered if we could hear more about how the selection process goes for that how people can apply for that and in terms of the expenses how there can be transparency around that whether it’s staff that are traveling or whether it’s musicians that are potentially being paid. Mr.

Crossman. So through the chair and yes it’s an important question to ask. Oftentimes well how exchanges are taking place is that a city is coming forward with a recommendation or a city is coming forward with a project that they would like to work with us on. So heading to our sub cluster meetings in cities of music this is one of these exchanges sort of take place or to our full annual meeting where all UNESCO creative cities take place so cities will propose projects based on you know their assets in their community and they’ll put it out where feelers where to other cities how could you engage would you like to participate kind of thing and then at that point there there’s specific it can really vary but there are specific recommendations often that those cities are making we’re looking for an artist that’s touring we’re looking for an artist of the genre looking for an artist has x y and z we have a directory on our website London for artists on one music office.com that is something that we share often with people in this community and outside of it and people select artists to perform based on that oftentimes when we hosted in 2024 that was a great opportunity to showcase our artists community and we had a number of artists that actually received showcases from that.

I think it is also important to note that the caliber of artists that are being selected for these programs are creating opportunities for themselves once involved in this great example would be John Felner he participated in the Ford City Film Fest he won a category and it received an exchange with two German cities that then led to an exchange in Liverpool that then led to an exchange in Degu South Korea he’s been able to open doors for himself so we’re there to play that role and help facilitate depending on the exchange it can really differ in what is offered some cities offer full flights and accommodation sometimes we need to assist the one thing that we are consistent with is ensuring that we’re paying our artists compensating them for performances ensuring that they have food and they’re taking care of while they’re in the other city a lot of times though once an artist touches the ground that city then takes over so it is important for us to have relation for myself as the focal point to have relationships with these other focal points so I know that our artists are in good hands and hope that helps counselor Stevenson thank you it does and I mean it’s an exciting thing for our city just looking to support in terms of and as I usually do around accountability and transparency is there anything keeping us from sort of highlighting the musicians that we’re sending and the amounts that we’re contributing as taxpayers right for their travel and then even in terms of staff being really transparent about how much we’re spending in terms of taxpayer dollars for staff travel through the chair as I said a lot of times we’re highlighting these things through socials through our social media channels we’re telling the stories when and where we can in terms of compensation I think maybe that’s a piece where we could discuss and maybe set a rate for artists and guaranteed rate across the city that might be a strong actionable item is UNESCO City of Music and then it’s an equal comparison but generally we operate within 120 to 125 per member performance is sort of that figure recognizing an artist is traveling and there’s more work involved it depends on what that exchange includes sometimes these exchanges are just performances sometimes of showcase opportunities sometimes they’re writing sessions it can really change and evolve and it is really unique in the sense that it’s based on what the other city’s offering right we want to make sure that we can get the most from our partner and provide the most comfort to our musician so it’s it’s not like it’s not cut and dry but it would make sense to have sort of established fees so one way that we are using the designation to gather more content and do more storytelling is the artists are over there and we’ll give them a stipend to capture social media content which we’re then sharing on socials so we’re trying to take every opportunity to be Ken while being as fiscally responsible as possible counselor thank you yes you know really great and not not questioning how it’s done or that it’s not being fiscally responsible it’s the transparency piece I know there was some issues around the budget and you know whether that could be shared or not and that is a question I have to you to staff is is an addition to this amendment needed or an amendment needed to this motion to ask that the budget and actuals for 20 to 25 be put on the dashboard for public viewing misdators bear thank you through the chair so the music office budget is part of the tourism London budget which is part of our overall city budget so the information is there counselor through through the deputy mayor but if there’s more information that you’re looking for more specific information we’re happy to talk offline about what that is but but it is approved as part of the council the council’s multi-year budget process thank you I’m talking about the granularity of the London music office given that there’s a whole music industry in our city that’s interested in this program and wants to see you know we all supported or I think most of us supported this investment in this to just show where it’s going that this much is going to travel and this much is going to whatever else we’re doing salaries to just be really transparent about where the 350 thousand dollars a year is going as I said it’s been public information and just wondering if on your dashboard if you need a direction from council to just put that on the dashboard because otherwise I’ll just move the amendment misdators bear thank you yes I understand the question you’re asking for a level of granularity that would I suppose then apply to every one of our organizational units across the corporation which I’m not uncomfortable to suggest but the music office does exist inside of the city’s budget so if you let us think about this take this back have some discussion about kind of the information that you’d like to have shared we’re happy to do that okay thank you given that I’ll speak between now and council offline around that but I do that that’s great but I do have the budget and I’m looking at it and I have some questions about budget to actual is this an appropriate place or would you rather I do that offline as well this actually misdators bear I’m going to answer that as chair that would be more appropriate to follow up with detailed specifics offline it’s it’s really well I realize that you’re asking because this reports before us it’s not really part of the approval motion that we have right now so councilor I would really suggest that those should be listed and sent to staff to to answer offline okay thank you I’m going to do that but this is a point that I’ve been making every time this kind of thing comes forward when we have reports coming back to us saying hey this is what we did with the money I would like to see the budget to actual for the taxpayers to have a look at and for us to do our due diligence in terms of being able to ask some questions about how the dollars not from a sense of that anything is untoward just that transparency piece to say to landowners here’s what we did with your money and here’s why it’s a great thing so I’m happy to support this motion appreciate all the effort that went into it really looking forward to you know doing even better in this area and involving the public in that and I I will very likely have well I’m still very interested in being transparent on the budget and the expenses and having that on the public record and so hopefully between now and council I can come up with something that works for staff and for me councilor ramen thank you and through you and I’ll probably take this conversation in a different direction um right now just wanted to first say thank you to staff for the report that’s in front of us um I don’t know if we just all ate a happy meal because this is exciting stuff and we’re a little bit low energy on it today I think but it is very exciting to continue to work to build the music culture here in our community I think that there’s a good look back here on what’s been done where are the successes there’s a little bit more on you know what we can do moving forward I really appreciate the councilor’s additions because I think that makes us forward focused and and gets us potentially to where we need to go there’s some great communication that’s been shared with the I know with myself and other members of council uh from from individuals in the community who are really passionate about this topic who want to play a bigger role and you want to see it at the table and I guess my question would be um how do we envision um how do we envision our public engagement as we move forward as we continue to grow as we grow as a city and we want to see music in every ward how do we really envision that because you’re a small team and so putting a volunteer army behind you is probably one of the best things we can do to continue to uh expand and broaden our our approach so that’s something I’ve been thinking about a little as I’ve been hearing from the community on this and then um just on a similar vein um you know education and music education is really important uh to me and I think to this city and so looking at ways that we can expand and broaden uh our especially the secondary but also elementary level um education the challenge being I mean we don’t have any influence over education here at council but really working as a community to strengthen that and to highlight it and make sure that we have a lot more avenues for young people to uh to get involved in music here and in our city to stay and as you mentioned incubate uh that that talent here um and really note that they’re supported and I know that we’ve got great places like the digital creative center at the Boys and Girls Club who’s doing great work on this as well um but just wanted to see if you wanted to add anything on those two topics uh through the chair and through you um I appreciate the uh recognition that uh things are happening and I think it really does speak to the level of work that’s being done coordinated effort that’s being done across the city when the Canadian music industry is recognized London uh as a leading city of music um that’s an industry noticing that’s nationally that that is a big statement um and I think on volunteerism it is a key piece right and we see that great success uh in community when community is involved I really do think that understanding the designation is going to have to start internally with the city and I think we saw a lot of really great work done um around the green vin program we integrated artists into what we do when we put artists centric and artists first and integrate them into things and inform the workforce that here is here at the city of London to be champions I think that’s a really strong starting point um similar in tourism we arm our front desk staff at hotels with knowledge about the city I feel the same way about this UNESCO designation and I think there’s ways that we can be doing a better job of that uh to start uh and then I think you know to the point that you’d mentioned about uh education that is challenging you know in this fact that we don’t have influence over public school education but I think there are things that we can do uh we did see great success with a music career day teaching people about the opportunities that exist within music and we say that for every musician on stage there’s 10 people that are behind the scenes uh working in music making things happen and we have a lot of really great people in this community um doing fantastic work so my here we’re saying I think there’s more that we can be doing in that area counselor thank you and my last point will just be around diversity and inclusion as we continue to grow as a diverse and welcoming community we’re seeing artists from everywhere here in our community um yet some artists that are from uh different parts of the world that live here in London maybe that are grown have grown up here in London but are you know performing in different cultures and languages and whatnot aren’t feeling maybe as supported and so I’m wondering how do we help to address that in our strategy a little bit more to allow for those artists uh to feel more connected to feel that they have a place with the music office and uh I know that there’s a lot of work being done um but as you mentioned we’re we’re still working to develop and that brand and to share that information so um again making that part of I think our our outreach strategy a little bit more stronger but I’m just hoping you can comment on that a little bit more. So just before you do Mr. Crossman I do uh want to draw to colleagues attention though that’s part of what’s in Councillor Trussow’s motion I think we’re asking Mr. Crossman to be a little bit speculative about the future before the report back comes so I’m just going to ask you to keep your response brief Mr.

Crossman um you’ve got a whole report to come back to us now uh with Clause C so I I’d really if we can keep it brief today because I know that there’ll be more that you bring back in the report. Through the chair and through you um I think that is very important and it’s a principle in which uh the designation takes place in the UNESCO Sustainable Development Goals um are key to that as you’ll see a council we ensure that we bring a diversity of of cultures of uh genres of music uh we make sure we have gender balance and all programming that we do um and it can be challenging at times um when we have a lot of duplication of events that take place and the genres of music uh so it is important to have a good cross-section so thank you for the recommendation. Councillor Palose I have you next. Thank you Mr.

Chair I do have a series of questions um when does Mr. Crossman see this report coming back like I wouldn’t be expecting it. Mr. Crossman yes so through the chair through you um this is our first time in this uh you know is a UNESCO City of Music.

I can’t speak exactly the timelines have shifted in the past it has been Q3, Q4 of that year that we typically see um a report to UNESCO um I can see clarification with the Canadian Commission but oftentimes they aren’t in uh you know they’re surprised sometimes by sometimes the timelines from UNESCO 27 at some point towards the end of that year. That’s what I expect. Councillor. Thank you um mindful of um the timing the report back uh and hey Corey good to see you um I think this is one of the interesting ones that the music offices and our tours in London which is arms length kind of council so you have a couple of Councillors who serve on it we have different information and different sessions um I would also note that we had Miss Finn and her team um the big tours and London updates um maybe going forward be nice if Corey highlighted Mr.

Crossman could highlight some things there um I know beyond that board we see great things like the trombone festival coming through town and great things they brought in um it’s not contained within this report but it’s music and it’s related um and and like there’s good things happening and and we seated the board and we great to see some more that highlighted here um wearing multiple hats and appreciative of Councillor Trousa’s uh motion as a starting point for this discussion certainly have had different discussions and different different aspects um you hear from residents that we’d love to have more music on our local streets community activations we hear from musicians of some are big and might get the opportunity to travel other ones are like I just want more gigs here in town to showcase more music and local talent so it’s really is different people having very different draws and needs based on the music office and being fairly new as well of what council would like in that music office of where we want to put our priorities and what we’d want to see um laid out within Councillor Trousa’s um motion looking at number three identified sources of funding when this report comes back I’m not sure procedurally if it’s going to have to go through the tourism board and then to us because if we’re looking for sources of funding it’s going to be how much wire and if we’re going into the annual budget update next year versus the multi-year budget so just to staff of how that’s going to come as it might not just be mr. Crossman’s music office it might involve a whole lot more from the status bear thank you through chair I think um those options both exist both through annual update and also more broadly through the multi-year budget we’ve been having discussions a little bit about that in terms of how we’ll move this forward but yes to your point both also thank you uh it was just highlighting that too as we ask for a report we want to see more things that that might be a council conversation of how much money are we willing to put into it or direction that we’re willing to give as we ask for things coming back um in number five uh it mentions public participation meetings um and community forums part of the focus I’m hearing us from the music community that they would like to be engaged specifically as a stakeholder so making sure that’s on the dock and then we’d be done mr. Deuter’s bear thank you through you and we have had many discussions over the last short period of time I myself as city manager have been involved in those discussions with with musicians and others as well um and have gotten some great feedback from the community about what they’re hoping for and I think you can be sure that that will be part of our our activities moving forward don’t start thank you uh and I assume that would be the same intent with the six item on the councilor’s list of addressing ongoing governance and organizational matters related uh to the nascos city and music program also noting that certainly speaking mr. Crossman’s team is ender tourism london which has its own board and members of council that making sure that processes aren’t circumvented as we have these conversations and the silos don’t happen and I see her nodding but I’ll just ask mr.

Deuter’s bear to confirm through you chair yes that’s correct don’t sir thank you those were I would say my procedurally crispy kind questions um just thank you for that and for coming before us always excited for the the city music designation and absolutely keeping it upholding it making it stronger and better and bringing many people along from different sectors on this journey um happy to be a small part of it uh as we serve on the tourism london board uh with the deputy mayor um and just excitement I’m seeing from members in the community looking at bringing different festivals and partnering I’ve certainly sent them your way but just really looking at the grassroots movement of musicians looking at what they can do or how to do collaborations across the pond and bring people over so thank you for that and some exciting things to come thank you councilor palosa looking for anyone first time speakers before I do have councilor preble on a second list but looking for first time speakers councilor trassel thank you very much thank you to staff for the report and thank you for the kind words that my colleagues have been saying today I really appreciate that um I’ve done a lot of research on this and I’ve spent a lot of time going through the available public documents and um I want to say and I want to say this with due respect there are there there seem to be some serious gaps in the kind of information that I’m looking for and what I may what I’m able to find on the public record and I I think what we were told before about how for example the budget it’s there it’s it’s not it’s not necessarily easy to find but it’s there so I’m not saying there’s things are not being shared but I think a lot of the um points that are underneath my my six recommendations many of them go back to the need for more transparency and the need for um the the the first the first point about improving alignment between public perceptions I agree that there is a huge gap in the public perceptions and I agree that there is a huge gap in terms of people’s understanding of what the purpose of this program is and how they fit into it and I think that’s something that needs to be addressed throughout all of the other considerations I would like to see a get involved page and I hate to pick on the get involved staff but it just seems if we want people to get involved why not use a get involved page I’m wondering if we could think about putting up a get involved page early on just to let people know that we are in an ongoing and out of our way um getting information from people I I don’t think that would be a burden on on on on city on city design staff and I think we’d be sending a signal to the community that we were very serious about getting feedback can I can I ask civic administration whether that is something that could be done really soon without waiting for a report back in late 26 or early 27 mr. status bear thank you through you chair and so the intention of the get involved pages for individuals or community members to be able to provide um consultative information to this process if that’s what you’re asking for we can certainly explore it I just want to be clear that there is a full London music office page within the tourism office page as well so I think it’s important for us to look at that as well as as the get involved page and I’m happy to look at both and city of music page as well two websites right the reason the reason I’m looking for something beyond the tourism London pages is part part of what I’m hearing in large part from the community is that this is a tourism question but it’s not just a tourism question yes putting heads and beds and bums and seats and revenue and restaurateurs and merchants is very important but there’s something that goes to the civic identity of the community that music is a public good music music music is something that touches the soul of every individual in this city whether or not they’re professional musicians or not that’s why I think the music education is very important you don’t have to be a talented musician to be interested in building up your music music skills it can come in a lot of different ways and I think that that gap in the perception in the first item is very important it’s very important and I think I want the community to be really excited and charged up about this program we’ve gone through a growing period we were successful in our initial application we’re not going to be applying for a second term as I understand is what this is what this is about I want the public to feel more engaged I sense I sense that there’s a feeling of this connection even alienation between some of the important stakeholders on the ground and the administration of this program and again this is not to take away from from from from the achievements of this program in in in the first term it really goes to why I want to see that public participation page set up now I do have a particular question about the source of funding I understand it will be hearing more about that I have questions about the budget I’m going to be consulting with Councillor Stevenson about some of her questions the sources of funding is so important because some of the things that we want to do including the incubation strategy which by the way you you go through in some great detail in your report which I think is very good but what I just want to flag you’ve got 30 seconds okay could I ask for another two minutes please we can see if there’s a mover and seconder for that Councillor Hopkins is willing to move Councillor Stevenson is willing to second we will have to put that to a vote vote yes Councillor Van Mereberg and oh yes losing the vote motion carries 12 to 2 okay continue counting on on the incubation program which I think is brilliant and I and I think doesn’t have to be one center it may be it may be dispersed between a lot of different different places you very few people know that you can go into the public library and there’s a there’s a music studio there not a not a not a professional one but they have some really good equipment that people can use where are these going to go and that one of my questions is looking at the disparity between the need for space which everyone agrees this is going to need space and the the high vacancy rate what are some and this this fits in this is not the first time this is being raised it fits in with the downtown planet fits in with the economic development plan these things really need to be addressed and I also I also want to highlight the the I want to highlight the question about purpose structure and goals one of the things that I think is missing and I’m sure it’s there but it needs to be more explicit is what is the high level vision what’s the purpose of this and I think I think by by having this in tourism London it’s used the purpose a little bit and I really want to I really want to see much more emphasis on this whole notion of music as a community public public good that that touches the lives of everyone in the community not just not just not just the tourism industry so I think I think with that I’m going to close I’ll certainly have more to say at council perhaps and I’m running out of time so thank you for the extra time but I really think that we have a community here as evidenced by the submission that we received just last night from mr brian which which sets forth a pretty fulsome strategic plan I would think that people might want to make comments on on on that too and uh that is available on on his on his website but I think that we have the opportunity here to really engage the community in a very positive way which is going to help the music office it’s going to help tourism London but it’s also going to help rank and file musicians counselors counselor you are at seven minutes now and small venue holders thank you any other first time comments seeing none I’ll just ask counselor roman to take the chair let me get my timer ready thank you go ahead thank you madam presiding officer so I’m I’m supportive of what we have before us and I’m supportive of the amendment because it speaks to things like consider consideration of get involved public participation in community forums it doesn’t say do it it says consider these bring them back in the report to us let us see what the options are um I think counselor plows a hit on a very very important point I’m not so much interested in a public participation meeting where people stand in the gallery and talk at us for five minutes I think a stakeholder community forum and community forums are mentioned in here which is one of the things I support and stakeholders people from the music industry can sit down not in a forum like this where we have time limits and back and forths that are points of order and those sorts of things a formal process but where we can have a more informal engagement with each other in a conversation about how people can be better involved how we can own this identity for our city in a stronger way I think that’s much more productive than a public participation meeting I do think that a get involved page where the public can provide some input is valuable to but I think there’s more work to be done around stakeholders in the industry stakeholders in the tourism sector who can be better involved in the process moving forward I think we’ve had a good start but I think it’s a start and where we go from here is really at the heart of why we’re having this discussion today I really like that I will say for me again it’s identify potential sources of funding I you know I’m gonna be blunt right now the city doesn’t have millions of dollars to buy vacant buildings to create incubator hubs and performance spaces we don’t so when we say identify potential sources of funding I think that’s going to have to include private sector partners too just as we have in terms of how Canada Life Place operates how we have partnerships with organizations not for profit but nonetheless organizations like the Grand Theatre in terms of how we work with them promote the theatre in the city in terms of how the private sector invests in film London it’s not all going to be public dollars so I want to be really upfront on and on the record about this right now if if the intent is to come and ask the city for 20 million dollars to buy a building I will tell you as a city counselor my answer to that will absolutely be no but I do think that there are opportunities that need to be investigated and leveraged you know the one of the more famous performing venues in the world is Carnegie Hall well private dollars put that name on that building it wasn’t public dollars that put that name on the building and so I think we have to look for partnerships just as tourism London already partners with private business owners across the city to develop attractions that bring people to our city whether that be having fun at the water slides at East Park going to 100 Kellogg or the Hard Rock Cafe or those places those are partnerships we don’t fund them all at City Hall there might be some mad asks that get some heads and beds from our hotels hoteliers bringing people to town to visit these places but that is not direct public funding that’s a levy on a hotel visit and so I think that there are opportunities when we look at our matte infrastructure side on on the city hall side of things how that might be used to leverage some venue spaces that attract people to our city because we have them but I want to be very cautious about creating a perception that we’re going to identify all kinds of sources of funding publicly or buildings and spaces so that’s but Council Trust House motion doesn’t say go find public dollars for this it says identify potential sources of funding so again I’m supportive of that because I think it opens the door to some diverse conversations I know I’m down to about 30 seconds because I’ve got my own timer going so I’m just going to say I do appreciate the monthly updates we get from Mr. Crossman at Tourism London about the smaller events that are happening throughout the city about some of the attractions or conferences that we get some of the opportunities to network with our other cities I know I just forwarded one that Councillor Frank and Councillor blows and I got about the Irish Festival that’s coming and a potential partnership with the Creative Cities partner in Ireland very excited for those sorts of things we’ve got a good start let’s grow it from here thank you returning the chair to you with no one on the speakers left okay and I do have Councillor Pribble for a second time around so no one else on the first time list I’m going to go to Councillor Pribble thank you and I was just talking to you about the amendment I would like to talk about the report thank you for the report and some of the initiatives that are included are really tremendous I’m very much proud of this designation I really do believe it puts our city on the world map and I do think that we need to maximize the opportunities arising from this and not just a kind of do the less or minimum to keep the designation the venues that we have here and if you look at the large events or the small events they were all great doesn’t matter if there were 50 people or 10,000 people and they were really tremendous in the last implementation plan that we received there was mentioned about the 21-25 action plan then it was mentioned about coordination with the UNESCO designation extending by two years which is still 2027 my question is now we are in 2026 what action plan are we kind of working on right right now what’s in place to maximize the opportunities I know in the implementation plan it’s stated that it’s going to come back quarter for 27 to meet the UNESCO deadline but I’m more interested in actually some of the things that we heard around this horseshoe our perfect example that should be included in the action plan can you please tell me what is the plan now apparently until the 27 end of 27 mr. Crossman through the chair and through you a great question and the intent in plan is to continue with our goals and our focus areas that we have in place now due to the timeline going back redrawing and retooling really doesn’t make sense you know we’re seeing what we wanted to accomplish the high-level goal with this and if you’re on the city music website you can see the work in the designation plan there and the vision is to make a robust city of music and I think that starts with integration and discussion and music is now leading discussions where we’re having music built into and integrate into a downtown plan or economic development plan that’s exactly what this designation is supposed to be doing and so I think that that is a huge step forward for this community is that music is part of the conversation and it is part of the solution so we’re going to continue over the next year and a half and work towards a new plan for 2027 which we’re getting community feedback from we had a community session in December of 2025 where we saw a lot of this and a lot of that information that’s in this report comes from that meeting as well that we do need to continue to drive forward and as we said all the things about this designation that the doors that it’s opening and it’s about the broader arts community is music’s that tool that kicks the door down so to speak so I think I’ll leave it at that but the plan is to continue with what we have in place already for the next bit.

Councilor Pribble okay thank you I do have a follow-up and great interest of strategy division but I do believe that if we need action plan and we need it kind of please consider to do one as soon as possible and consider the things you heard because everything that I heard around the horseshoe are very very valid points and as I said I’m tremendously proud of it have it even in the logo and city of music London in my signature on my email but we really need to spread this positive word among our city and as we are the only one actually in Canada was this designation going back to what the Peter Mary said private funding and finding the money totally agree but not just local I really think that there is opportunity as we are the only ones in Canada to go out there looking at the provincial and national organizations private funding to find not just the city or municipal funding but private as well so please consider that as well I do have one follow-up as well in the direction from to the civic administration it states their alignment with the two both downtown and the economic strategy when we took when we sorry when we talk about it when we talk about the alignment is it the alignment after the two plans come back to us or is it the alignment currently happening with those two plans thank you mr crossman i’ll defer to mr bares through you um definitely throughout the development of both the economic development strategy and also the downtown master plan the concept of the work being done by the music office and other organizations in in our area has been considered as part of both of the development of the strategies and so I think to your question you will see it both during the development of the strategies but also you will see it when the strategies come back to to council later this year I think it’s probably fair to say that it that the work that is done by the music office in support of supported by tourism london is part of our economic development strategy and obviously there is a connection to the downtown piece as well so you see it there both as part of a consideration currently and in the future council purple thank you for that so I will just sign all I said it twice but I’ll leave it with a comment and again thank you for all the initiatives very positive let’s pray the good word throughout the city throughout the province throughout the world but please do consider the action plans so we have something solid for next two years so we know what’s happening next month the month after the month after and how we how we are getting everyone involved and please consider the comments you heard around the horseshoe thank you very much Councillor Stevenson thank you just a follow up to Councillor Pribbles there when we talk about the meeting that took place around getting those that feedback who who’s invited to that meeting mr. Crossman so through the chair this is the meeting december you’re referring to so these are a cross-section of industry individuals are invited that are doing great work and are representing our sector it’s kind of noted I’m not speaking to individuals but it’s noted across the sector music is more than just live so there’s a lot of a good variety of people that were included in that good cross-section Councillor thank you and just a follow up so it’s by invitation only kind of thing rather than an open public meeting through the chair yes it’s by it’s by invitation to ensure that we have a good cross-section I didn’t want to have too many in one area want to make sure that we have appropriate representation across the sector also looking at diversity and inclusion as best we can and the gender balance okay thanks that there’ll be things for me to look into offline in this in regards to and I’ve said this before in terms of the whole of community we don’t know who’s on it there’s no minutes versus advisory committees which is something that we do appointments and we get information on I wondered too if it’s okay this was the 21 to 25 action plan but I just wondered for me and maybe for the public who’s listening what was the role of the music office in 2016 and then how did it change as we got the UNESCO city of music in 2021 mr. Crossman to the chair so first question is related to a public document yes we have worked on reports so we could share that to give you more insight I can make that available I think that’s a separate follow-up sharing that yeah is there I’m just not sure if there’s a procedure for that or and then the evolution response evolution of the music office so music office in November of 2024 as the start of the music office and the intent of that time you know was initially a two-year contract to make this job permanent which we did was in office of one after some moving around throughout the city moving over to tourism London in I guess would be 2028 2018 sorry so the role has changed putting forward this proposal as in line with many cities around the world and I don’t want to say the global standard but you’ve seen that best practice in many cities that it it is a city designation and is often led by a city individual music office working with a culture office putting forward that I’ve served as the focal point and a cultural manager of cultural services is is the co focal point so the role has certainly evolved and we’ve seen that in the growth of the music office and the in the work that we’re doing and I would note that last year was an absolute benchmark year for services delivered and that is a direct result of investment into music office council okay thanks that’s great and if I can get that that’d be great but I wondered if just now can you just quickly tell me what the role was of the music office before and if it changed when we got the UNESCO so through the chair the role of the music office is create conditions for the music industry to thrive and grow in London joining international network music office now serves as an international representative and ambassador and I think that if you step back and look at how music represents or the music office represents music we have the same idea across tourism London we have a sports division who looks after that we have convention planning you know there’s different roles our job at the music office is to speak and be that ambassador be that beacon to bring opportunity to London and to help elevate us and I think we’ve done a great job doing that and have been recognized on an international level recognizes Global City of the Year last year in the nomination and in 2024 recognizes Music City of the Year in Canada Councilor thank you yeah so probably just one last question anyway so it’s less of a local initiative like it’s shifted is that what I’m understanding like shifted from a local initiative to a more international focus through the chair through the chair no it is both we’re still serving both it has always been there has been work done internationally prior to this designation there’s just more of a focus as we now have a commitment to work internationally thank you Councillor Stevenson anyone else before we call the question everyone’s okay with us voting in on everything together I haven’t had any requests to pull anything separate so I’m going to ask the clerk to open the vote closing the vote motion carries 14 to 0 thank you colleagues we do have another item for direction before we do that though I will ask vice chair ramen if you can just report out on the closed session thank you I’m happy to report out that progress is made for the items of which we end camera thank you and that brings us to item 4.2 which is with respect to the special meeting of the shareholder of London and Middlesex community housing for articles of incorporation update and the CMHC affordable housing loan housing fund loan agreement so that is now the item that we’ll be dealing with and I’m going to look to see if we go to move we’re in a second or put the staff recommendation on the floor and then we can go into discussion Councillor McAllister Councillor Hill here thank you so that’s on the floor we do have Mr. Chisholm and Mr.

Crill and Mr. Candia here from LMCH and we can also go to Mr. Murray or Ms. Barbone for questions on this if needed so looking to see if there’s any questions or comments on the special shareholder articles of incorporation update and the CMHC affordable housing fund loan agreement Council trust out yes through the chair let me start by saying I have no objection to this I’ll be I’ll be voting for the measure I’m not going to be offering any amendments I do want to express a concern and that is I’m in full support of the efforts that are being made in the Southdale project I remain concerned though about the has demonstrated in our last asset management plan I remain concerned about the conditions in the rest of the building and when I when I see that we’re going out and getting this type of funding that really makes me feel good because one of the things I tried talking about at the at the last shareholders meeting was the need to maybe finance refinance some of our buildings my my specific question is to what degree are any of these funds going to be available to assist with the regeneration of the other buildings particularly those that are in very poor and poor condition you’re gonna have to give me a moment here council trust out trust out I’m going to have to see if you can narrow the scope of the question I want to re reinforce for everyone actually this is a special meeting of the shareholder we’re only dealing with the item that’s specifically on the agenda which is the CMHC loan agreement and the minor change in language that are really it’s really a housekeeping change in language to comply with the new CMHC language that’s being used by the federal government I’m interpreting your question as being asked about how LMCH will be allocating other funds which is not related to the CMHC loan which is very specific in terms of how it can be spent so I’m going to ask if you can reframe your question in a way that meets the purpose of the special meeting which is the approval of the CMHC dollars.

I appreciate that opportunity however I’m going to stand on my question and if it’s out of order you may rule it’s out of order I’ll be very disappointed I think that members of the public want to understand especially when we’re going out and getting this additional funding how it’s going to affect the very bad conditions in the other properties and I think it’s a legitimate question to ask whenever they’re before us. I’m going to suggest perhaps a framing that might help you here I think what would be in order to ask rather than blanket ruling this out of order would be to ask if this if the approval of this loan frees up municipal funds that have been allocated to CM LMCH to address other concerns within the portfolio if it’s specific to this loan freeing up municipal funds for other purposes and we can’t get into the specifics of the other purposes but you could ask if it was freeing up municipal dollars to address if this loan frees up municipal dollars for other purposes. Yes that’s a good way of framing the question it was my intention to frame it pretty much that way in terms of this infusion of new money coming into the system but I won’t repeat what you just said I’ll just say yes I’ll ask that. Okay let’s see if Mr.

Chisholm or a member of his team might be able to address how this loan impacts municipal dollars. Thank you and through the Chair there is I guess the short answer to this is the receipt of the funding from Cannon Morridge and Housing Corporation frees up previously allocated city funds to do more regeneration community regeneration work across LMCH and that is the the request contained in the report so that is the intent is that we make the funding that’s already provided go further and improve and increase our housing across the city. Council trust out. Yes that’s fine because I think some sort of reallocation of existing funds is very badly needed.

I don’t see the conditions improving to the point where we’re up to fair much less good in terms of our next report so I want to encourage you to do as much as you can to in consultation with the tenants do what needs to be done to improve their living conditions. Thank you. Any other speakers? Seeing none I will ask oh Councillor McAllister.

Thank you through the Chair I just want to make a quick comment on this as we said these funds are integral in terms of continuing the regeneration of LMCH. Yes there are some older buildings but as we have previously identified these are all buildings to begin with many of them rather than their life. I don’t want to speak to that because that’s not why we’re here but this money will continue the good work we’ve seen. We’ve got the first housing built in 50 years that’s a huge monumental thing that I think we should all take pride in that we are seeing that investment and you can see the dollars here that we’re reinvesting and getting more housing built.

So I encourage my colleagues to support this and this will continue the good work that we’ve already seen. Thank you. Thank you Councillor McAllister. I have no one else on the speakers list so I’m going to ask the clerk to open the vote.

Closing the vote motion carries 14 to 0. Thank you colleagues and thank you to our guests from LMCH. We do have another item to dispense with but if you need to take your leave of us feel free to go ahead and do that. Of course if you want to attend the rest of our meeting and hear the other scintillating items on the agenda you’re welcome to stay.

And colleagues that does bring us two deferred matters and additional business. We have one item that is the assessment growth funding allocation from the consent agenda. There was a request for delegation status from Mr. Butler.

So I’m going to look to see if there’s a mover there is from Councillor Stevenson and I believe Councillor Trostall was also willing to move. So move and second the delegation request so we will ask the clerk to open the vote to approve the delegation. Closing the vote motion carries 14 to 0. Thank you colleagues.

Mr. Butler if you would like to approach one of the microphones now that we’ve got your delegation status approved I know you have spoken to us in the past on other items so I know you’re familiar with this but when you’re ready if you can just give us your name and you have five minutes and I’ll give you a wave with about 30 seconds to go. That’s awesome. I just want to thank Councillor Lewis for the welcome mat and the two Councillors that approved me speaking.

I guess the word is for opening the door. In that sense there’s a bit of a sense of urgency. I wanted to pay my respects to with the approval of the last budget which was our 226 budget in January sometime. The sense of urgency from council and I think city staff to move that forward with moving it down to closer to something that is within the Bank of Canada inflation range has been awesome and from talking to friends this week we’re seeing how urgent it is to move that forward.

That sense of urgency to two thousand and twenty seven. I mean a couple of comments came back to me from friends that our assessment our assessment rate on our taxes is now over 1.6 percent and it kind of surprised me and I paid my interim yesterday so we’re now top five in Ontario and I know that’s balanced with housing prices everything else but to address that sense of urgency I wanted to talk about a few things and then that move move that into assessment value growth a little bit. I see things a little different. I see some tremendous opportunities for this council for people from the public and for city staff.

I look at things as a three-legged stool. I see a great deal of healthy cash flow in the city. The unfortunate part is that most of that cash flow is outside of the budget process it’s outside of the consent process and it’s outside of council’s housing. Now one of the one of the legs of the stool I guess that’s the way I want to put it is the ass growth piece and it’ll come to that in a second.

The second leg is the budget surplus which is about four percent pretty regularly every year and it should be on over a billion dollar budget and then the third item is really the interest on investments earned for our reserve funds which are sitting about four hundred million dollars. Those three legs of the stool add up to about sixty million dollars a year. That’s a very positive thing when you think that our our city staff or our taxpayer based budget is what nine hundred and ten million. So with that I want to start with the ass growth piece.

Right now we have a very unique situation at London. London is the only city of Ontario that I can identify that has a policy and has the way that we do things. Every other city takes their assessment value growth, reduces their operating budget by that, works through their own little process with respect to the things that they want to address the growth and go from there. In London we all know what we do here.

We basically we the other cities also make that part of the public budget process right up front in terms of things going on so the council and the budget can look at things and say are these growth things that we want to support and go from there. So the second part of that is really that we have another piece here that that is very unique to London as well. With the exception of Brownfield special DC charges none of the other cities at this moment really support anything that we’re doing with paying developers in terms of the grants that are associated with that. So there’s a I think assembly to look at there is I’m going to high school and you’re taking my lunch money with the ass growth piece.

I get something that no other taxpayer gets. In Ontario everybody else gets that piece so my lunch money is gone there and you’re asking me to pay supper for the developers here in all these special areas to go there. And when you look at that that’s a real conflict. I can’t support it’s very hard to support the 4,000 homes that we want to do because I have to pay for supper too.

Those two pieces together are about 4%. So okay we’ll go from there. I guess what I’m asking for is that toxic combination in the ass growth piece. I’d like to get this all aligned with the city budget and make it part of the public process so that you folks and I can have some say and where that money gets spent because it’s about 60 million dollars.

And the second piece I’d like to ask today or I know that we have a priority to pay off debt. I don’t see any reason that we can’t use the interest earns on our reserve funds to do that as opposed to the ass growth of the other piece. I don’t see any reason at all that’s what I would do in my family budget. So today I can’t see any reason at all.

I shouldn’t be asking you for 2.9 million dollars reflected back to taxpayers so that it carries over into next year. So I’d just like to leave it at that that’s where we’re at right now. And that’s that’s out of five minutes. So I’m going to ask you to stop there but thank you for your presentation today.

Do we receive the delegation? We also have a piece of correspondence to receive as well. Do we have a mover and a seconder for the staff report the recommendation? Councillor McAllister and Councillor Hillier.

Okay so that’s on the floor. So now we can start a speaker’s list on that. Councillors. Thank you through you.

I just wondered if staff does have an answer in terms of the question that Mr. Butler posed around London being an outlier in terms of how this assessment growth revenue is handled. Mr. Murray or Ms.

Burbone? Mr. Murray. Thank you through you Mr.

Chair. So I would say that yes in fact what London does in terms of our assessment growth growth policy is quite unique amongst municipalities for sure. I think that is done that way though intentionally. It is intentionally being carved out as a separate policy and a separate process in order to ensure that we are continuing to fulfill the growth pays for growth concept and principle behind this.

So you know the the thought that assessment growth revenues could simply be taken into the budget without the corresponding growth costs that go along with them. I think is is a faulty argument. Unfortunately I think you know at the end of the day there is costs associated with a growing and expanding city and whether those costs are dealt with through the budget process or through the assessment growth process as we do at the end of the day all Ontario municipalities are going to be faced with those costs of a growing city. We just deal with that through a separate process that specifically aligns the assessment growth funding the cost or sort of the revenue that comes from the growth to fund those costs of growth.

Okay thank you. Yeah find it interesting because in the policy the way that we do it it’s it’s all delegated to staff versus council looking at it I guess. So my question my follow-up question be when did we change to this this method of doing things? Mr.

Murray or Ms. Barbong. Thank you through you Mr. Chair.

I don’t have that specific date. It’s been a number of years though I believe it probably corresponds to right around the time we shifted to a multi-year budgeting cycle roughly and that was 2016 so we’ve been at least a decade at this point I think of doing it this way. Councilor. Thanks I’m going to leave it there for now.

Okay looking for other speakers Mayor Morgan. Yes I’ll say a few words. So first off I want to thank staff for the report. I also want to say I agree with your assessment of the business cases.

I think you are properly allocating the cost of growth with the proceeds of the new taxes that come from growth. The delegate said are these growth you know that we could put this in a bunch of processes and decide whether these are the growth that we want to support. Well I don’t see how we have a choice but to support these things. You build a new subdivision you’ve got to provide garbage collection you build a new subdivision you need traffic signalization you need snow plowing you need all of the things that we start to allocate the cost of growth towards and so you know we could put that in the budget process and we could decide not to do those things and we’ve seen other municipalities decide not to pay for the types of things that they should be paying for associated with the growth because there’s always a temptation to say hey well we’ve got this cash let’s use it for some other priority that we have at that time but you got to actually have to pay those bills right the cost of growth are actually there.

I think we’ve actually done some really smart things with assessment growth over the time we’ve been doing this. I’ll say a number of years ago when we built a new community facility we took care of the life cycle maintenance costs right at the time of assessment growth. You build a new community center you know you’re going to have to maintain it over the lifetime. You set aside some permanent tax dollars at the start you’re not going to have that infrastructure gap growing because you didn’t do it.

We’ve done things like that with the assessment growth policy in the past. Have other municipalities done that? No probably not. Is it a really smart financial thing to do?

100 percent. So I think what we want to do whether it’s delegated whether it’s assessment growth policy however you want to do it I think we need to continue to make really smart financial decisions with the actual costs of growth and the assessment growth policy is one of the ways to do that. Now the other thing I like about the policy is we use it to make sure that some years we expect we might have a surplus some years we expect we might have a deficit because growth isn’t always a linear thing. So what do we do?

We carry some of that forward each and every year if we need to or we draw from the carry forward if we have if we’re short and what we do on a one-time basis with that money is take care of a couple of things we know we have needs on paying down some debt putting some money towards the Infrastructure Gap Preserve Fund. Again two really smart things that actually pays dividends later and from time to time we’ve also you know looked at it and said do we have a systemic surplus in the assessment growth do we project growth to be relatively flat and stable and even in previous years we have done things like spun some off permanent tax relief in a small amount in a responsible way when the time was right what we know now is that we have growth costs to pay for and we know that the city is growing quite fast so allocating assessment growth dollars to the cost of growth I think is responsible and again I continue to support that idea that let’s take care of some lifecycle maintenance things when we can at the time that we build a new community facility by allocating those dollars up front so again I think staff have done a good job on the assessment of the assessment growth business cases I want to also commend two organizations for submitting and getting assessment growth business cases approved the London Public Library and London Transit Commission you know this is something that council has been asking for we recognize that as the city grows the need for library service collections grow in the city it’s a reasonable business case to have in assessment growth we recognize it as the city grows transit demands grow in the city and so for the first time we see the transit commission actually expanding growth related routes in the city with assessment growth dollars rather than hitting us on the property tax supported budget you know next fall like we know the city’s grown these new tax dollars have come in those people who are paying those new tax dollars can pay for some of the growth some of the costs of the growth that they’re generating by coming into the city so I support this staff report before us I always appreciate mr butler’s engagements on this I think he’s a smart guy he’s got ideas that I don’t necessarily disagree with but I can say I do actually like and support this process even though it’s relatively unique in the province because I think it’s done very well for the city and very well for London taxpayers thank you mayor Morgan I’ve counsel mccallister next thank you through the chair yeah just echoing uh many of the comments the mayor said um I agree with a lot of the business cases in here I see the library I think it’s also very important to highlight transit it’s really great to see them in the assessment growth growth with a business case there’s a lot of areas in terms of servicing we definitely need online and it’s great to see LTC come forward and you know get those areas serviced whether just speaking kind of the general area around my um board um great to see you know summer side for sure it’s an area where a lot of people are saying well you know big residential growth need some buses out there um or whether it’s industrial um I have um you know sliver of veterans Scanlan um well serviced for ward two ward three has got some good service too but we’re seeing a lot of growth out that way and those industrial drops that are driving our economy 100% we need to see those services online and expanded so I’m very happy to see within these business cases um there’s very specific areas that we’ve been asking for for a while to see uh those um those services come online obviously recognizing we’ll take a bit of time but I think this is the appropriate way to go as we said growth pays for growth and I think these are areas we’re seeing a lot of that growth and we need to um have those business cases to support the services in those areas so thank you and I’m supportive of this Councillor ramen thank you and through you so um just wanted to say thank you for the report I do find it helpful to um be able to see the projects outlined in costed but I did have some questions because um some of the projects that are listed in the assessment growth package especially related to parks um are for improvements that we approved in other budgets as well so I’m just wondering how do we then divide and allocate so for instance the urban park at Kent Park there’s a forty thousand dollar estimated value which is the highest amount that’s included in that parks budget and yet we also had that funding in in the mayor’s parks and initiative as well so just wanted wanted some clarification on that Mr. Murray thank you through you Mr. Chair yes so the specifically as it pertains to the the parks items here I think it’s important to note that these are the operating costs associated with these parks so what you would have seen as part of the the previous budget approval and specifically the parks improvement fund I believe was the terminology that was used for it that was used to fund the capital of front costs of constructing those those parks any new growth related infrastructure that comes on board of course though has operating costs to operate it and maintain it on an ongoing basis and that’s where through the assessment growth process those costs are picked up and funded also thank you and through you so this funding line is the operating for that park so I can anticipate forty thousand dollars will be spent to operate that park as I’m as it moves forward annually and then for the multi-use path between the Hyde Park Road and Coronation Drive that supports Hyde Park Village Green which is wood chips right now I can anticipate that that’s five thousand dollars worth of maintenance on on that particular path annually just to be clear Mr.

Murray through you Mr. Chair that is correct yes elsewhere thank you that’s very helpful and I just had a question about the policing component that’s included in the assessment growth business case I want to say thank you to London Police for providing the information here I find it very helpful that we continue to include the benchmarking numbers that are for the province and and for the country in that document I’m wondering though do we set or not we but I guess the police board do they is there an internal target for what they’re looking to benchmark against going forward just we’ve got those two numbers that appear in the assessment growth report repeatedly each year but I’m just wondering is the target to align with the provincial target is the target to align with the national target I’m just wondering if someone can help me understand that I’m not sure if our finance team can comment to the police metrics but we’ll go and oh sorry and we do have Superintendent Harvey with us on zoom so Mr. Murray did you want to start then I can go to Superintendent Harvey sure I will start and then we can pass it along to our folks from London Police so as it relates to the recent requests over the last few years the police have been trying to close the gap back to what the police to population ratio was approximately in 2010 so approximately 15 years ago so they’ve been trying to get back to that metric and have been successful in closing that gap over the last few years I will though turn it over to Superintendent Harvey to speak to going forward what the intention would be in terms of what metric they’re tracking towards welcome Superintendent Harvey and go ahead when you’re ready thank you Mr. Lewis sir just confirming you can hear me okay you are coming through loud and clear sir thank you yeah I’ll just comment and support what Mr.

Murray has suggested there through this ask it’s really an attempt to maintain our current police to population ratio and I would suggest that there is not a specific ratio on this ramen that’s that’s been specifically identified within the organization and currently we’re just trying to maintain our ratios within this 156 number currently it’s not the the police to population ratio is an important measure but it certainly doesn’t tell the whole story so we have to be we have to be guarded and cautious in in in setting a target in regards to that number but at the current time I would suggest that just maintaining this 156 is what we’re what we’re shooting for right now thank you thank you Superintendent Councilor thank you and through you so just with respect to the numbers that are provided for the police one of the things I’m trying to understand is with the assessment growth if it the point is for growth to pay for growth in some of the cases in the report it highlights areas where I’m just wondering if that growth of the area was considered in the targeted approach of where that funding is going to be used so for instance it talks about the core area and I’m just wondering how that assessment’s made around for instance in subdivisions in areas where we are seeing growth and maybe we’re hearing that we’re not seeing police so I’m just how does that balance out when we’re talking about assessment growth thank you Mr. Lewis for you sir so I’m going to suggest that the majority of our resources are really deployed on a on a city-wide basis so yes there are patrol resources that are assigned within specific sectors of the city but overall the majority of these resources that are that would be created through this through this process are really resources that would be assigned on a city-wide basis and not to specific areas or neighborhoods thank you counselor thank you I’ll leave it at that and follow up offline with the police I guess one of the things I hear from my residents is that our areas in the northwest part of the city are growing and as they continue to grow they’d like to see more police presence and I think the police are trying to address that with even the opening of a location at Masonville place but I do think that more traffic enforcement for instance is one of the things that’s mentioned in tier I think that that’s an area that definitely needs more support in our in our city and especially in areas where people are continuing to to to complain about not seeing police and that’s what I was hoping that I would see a bit more of in the assessment growth as well thank you counselor ramen I have counselor Hopkins next thank you mr chair and I do have a comment on the assessment growth business case from the London transit I’m very very supportive of growth paying for growth and I’m really pleased to see this mr butler I always appreciate your comments you always make me think to to understand where we are as a city and and what we’re doing but I’m a big supporter of growth paying for growth representing word nine subdivisions we have two routes for 2027 in this assessment growth business case to subdivisions that right now people have to walk walk about two kilometers get to the nearest bus stop so really appreciate seeing these service hours coming into new areas through you mr chair I do have a question around the 50% gap on the capital infrastructure reserve fund that we will be putting money into to we have a report coming to us I’m kind of interested in knowing where that report is and when we can expect an update on it mr Murray thank you and through you mr chair I believe the counselor might be referring to assessment growth case 16 which is the asset management case I believe that that is directly linked and a direct result in fact of our corporate asset management plan and policy that includes a specific recommendation on actually utilizing the assessment growth mechanism to capture the the future lifecycle renewing costs associated with the growth infrastructure that we that we add to the system each year so that’s a direct recommendation out of that plan the the most recent corporate asset management plan I believe was from 2023 and there are annual updates that come to counsel each year to kind of provide an update on on that and how progress is being made against that maybe I’ll turn it over to mr bone in terms of when that next update will be coming yeah thank you through the chairs so I just add to that the team is actually working on the updated capital asset management plan currently as we speak for the city of london that’s on track and in progress and so one of the things earlier on the agenda today was the policy we had some tweaks to update that to finalize the preparation and that should be coming to counsel early next year with the full completion of all the city of london assets to determine where we stand with respect to the infrastructure gaps so that’s certainly a great deal of work that the team is undertaking and then that will set the stage for looking at where we are and how that will ultimately inform our next multi-year budget yeah thank you for that I think it’s a really important report for counsel to have I do have concerns that gap is growing and how we’re going to be able to maintain that so with this amount going into the reserve fund is really the last time we’ll have an opportunity as this council to really deal with with with that fund so thanks for the update and thank you thank you counselor hopkins looking for any other first time speakers seeing none then I will go back to counselor stevenson for a second time thank you just to follow up on the change in policy through you to staff is it possible to get the link to the staff report where that policy changed and had the rationale just sent to us via email mr. murray through you mr. I just need some some clarification is the counselor referring to the most recent updates to the policy which would have been as part of the council policy review in 2025 or the original shift to the assessment growth policy thank you the original shift through through the chair yes mr.

chair we can certainly do that okay thanks yeah because i’m curious to see that um you know usually if it’s such a great thing i’m surprised no other municipalities have followed us you know there’s that expression about you know you’re leading if you look behind and people are actually following um in the business case number 17 about the human resources i just wanted to confirm it talks about the growth in the city between 2022 and 2024 and i just want to confirm that that’s two years not three years is it everything after like is it for 23 and 24 or is that actually for three years mr. murray thank you mr. chair i’m just uh pulling out my notes here yes so that is in fact uh for two years uh covering the years 2023 and 2024 answer thank you that’s what i thought and thank you for confirming that so it says that there were 343 new positions over the course of the two years and i just wanted to confirm i’m assuming the police is the only one where the employees where they have their own HR department it wouldn’t be factored in so are these employees of uh that’s the growth in city of lennon employees not including lps mr. murray or mr.

parody mr. murray thank you through you mr. chair that is uh city of london employees that does not include the police that does not include uh agency’s boards and commissions generally so that is strictly uh city employees um i will know it as well that uh the timing is is interesting given that uh 2022 and and for that matter i guess 2021 and 2020 uh would be uh artificially shall we say uh fluctuating i guess based on the staffing and the restrictions that were in place in those years due to uh due to the pandemic so uh you know our staffing levels uh for certainly 2020 and 2021 and even 2022 for that matter uh were affected by what services we could offer in terms of um you know for example uh some of the uh the recreation programming that we provide uh you know some of that programming couldn’t be delivered as an example uh so we wouldn’t have hired uh for example the casual staff to support that in 2020 2021 and 2022 so if you’re looking at uh personnel data uh it’s just important to know that those years might be slightly affected uh or in some cases not so slightly affected by uh the pandemic restrictions elsewhere okay thanks although i’m assuming that this growth isn’t that bounce back this is like an actual expansion due to the city getting bigger mr mary uh thank you through you mr chair so uh the the increase would be referencing the headcount as of 2022 versus the headcount as of 2024 so there would there would be some of that uh bounce back uh as well as the growth uh incorporated in that as well um ultimately uh though the the resources that were in place in 2022 to service the uh staff uh complement at that point in time uh were the same resources that were still in place in 2024 with that increase in complement counselor okay thank you um the other question i had on this one was the average salary for the HR it’s showing 124,441 per full-time employee it does seem a little high just from somebody who doesn’t know uh so i just wondered too why we’re using average personnel costs i would have assumed uh it would be front line like lower level rather than average mr mary uh three mr chair it’s important to note on those costings as well it’s not just salary that would be inclusive of fringe uh cost as well so the actual salary rates uh would be uh would be much lower um the uh the calculation on each case is very much case specific in terms of how they determine the uh the the metric and the and the costing and then the ultimate uh request uh that is put forward uh in this case they’ve uh simply used the the average costing uh as a whole inclusive though of fringe benefits counselor okay thanks i’ve got some questions about increases in employees and that kind of thing but i’ll do it between now and counsel and so that’s all i have for now thank you uh counselor ramen can you take the chair for me thank you i have the chair go ahead uh thank you madam presiding officer and uh just through you uh to staff i i’m really happy with this report and a couple of other counselors have said this already but especially that we’ve taken a look at the metrics that we need to look at for the library and transit i know in the past we’ve been told doesn’t work we don’t have the right metrics to apply to equate it to growth when i look at where we are on transit and the innovation uh park service expansion out there the gap and android any pasta have opened on that service route that’s two major new employers uh who have employees who need transit service this is exactly the kind of assessment growth case that i think is applicable to the transit service and so certainly both to the ltc including those at the horseshoe who are on that board um and to our finance staff i’m really glad that we could find a way to bring this forward it matters and transit service and i’ve been saying this for years it cannot just be about uh transit service around western and fan shot has to include employment sector areas this does that it matches perfectly because when we talk about assessment growth it’s not just new residential growth it’s industrial growth as well we’ve had two major new employers who are now paying industrial property taxes who who’ve contributed to this assessment growth and it’s going to provide transit service that’s exactly what i do expect to see um increasing digital uh collections at the library same thing very supportive of this because as the city grows we’re going to see no matter what part of the city people are in we’re going to see an increase used in uh digital library borrowing uh so i think that that’s a very positive thing um i’ll save my rant about federal government and digital copyright borrowing legislation problems and all of those other things for another day perhaps it’s something councilor trussow and i can commiserate over a pint over some day after work but it’s this is exactly where a library assessment growth case makes sense increase the digital collections so that folks in the new areas have access to library borrowing too uh so very very happy to see those two i agree with the mayor too the garbage collection the snow plowing uh the grass cutting in in parks and new subdivisions i hear where mr butler’s coming from at the same time i don’t need those in a budget business case we have to do them as new neighborhoods come on board i think there’s some argument to be made about i’m particularly interested in the comments about um debt repayment and interest from reserve funds and things like that i think there’s there’s perhaps some other discussions to consider in the future around that but i do think from the assessment growth uh piece the nuts and bolts stuff the the police the parks the snow plowing the garbage collection um we have to do it so let’s not complicate the budget process by putting a whole bunch of new business cases for new subdivisions into the budget case let’s just do it out of the assessment growth that those residences have contributed um even when we talk about the staffing increase um the counselor stevenson mentioned uh i know in 2022 as we were reopening from covid i mean mine was awarded the benefited from a new community center it had no staff before because it wasn’t open and when it did open it had a small number of staff and it’s only grown to become one of the busiest community centers in the city and that means lots of casual and part-time staff as well as some full-time staff uh as well as lots of calls from myself to miss smith about various questions um but overall it’s been a fantastic site for the community and that needs staff to run it uh and that’s not the only facility that’s had to add staff just as a matter of our growth um when you think about all of those processes that we’ve had um in terms of meeting our housing target that requires planning staff and building division staff to to get those applications processed and through um so those things are are just like i said this the nuts and bolts thing um but i really want to express my genuine appreciation and really happiness to see the transit in the library growth cases here because i think and i i said it during the original multi-year budget and i know that not everybody agreed with me but this is where they should have always been so i can end it there thanks for the work um always open the discussions moving forward but i think for this um particular year of assessment growth we’ve got a really good set of business cases here that are absolutely um something we should all be supportive of thank you returning mature to you if no one on the list okay gonna look to my left look to my right counselor stevenson just one quick question i hope i’m just seeing this one on the human rights uh that we’ve got four full-time employees and there’s a need to hire an additional full-time employee for workplace harassment investigations uh so i just wanted an update from staff on that as to why we need another full-time person mr parity yeah through the chair so uh three of three are investigators we have our our manager three investigators and we have a coordinator uh we’ve been uh right now we need the extra investigator uh city grows corporation grows we have you know counting everybody all the end we’re over four thousand of employees and we’ve also taken on uh training component component of the respectful workplace policy across the corporation to all thousands of employees uh we have our uh investigation side and then we assist uh the other uh human resources and workplace violent uh prevention procedure under emergency management security we want to make sure we can give uh all as much attention to in the investigation side as we need to an investigation can take up to 90 days when we if you get multiple investigations plus we’re doing training uh it has taken its toll with the size of the corporation as as a growing so we had to put an assessment growth case in in order to build that team where we can manage it across the corporation better counselor okay seeing nothing further i’m going to ask the clerk to answer purple thank you answer the check the staff i do have a question regarding the ltc i do see the uh issue currently are the additional buses so for buses for the capital not financially but fits the delivery but if somehow this capital or the buses would be delivered earlier would there have to be in terms of the budget requirements any changes through this assessment to start actually earlier than 2028 thank you mr. Murray through you mr.

Chair and unfortunately the lead time on buses is uh is extremely problematic uh it is uh last i heard uh 18 months plus uh to to receive buses so uh realistically we are uh in all likelihood looking at uh 2028 before that new service can be implemented having said that though uh the funding will be in place uh through the the approval of this assessment growth to initiate uh that service once those buses are available and in place council purple thank you so i do have follow-up if a miracle would happen and the buses would arrive earlier and because this is the assessment for this year would we have the funds available to start these for prior to 2028 if the buses were delivered earlier thank you. Councilor purple i i’m going to say two things on that one it’s highly speculative to ask our staff about if a miracle happens and second ltc would have to address that operationally first if they couldn’t address it internally they would come to the city i’m not going to ask staff to speculate on whether ltc would have to come back or not that would be an internal ltc matter first okay thank you so i’ll have a follow-up question is the money available now. Councilor pribble i’m still going to rule that out of order we don’t have the service is not ready to go so it’s asking staff whether the money is available now it is not in order the money’s not being sought now because the operation will stand up of the service can’t be done now so i’m not going to ask staff to respond to that okay truly don’t understand the reasoning for that because i’m just asking this is the assessment now if it’s approved today if it’s approved by the council i will you know see how it’s out of the order to ask if the money is available. Mr.

Murray uh let let me uh take a shot here mr. chair at explaining how this will uh it will work um so what what you’re approving here is a permanent increase of a little over two million dollars for ltc um for the first two years or the first two years of that uh two point one million dollars per year that will be used to fund uh the buses uh the actual capital cost of the buses uh subsequent to that uh it will convert back to operational funding uh so that those routes uh can then be operated using those buses that have just been bought so uh it is permanent ongoing funding that will be available to pay for the operating costs once those buses are here. Councilor thank you for that answer no more questions. Okay i’m gonna ask the clerk to open the vote.

Councilor blows the votes yes closing the vote motion carries 14 to 0. Hey that concludes our agenda colleagues so i’m going to look for a motion to adjourn moved by Councillor ramen and seconded by Councillor Hopkins. We can do this one by hand all those in favor. Yes motion carries.

Thank you everyone.