March 31, 2026

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Official minutes have not been published yet. A meeting transcript is available below.

Meeting Transcript

Duration: 2 hours, 52 minutes

Source: Lillian Skinner’s London Council Archive

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, 52 minutes)

Okay, thank you, please be seated. Okay, colleagues, welcome to the sixth meeting of municipal council. I’ll just note if you’re in council chambers, Councillors McAllister, Pribble, Stevenson, Hillier, and Ploza are online, as well as members who have joined us today. I believe Councillor Troceau will be joining us shortly.

I wanna start with the land acknowledgement. We acknowledge that we are gathered today on the traditional lands of the Anishinaabe, Haudenosaunee, Lene Peiwok, and Haudenosaunee, peoples. We honor respect the history, languages, and culture of the diverse indigenous people who call this territory home. We acknowledge all of the treaties that are specific to this area.

Two Row Wampum Belt Treaty of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, Silver Covenant Chain, Beaver Hunting Grounds of the Haudenosaunee Nan Fan Treaty of 1701, and McKee Treaty of 1790, London Township Treaty of 1796, the Huron Track Treaty of 1827 with the Anishinaabe, and the Dish With One Spoon Covenant Wampum of the Anishinaabe and Haudenosaunee. Three indigenous nations that are neighbors to London are the Chippewaas of the Thames First Nation, Oneida Nation of the Thames, and Muncie Delaware Nation who all continue to live as sovereign nations with individual and unique languages, cultures, and customs. The City of London is also committed to making every effort to provide alternate formats and communication supports for meetings upon request. To make a request specific to this meeting, you can contact Council Agenda, London.ca, or 519-661-2489 Extension-2425.

And onto the O Canada singer. Josh Tri is a London-based multi-instrumentalist, music director and tour manager. His work routinely takes him across North America, working with acts like Nate Holler, Sasha, Texas King, and Tyler Shaw. Please rise and join me in welcoming Josh who will now be performing the National Anthem for us.

♪ Canada, our home and native land ♪ ♪ True patriot love in all of us come in ♪ ♪ With glowing hearts we see thee rise ♪ ♪ The true nor strong and free ♪ ♪ From foreign white O Canada ♪ ♪ We stand on guard for thee ♪ ♪ God keep our land glorious and free ♪ ♪ O Canada, we stand on guard for thee ♪ ♪ O Canada, we stand on guard for thee ♪ Okay, that brings us to disclosures of pecuniary interest. I look for any disclosures the colleagues might have today. Seeing none in chambers, I don’t see any online. All right, we’ll turn it to recognitions.

There are two, and I’m gonna start with Council Faire. You’re up first. Thank you, Mayor. I just wanted to make a recognition for a very special Londoner and Canadian, Jeremy Hanson.

I wanted to just take the moment to recognize, you know, someone who comes from the city and represents, you know, the very best of our city and our country. Jeremy was born right here in London, raised just outside of our city. He built a career through discipline, service, excellence from the Arcadettes in London, which I had my own stint in, to becoming a Royal Canadian Air Force fighter pilot, which I didn’t do, I wish I did, glasses, at the time they didn’t allow that, to now representing Canada on the world stage as an astronaut. In the coming days, maybe tomorrow, maybe tomorrow to the six.

That’s the launch window. He’s gonna take part in the Artemis II mission. It’s gonna be a truly historic moment. This will be the first time humans travel back to the moon in over 50 years since the Apollo era in the early 1970s.

And more specifically, this is the first crewed mission since 1972. It is a major step in setting the stage for humanity, once again, to walk on the lunar surface after decades being decades away. And to push further and to deep space exploration, something that we should have been working on ever since then, but that’s another conversation. So like many, I’ve been following the Artemis program very closely for years.

I’ve been waiting for this my entire life to go back to the moon or at least get close to it. So I’m very excited. And I am very excited to see this stage now and to see a Canadian, and more importantly, someone from London take part in this. It’s something we should all take pride in.

So it is an honor for Canada. And for those who have spent our entire lives watching space exploration and hoping to see humanity return to the moon in this moment is a great deal. So we know this mission has not been without its challenges. The launch date was delayed a couple months ago.

I was excited for that, but I have faith that we’re going to be going either tomorrow or in the next couple of days. So for the moment right now in front of us and for Canada and from London, this is a milestone. And it’s going to be making history. And it’s exciting stuff.

So on behalf of Council and behalf of Canada and on behalf of us in London, we wish Jeremy a very good luck. And we’re there with you. We’re rooting for you. Thanks, great recognition.

And I don’t usually comment on recognitions, but I’ll say, Councillor Ferra, we share a lifelong interest in space and space exploration. I remember sitting on the couch in the ’80s, watching the space shuttle launch with my dad. And it’s kind of an amazing moment for this region to have someone who grew up in our region go further than humans have ever gone. Like this mission will have humans go further into space than have ever gone before.

They won’t land on the moon, but they’re going to, as they orbit the moon, travel further away from the Earth than we’ve ever been. So it’s quite a moment. And it’ll be something really, really amazing to watch over the coming days. I have Councillor Vameer, we’re going to next.

Thank you, Mayor. I’d like to recognize a true London gem, Adventures on Wonderland. For 26 years, Adventures of Wonderland has provided countless, countless young people from the London area, their parents and grandparents and their caregivers an experience of joy, experience of fun, experience of learning. And this was founded and was guided by Barb Pragia and through Barb’s guidance.

Many of those children who got to have all that fun got their all-important first job at Adventures. And many still of these children, from the earlier years, having all this fun and creativity more recently returned to Adventures with their own children. This place has had a profound impact on London, situated, of course, as most good things are in Ward 10. It’s a place that we celebrate.

And Barb, we wish you all the best, and we thank you for the memories and all the best going forward. Thank you, Mayor. Thanks, and Councillor Cudi asked to add recognition as well there, just in the last minute, so go ahead, Councillor. Thank you, Your Worship, and through you.

I’d like to recognize my colleague from the Upper Thames River Conservation Authority Board, Councillor Hugh McDermott, Hugh is Deputy Mayor of Perth East Council and Your Worship. If you ask me to point out Perth East on a map, I probably couldn’t do it, but it’s in the Stratford area. I’m sure you would probably know where it is, Your Worship. But Deputy Mayor McDermott has been on council from 2010 to 2014, and then again from 2000 to 2018 to present day as Deputy Mayor.

Hugh lives on the family farm that’s been in the family since 1837. Hugh, my family’s been in here since 1816, so we’re close, but I’m not on the family farm anymore, but colleagues, please join me in the welcoming Deputy Mayor McDermott to our council today. Thank you, Your Worship. Thanks for being here.

If you didn’t get enough of your own council meetings, you wanted to pick up some in London, so glad you could be here. And yeah, we’ll see if you think that at the end of the night. OK, so that’s it for recognitions. Really appreciate colleagues with those.

We have a review of confidential matters to be considered in public. We have none. We have a counseling closed session, which includes four items. We’re going to use Committee Room 5, but I need a motion to go into closed session first.

Councillor Hopkins, seconded by Councillor Van Mirbergen. Any discussion? OK, we’ll open the vote to go into closed session. Councillor Peruzza votes, yes.

No to thank you. Councillor Hopkins votes, yes. No to thank you for closing the vote. Motion carries 15 to 0.

OK, so we’ll be going to Committee Room 5 for the public. We’ll be back shortly. OK, thank you. Please be seated.

OK, that completes our in-camera session. We’ll have a report out on that later. We’re on to item 5, which is confirmation and signing of the minutes from previous meetings. We have the fourth meeting, which was March 3rd and the fifth special meeting, which was March 13th.

Moved by Councillor Van Mirbergen. I’ll second it. OK, so those are on the floor. Any discussion on the minutes?

OK, seeing none, we’ll open that for voting. Councillor Peruzza, seconded by Councillor Hopkins. I vote yes. No to thank you for closing the vote.

Motion carries 15 to 0. OK, we have a number of communications and petitions, seven different groupings. We have a motion consolidated to refer them all to their relevant points in the agenda. Councillor Ferrer is willing to move that.

And Councillor Cudi is willing to second it. OK, any discussion on moving those items to the relevant parts of the agenda? No? OK, we’ll open that for voting.

Councillor Peruzza votes yes. Interval of Councillor Hopkins. I vote yes. No to thank you for closing the vote.

Motion carries 15 to 0. OK, item 7 is motion, which notes was given. We have none, which means we’re on to the reports section of the agenda. And the first one up is Community and Protective Services Committee.

Councillor ramen, I will let you present the report. Thank you, and through you, Mayor, I’ll look to put the fourth report of Community and Protective Services Committee of a number of items that have been pulled. I would like to put items 1, 2, 3— or sorry, I would like to put items 1, 2, and 3 on the floor, making sure I get the numbers right. 6, 8, 10, and 11, unless I hear from somebody that they want to need those pulled.

OK, so Councillor ramen is trying to do 1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 10, and 11. Does anybody want those dealt with separately? We’ll see anybody, so I’ll let you make that motion. Thank you, I’ll put that on the floor.

OK, so we have 1, 2, 3, 6, 10, and 11, and 8. OK, all right, any discussion or comments on those items that are before us? Seeing none, then, we’ll open that for voting. Councillor Pribble votes yes.

Closing the vote, motion carries 15 to 0. Thank you. I will look to put item 4 on the floor, please. So that’s the amendment to the Parks and Recreation Area by-law PR2 related to bill number 141.

All right, so that’s on the floor by the chair. I’ll look for any discussion. I see Councillor Stevenson online. You can go ahead.

Thank you, yes, I’ve got a referral that I’ve circulated to Council and with the clerk’s office. I can read it out if you like. Yes, if you could read it out, that would be great. OK, the staff report dated March 9, 2026 from the deputy city manager, neighborhood, and community-wide services regarding proposed amendments to by-law PR2, being the Parks and Recreation Area by-law, be referred to the broader review of the Parks and Recreation Area by-law PR2 scheduled for 2026, 2027, and be considered as part of that comprehensive review process.

And I believe I have a secondary and Councillor Hillier. I see Councillor Hillier confirming a second. OK, so that is now a referral on the floor. I’ll introduce it.

Yep, I’m just making sure we get it up on the screen. So people can see it should be up now. So yes, if you want to go ahead and speak to it, that’d be great. Thank you, yes, this was a change to the age that caregivers, parents, and others were able to bring minor children into the change rooms and the washrooms in our recreational facilities.

And I believe the change was going from 6 and under to 10 and under. When I posted this on social media and asked for some feedback, there was a lot of interest in this and a lot of concern, actually, in the change. So given that it’s not an urgent issue and that we’re doing a formal review that’s going to include a public participation meeting at some point in the future, I wanted to bring forward this referral, hoping that my colleagues would support in allowing the public to have a say in this important issue, and that we make it part of a comprehensive review and give the public an opportunity for input into something that’s going to affect them and their children. OK, so on the referral, I’ll look for speakers.

Councillor Trossal. I’m just curious to the chair, to the maker of the referral motion. In terms of the concerns, we did have this come up at committee. I don’t recall anybody appearing at the committee.

Or am I wrong about that? Yeah, so I’m just wondering why we’re doing a referral request. So Councillor, just let me stop you. So I would say the committee chair can answer whether there was any delegations at the committee, and I’ll have heard you that in a sec.

But also, I think public feedback comes in many ways. So it might have come from the committee. It could have come directly to different Councillors. So I don’t think we can presume what it is or how much it is, because as you know, the people give feedback to municipal council in a number of ways.

But public committee chair confirm whether or not there were delegations at the meeting. Thank you, and through you, there were no delegations on this item. But just a point of clarification, maybe you needed from staff as to what was actually in the staff report, because I believe the numbers and the ages were presented incorrectly. Maybe, but Councillor Troso has the floor, so he could do that through a question, or you could later, but I’ve got to go back to him on the floor for now.

I would ask the chair, if through the chair, through you, the mayor, who’s the chair of the committee, if you have any further information that might help us understand the purpose for the referral, because I don’t see anything in origin, they’re either for added. So could you help me out with that? Well, I can help you out with what the chair said, and that is, I think the council and the presentation had the age numbers the opposite way. So if you could just clarify what the item was before the committee and the related, just the related high-level details of that, and then I’ll go back to Councillor Troso.

Thank you, and through your worship, the current age for children to use gender-specific bathrooms is 10 and under. The amendment we proposed to the by-law was to change that to seven and under. And that’s what came through the committee, was support for the change to the by-law. So before us today is that particular change, which has now been moved and seconded to be referred to a subsequent process and review of the Parks and Recs.

Okay. Area by-law. Thank you. Excuse me, thank you very much.

Sure, okay, other speakers to this? Deputy Mayor Lewis, go ahead. Thank you, Chair, and through you, your worship, I won’t be supporting this referral. I’ll be supporting the committee’s recommendation.

Our staff, as they presented at committee, have done their homework. They’ve done environmental scans, the best practices in other municipalities. And quite honestly, I have not. I concur with Councillor Troso.

I’ve not heard a single comment from any of my constituents that this is a concern to them. I would also point out that our aquatics facilities, and through you, I’ll ask staff to correct me if I’m wrong. But our aquatics facilities also have family change rooms in them, as well as gender-specific change rooms, which means if a parent’s not comfortable with this, they have another option. So I don’t need to refer this back, talk about it again and again.

And frankly, while the Councillor may not appreciate this comment, I don’t do governance by social media commentary. I’ve looked at the staff report here, and for me, I am comfortable with what staff are recommending, so I will not be supporting the referral. You had a question of staff about the availability of, like there’s gender-based facilities, but there’s also family facilities and in our recreational services. So I’ll go to our staff for that comment.

Thank you, and through your worship, in all of our indoor pools, we have universal change room. In the majority of our outdoor pools, we have universal change rooms or alternatives for individuals, they are separate bathrooms and change rooms. We do have three outdoor pools that do not have these facilities. However, in the past, when people with disabilities or others required separate space, we have used a first aid room and we have closed a bathroom off or used a staff bathroom to accommodate in those three outdoor pools.

But we really have not had those requests. Okay, good. All right, other speakers to this. And again, we’re on the referral.

I appreciate people needed some information to support their discussion, but anybody else on the referral. Okay, so we’re gonna open the referral for voting. Council of approval votes no. Closing the vote, motion fails two to 13.

Okay, so that was on the referral. I’ll go to speakers on the staff recommendation, which is on the floor by the chair. Go ahead, chair. Thank you and through you.

So I just wanted to say first, thank you to staff and to the public that have reached out on this item as well. I will say that one of the things I did here in feedback, and this is just for commentary because I think it’s things that we will consider during the Parks and Rec Master Plan, as well as other facility plans as we move forward, is that one of the concerns is that in some of our facilities like our outdoor pools and like the aquatic center, it does put pressure on those spaces where we maybe do not have adequate enough family spaces. So specifically at the aquatic center, I do hear that concern from folks that they would like to see an upgrade to that facility to see more opportunities to allow for families to be able to use family change spaces. So that is something that we need to consider for the future as we look to bring this update forward.

Thank you. Okay, any other speakers to the committee’s recommendation? Okay, seeing none. So this is on the committee’s recommendation.

We’ll open that for voting. Council of purple volts, yes. Close on the vote, motion carries 13 to two. All right, back to you, committee chair.

Thank you and through you. This is item five, 2.4, the community safety and well-being plan update. There was added communication in the agenda, which made it change to appendix C leave. So that was here for us.

I’ll put that on the floor. Okay, this is on the floor. I’m gonna look to Councillor Stevenson, who I think has an amendment to this, go ahead. I do, thank you.

And I believe I have the seconder and Councillor Layman. Do you want me to read this out? Yes, please. Whenever there’s a motion that isn’t on the added agenda, it’s just great to read it out.

So ‘cause we’ve got a number of people in the gallery and they won’t know what it says unless we articulate it. So if you can read it out, that would be fantastic. I did circulate it through email to council, just prior to the meeting. So it’s that the motion be amended to include a new part C to read as follow.

C, the civic administration be directed to include a member of the London Police Services Board on the community safety and wellbeing advisory committee, the CSWB advisory committee, in accordance with the community safety and policing act 2019. Okay, that’s on the floor. And I just confirmed that yes, there’s a seconder for that. I don’t know if you want to speak now, Councillor, if you’d like to wait.

Yeah, also I’ll speak now just to quickly let. Just one second, I have just a quick point of order from Councillor Troso. I just find this so confusing, oh, sorry. I find this confusing because it says, in accordance with the policing act, is there a mandate in that act that a member of this board be there?

I just don’t think this tells me what I need to know and I didn’t get a chance to review it. Yes, that’s my understanding of the act. I mean, my police board colleagues probably know the act as well as I do. So it was something that I’m not sure if it’s like, yeah, I can let my colleagues speak to that.

I can say it’s section 250, 3.7. You can say so, that would have been helpful. Of the Canadian safety, the CSPA. Okay, Councillor satisfied with his question.

That was a point of order. So we’ve dealt with that. That information’s here. I’ll go back to you Councillor Stevenson.

Yeah, thank you. This is just, I want to put this on the record that the city reached out to the LPSB and make sure that it members on that committee to ensure that we’re compliant with the CSPA. Okay, other speakers to this. Go ahead Councillor Furrier.

Thanks Mayor. I just want to go to staff on this one. So I do see that a reference from the committee police act was made, just want to go to staff on that to see if staff can confirm that, to see if it is mandated, go to our staff. Thank you, and through your worship, the CSWB advisory committee and the act determined that municipalities must create one of these plans.

In order to do that, they were to develop a community safety and wellbeing advisory committee, which we did, having all the members, including the London Police Service Board member. Once a plan is approved and implemented, we then followed in 255 revisions by the municipality in the act that then tells municipalities to go forward and implement your plan. So in order to implement our plan, we have what we call a working group or an implementation committee, and on that committee sits all the actual plan members, and we do have members from the London Police Services who sit on that plan and sit on that implementation group as the London Police Services plan is on that group. So the active members now are currently those who have plans that are part of the community safety and wellbeing plan in front of you.

Go ahead. Thank you. So the act mandates London Police Service members and not necessarily London Police Board members on the safety and wellbeing advisory group. Thank you, and through your worship.

For the advisory committee, it lists, and to develop your plan and advisory committee helps develop the plan. So when our plan was developed over five years ago, we did have members of the London Police Services Board. Now to implement our plan, we have members of the London Police Services on our working group. We do no longer have the official community safety and wellbeing advisory committee because we’ve already developed our plan.

We’re now implementing it. Okay, so we are no longer using the community and safety wellbeing advisory committee. We are now in the implementation of the plan. So adding a police service board member to this advisory committee that is no longer being used.

Okay. Go to the chair. Thank you, through you. I’m just wondering if we should refer this matter for further clarification at this point because I can’t pull up the act fast enough to verify which component of, I agree with sorry.

Let me rephrase that. I understand what staff is saying. I just want to be able to better understand this, but I don’t want to refer the whole plan. So this to me is a separate component of this because we’re just talking about adding somebody.

I think we can still deal with the plan and refer the item of putting somebody else from the police service board to a further discussion. So I’m wondering if I can move that referral. Yeah, referrals in order if there’s a second or I see Councillor Hopkins willing to second. So this is referring just the amendment, not the entire item.

Okay. Yeah, so the referrals in order and you can refer just that piece of it. And certainly it could be dealt with a committee without any prejudice of us moving forward with the other piece of the plan. So go ahead.

Thank you and through you if I may speak to it. So first I just want to thank my colleagues for bringing this up because I think it’s always important that we look at legislation and make sure that we’re compliant as possible. And I think that there would be value if we were missing voices. But what I hear from Ms.

Smith is that we’re in the implementation plan and we have voices from police services there. So I just want to be able to look at this a little bit further. I hope my colleagues will support it going back for as a referral so that we can have this discussion depending when we receive that information. Okay, I look for other speakers on the referral.

Councillor Hopkins, go ahead. Yeah, thank you, Your Worship. And thank you to the chair for the referral, happy to second it. I think as we’re here at council making these decisions to me without all the information, I feel a little uncomfortable.

So having a go back to committee and having a better understanding, we’re not delaying the work in group or the work that’s going on. So happy to support the referral. Councillor Troz, sir. Thank you for the chair.

As I understand this, we’re not under an obligation to make this change. I don’t see the point in referring this back. And while normally it’s fine to refer this back, I really worry about the fact that this committee and other committees, we’re hard pressed in terms of the time that we have at our committees. And unless there’s, unless somebody from the staff wants to tell me that there was a mistake in the original staff report that needs to be corrected, which is not what I’m hearing, I just want to finish with this matter today and not refer it back.

I just think we have to be more mindful of the demands on our agendas that result in long meetings. And I don’t know what’s underneath this. I’m not going to try to guess, but it doesn’t seem to me as if we’ve made any mistakes. So I’m ready to proceed based on what we had before.

I should add it would have been nice to have this a little earlier, but, you know, then again, here we are. Thank you. Okay, I’ll look for other speakers to the referral. I see, no other speakers to the referral, so we’ll open the referral for voting.

So the approval votes yes. Present vote, motion carries eight to seven. Okay, that part’s referred, but we have the original staff recommendations still on the floor by the chair. I’ll continue any discussion or debate on that, or the committee recommendation, my apologies.

Okay, seeing none, we’ll open that for voting. Council of approval votes yes. Present vote, motion carries 14 to one. Okay, back to you chair.

Thank you, I’ll put item seven, which is 3.1, the short-term accommodation license and penalties related to bill’s number 134-135-140 on the floor. Okay, that’s on the floor. I’ll look to speakers. Councilor Frank, go ahead.

Thank you, yes, and included on the agenda. It was a letter from myself, the deputy mayor and Councilor Pribble in regards to some amendments we’d like, so I’m happy to read out the motion to get on the floor if possible. So this one’s on the added, so you can read it out if you like, but you don’t have to, because it’s on the public record already. We can just load it up and keep going if you like.

Wonderful, yes, and maybe I’ll just confirm I’m a seconder. Yeah, I kind of saw a nod from one of your colleagues, but I’ll make sure that just in case, Deputy Mayor, you’re gonna second this, right? Yeah, okay. Okay, go ahead, okay.

So just to further expand on the letter that was submitted, but I won’t go over it entirely. I had some feedback from residents who do have short-term accommodations. We saw some folks in the gallery who spoke and some folks emailed in some of the feedback. One of the main ones being that the age of allowing folks who are under two to be with their parents was a little bit too young and changing that up to 12, which is more common when folks are traveling as a family.

Additionally, some of the concerns that were being created were the difference between hosted or non-hosted or essentially landlord on site versus landlord not on site short-term accommodations. Generally, I found that the more problematic short-term accommodations are the ones where there’s no landlord or owner on site and therefore sometimes turns into bit of a party place. So some of the concerns I had from residents in my area was they live on site, they live within the building or an addition to the building and they’ve never had those complaints and yet they’re still being penalized in the same way for those who have more of a party Airbnb approach. So these two amendments are to try and address that and specifically in regards to providing an exemption for those where the host or owner is present on site during the guest day.

And that way those folks who are on site are not being swept into the same legislation that’s governing more of the party locations. So I’ll stop there, but I’m looking for support on those two amendments just to improve the by-law. Yes, and I will say thank you for preparing that ahead of time. Because of that, if this changes, we do have alternate versions of the by-law available today.

So if colleagues pass this, we can actually continue forward and pass the by-law tonight rather than a referral back. So it’s moved and seconded. Councillor Frank has spoken and looked to other speakers on this. Okay, Deputy Mayor Lewis and then Councillor Troz.

Thank you, Your Worship, and through you, I’ll be brief. I’ll just say did owe to everything that Councillor Frank has said. You know, I’m supporting this through my own experience. You all know I spend part of my time away from here coaching hockey.

This is not an uncommon situation for families to share hotel rooms, share Airbnb rooms as they’re traveling for sporting events and things like this. This is pretty consistent with industry standards in the hotel sector. So I’m comfortable applying the same standards to the Airbnb short-term accommodation vendors. Councillor Troz, go ahead.

Thank you for the chair. I do need a clarification because I’m a little bit confused about the discussion about distinguishing between on-site owners and situations that don’t have on-site owners. Under our current by-law, and as we’re talking about amending it, isn’t there a requirement that this only apply to owners who are on the premises? Or what am I missing?

Mr. Mayors, go ahead. Through you, through your Worship. So it has to be in a unit that’s owned by a person who resides in the home, but that person could be, for example, on a sabbatical or away from the home as long as they still own the home.

This hosted aspect would require the owner to be on-site while the actual booking and accommodation is occurring. Yes, and in my view, we had that on-site requirement very consciously in the initial by-law, and I am not prepared to change that. So unless, I’m sorry, am I, do I have, do I have the floor? You do have the floor, yes.

Okay, it’s hard when people are making faces at you. I just, I’m not gonna support this because I think we have that on-site requirement as for a reason, and I don’t wanna start departing from that. So unless there’s something else that should lead me to think this amendment is well thought out, I’m very, very concerned about disturbing things that we’ve been through very, very well, and I don’t wanna make this change unless, yeah, given the fact that there’s a requirement that people will be there, I just don’t wanna make this change. So I’ll be voting no one less.

Okay, other speakers, I don’t have a list actually. Oh, Councilor Pribble, sorry, I got you online there. Go ahead. Thank you, I’m sort of chair to the staff.

If Mr. Mathers could clarify, I’m under the impression that the state’s primary residence, and I believe it will still state primary residence. So there is no change in this perspective. Just let me clarify, ‘cause Mr.

Mathers said this, primary residence, and then being there while you’re having someone stay are different things, right? For your primary residence, you could not be there that day or week while someone is renting your space. Councilor’s amendment is you get an exemption if you’re there on site. So that’s the difference between what it says in the by-law, or what it says under the current rules and what the Councilor’s proposing is the change.

And Mr. Mathers, you can confirm that if you’d like. Through the chair, absolutely, that’s correct. The current by-law and the new by-law would still have a primary residence requirements.

The change it would be making to address the motion here would be to actually create a new definition, definition on hosted short-term accommodation, which would add this additional criteria that would have the ability of the exemption. Okay, does that help clarify, Councilor Pribble? It certainly has the cooperation. Thank you.

Okay, other speakers, go ahead, Councilor Raman. Thank you and through you to staff. I’m just wondering how would this be enforced or interpreted in terms of, I mean, if the person was there for a period of time, but not the full time, et cetera, how would that be defined? Okay, I’ll go to Mr.

Mathers. Through your worship, it would have to be the entire time. It’d have to be something that actually is included in the marketing materials for the site to say that there is this is a hosted accommodation and the person will be there for the entire period of time. And that’s something that’s need to be certified to the city as far as needing that criteria.

Thank you and through you. And do you see any enforcement-related challenges? For instance, a by-law officer shows up on site and the person isn’t there. I’m just not sure how much leeway do we give to that person getting back to the house, for instance, or whatnot.

I’m just looking for more clarification on how I understand the purpose of the definition as it relates to a particular or some of the communication that we’ve received from particular owners, but I just can’t understand how that would be enforced. Go ahead, sorry. Through you, worship, yeah, it definitely would be a challenge. We would use the same type of approaches we do on any of these, is require that compliance, ensure that they are on site.

If they’re not on site, try to understand why they may not been for that period of time. And it will be a little bit more complex. We’re not expecting a huge number of folks going down this road ‘cause there is more documentation that they have to provide us to be able to undergo this special exemption. We’re thinking that it’s gonna apply mostly to larger units or locations where they really are focusing on bringing in families, but it will be a little bit more complex to be able to administer.

Go ahead. Thank you and through you. I appreciate that feedback. I’m just looking to separate A&B then please.

Sure, we can vote on A&B separately, no problem. So we can vote on A&B separately. However, if one of those fails, we would have to refer the other piece back to have the by-law rewritten. So just so colleagues are aware that should a part of this fail.

We don’t have a by-law that doesn’t have both in it. I’m gonna allow it ‘cause I want colleagues to vote their way, but I’m going to ask if one passes but not the other, that we move to a referral back to committee to write the by-law. So ‘cause we would not pass a by-law today. Okay, alternate, we don’t have to refer it.

We just have to bring the by-law forward to a future meeting of council for approval. So we could approve it in any way we want today, but it would not come into effect until later once a by-law comes to council and gets three readings. What’s the point-of-order councilor? I’m having difficulty understanding why we can’t vote on the amendment separately.

And if the amendment is voted down, we just have the report that came to us. So you can do that. What I’m saying is the amendment is separated into two pieces. We have two by-laws prepared.

The one has came through committee and one that has both of these changes integrated in the by-law. So if you pass A and not B or B and not A, we don’t have a combination of by-laws that actually has that legislation in it. So that cannot happen tonight. But you can vote down all of it, no problem.

You can approve both, no problem. Just anything else we can’t do. Okay, well, I just think it’s unfortunate that we’re gonna have to maybe have to look at some more of the way ‘cause we need these changes, but whatever, you rule, yeah. Well, it’s not whatever, that’s how it works, Councillor.

So colleagues are allowed to make changes. We sometimes can pass legislation the same day, sometimes we can’t. So that’s the consequences of making changes. I will say the Councillor did suggest two changes, brought a by-law for that, didn’t bring every possible combination.

That just wouldn’t be functional for our staff to do. So that being said, you can vote whatever way you want, and whether it gets implemented today or it gets implemented at a future meeting, that’ll depend on how the votes go, okay? Okay, I still don’t understand why we can’t just enact the by-law that came to us through committee. You can, by voting down these amendments, you can do that.

So just vote no to both AMB and then you’d be, you’d be passing exactly what came through committee, okay? All right, other speakers, to the amendment. I have Councillor Ferra and then Councillor Hopkins. Thanks, Chair, from what the Chair’s questions were, that was my question as well.

I did have an additional one as a follow-up. And that would be, I guess, with respect to the age limit in 12 years and older, like how would we be able to enforce something like that? Would that be up to the owner/occupier doing the enforcement? Would staff come in?

What type of documentation are we looking for? Go ahead, Mr. Mathers. Yep, through your worship.

So a couple pieces to that would be one, as part of any kind of marketing of that unit, that they’d be very clear as far as what the requirements are for occupancy. So that children under 12 years are allowed within certain units in different sizes. So it should be, that’s part of ensuring that people are aware of that. And then if there is any kind of municipal compliance action, then we would be asking for information about the folks that are staying in that unit and confirming their ages.

Go ahead. Thanks, so the only real matter of enforcement from the city perspective would be the compliance officer going there. And that would, I would assume only get raised if the owner/occupier or the host would be the ones who are flagging that. And I would be concerned because we do, like I like the intent of the motion that the counselors are bringing.

But at the same time, I wonder how the enforcement aspect would be because a host, I would assume wouldn’t necessarily be willing to enforce that if there is an accommodation, a review that’s involved, and anything like that. I would think that what I would support is if we referred this back to staff, this part and enact the by-law as it was that came to committee, ‘cause I think that’s a good by-law as it was written, and it does give us more, I guess, protection as a city. But if I wanted to do something like this, I’d need more information on that, and that’d have to be separate. So if we’re not able to do that, then I’ll have to vote both A and B down.

Councilor Hopkins, you’re next. Yeah, thank you, your worship. And thank you to the counselors for bringing this forward. I find these amendments satisfactory.

I don’t wanna get too much into the weeds here at council, but for me, ultimately, this new by-law is to preserve the rental housing stock. It doesn’t really change that. Really, the whole idea is to preserve the rental stock, so I am okay with these amendments and with the committee recommendation as well. Okay, any other speakers on the amendments?

And we’ll do them separate, so, okay, see none. Okay, we’re doing A first. A is the piece about the owner being present during this day, so hosting. We’re gonna open A for voting.

Councilor Pervil votes yes. Opposed in the vote, motion carries 12 to three. And B is the provision that permits two adults with children’s age 12 years or under, which replaces the two years or under. So that is the change going from two to 12.

Everybody’s clear. Okay, we’ll open that for voting. Councilor Pervil votes yes. Opposed in the vote, motion carries 13 to two.

Now look, Councilor Frankly willing to move the as amended motion. Okay, as amended, seconded by Deputy Mayor Lewis still. All right, on the as amended motion, any further discussion? Councilor Trossa.

So if I understand the situation, I’ve been placed in, if this is defeated, then the very badly needed amendments to the by-law are a decided matter of council for the rest of this term, and we’re done. So I feel as if I’m in a situation and I wanna make sure I understand procedurally what’s going on, I feel as if I need to support this motion, albeit with fundamental flaws that I think are really gonna complicate the enforcement. We’re gonna ask children to produce ID to show how old they are, the children usually carry ID, showing how old they are. I think this is a terrible amendment.

I voted no on it, so I don’t want anybody to think, I’m gonna vote yes on this overall motion, ‘cause we very badly need these amendments, but I just, I need to say I’m very unhappy about these amendments, and I certainly hope that they don’t rise to the level of creating yet another loophole in this by-law the enforcement of which has proven problematic. So I think we’ve done a disservice here, and there’s not much more I can say here, I’m not going to make another amendment, other than to ask, can I make an amendment saying we’re going to enact the by-law as submitted and have the amendments referred back to the committee with respect to the children’s age, or is that out of order? No, that’s out of order. We just had those votes.

You voted in the contrary, you weren’t successful, majority of council has changed it, and so you are in the situation as you described, that’s how democracy goes, so majority want to proceed this way, you might not be happy with it, so you can either support it all, or you can vote against it all, but it’s all together now. That’s fair, and I will be supporting the flawed by-law that’s in front of us, and as soon as we can, next council term, if circumstances are such, I will try to fix it. Thank you very much. Okay, others to the as amended motion, Councillor Frank and then Councillor Ferra.

Thank you, yes, I’ll be supporting this as amended motion. I think we’ve actually improved it. Additionally, if anyone is concerned in regards to the age limitations, the by-law that was passed at committee did have age limitations of two, and now it is 12, and so either way, whether the original committee recommendation had passed or the one that just got amended, there would have been age requirement, which, so if we’re concerned about people producing documentation, would have happened both ways. Thanks.

  • That’s a fair. Thank you for that. I, like I’m gonna support the as amended motion. Yeah, I worry about any loopholes that we may have opened up here as well, and I know that they’re gonna reveal themselves.

I hope that there’s not, but there are some questions that I have, and I know that as I guess, we get things rolling, they will come up. I will also say, you know, a two-year-old, 12-year-old is easily distinguished by just by looking. But I will say, I do wanna see this, I do wanna see the extra protections and the extra actions from the new by-law come in as quick as I can. So I guess I’ll ask with the amendment and it coming back as a by-law to the next council.

So that’s one cycle away. Is it right to assume that it’s gonna just be a month behind on the, as we enact that by-law? So we’re passing the by-law tonight, because we have that by-law, because both of these passed. The only thing we didn’t have is if one passed and the other didn’t.

So council’s added to the motion two things. There’s a by-law that represents those two things and it’s gonna be voted on tonight at by-laws. So yeah, I’ll let you ask whatever question you want, but we’re having a vote tonight on this. Okay, that’s the answer.

So that, I guess, schedule will still continue and we’ll have the by-law as amended get enacted when it’s supposed to as it was at the committee. Okay, all right, so like I said, I worry about the loopholes, but I am gonna support this because we do have those extra protections and I guess we’ll see how it translates out into the real world. Councilor ramen, go ahead. Thank you and through you.

Just wanted to say, although I didn’t support all of the amendments, I’m happy to support what’s in front of us because I do still see it as improvement overall. So thanks to colleagues for their work on this and thanks for the engagement from the public on this. And I wanted to say thank you to staff ‘cause I know they went out of their way to communicate with the public as we were in cycle committee cycle in between council on this matter as well, just to let them know where things were. So thanks for that as well.

All right, any other speakers on the as amended motion? Seeing none, we’re gonna vote on that now. Councilor Perbal votes, yes. Opposed in the vote.

Motion carries 14 to one. Sir, ramen, go ahead. Thank you. I’m introducing item nine, which is 4.2, which is the restricting city funded organization from distributing safe use drugs, smoking supplies.

Okay, that’s on the floor. Councilor Stevenson, go ahead. Thank you. At committee, my letter was received, but the motion was not put forward.

So I would like to bring it forward now. I am looking for a seconder so that we are able to debate and vote on this publicly. Do you wanna just read your motion and then I’ll ask for a seconder, if you could. Yeah, but notwithstanding the city’s current policy endorsing the whole of community system response, the following actions be taken.

A, civic administration be directed to implement the following restriction, effective April 1st, 2026, with respect to all city services and all organizations receiving funding through the city of London, excluding the Middlesex London Health Unit. The distribution of safe use substance inhalation supplies, including but not limited to pipes, foil, straws, cookers and snort kits, be prohibited within the core area, meaning downtown, midtown and Oldies Village. Okay, I look for a seconder for that. I see no, okay, I see a seconder in Councilor Hillier.

So if you wanna have debate, you could have debate now, Councilor. Okay, thank you. I’m gonna hold my comments. Okay, is there any other speakers to this?

This is now the amendment that Councilor Stevenson just read out, so I’ll look to speakers on that. There’s no speakers here, Councilor. If you wanna provide some context again. Okay, I will then, yes.

So the reason I brought this forward was to help support the goal that we have regarding reducing open public drug use within our core area. We currently have the London Police Services Open Air Drug Strategy, where they are working on addressing those issues within our core area. And so to me, it made sense not to have two taxpayer funded services working at cross purposes. So that within this area where we’ve committed to reducing open public drug use, that we not be handing out pipes for crack and meth, foil and straws for fentanyl, and snort kits, again, just within this core area where we’re focused on reducing it.

And my understanding is through the committee that London Cares had already agreed to not hand it out along Dundas Street from the river to Egerton. So this would just be really, it’s a two block width on the north side of Queens. You’d still be able to access this. We’ve got harm reduction outreach teams through HIV/AIDS, the health unit has mobile, or in HIV/AIDS has mobile delivery service where people can get these drug supplies delivered to their homes free.

It’s also available at the Middlesex Health Unit and various other locations. So this isn’t about not allowing people to have access. It’s about stopping the taxpayer funded services that are working against each other in a particular area. So I’m hoping that council will support on this.

As I said, London Cares has already agreed to do it indefinitely along Dundas Street. This would just widen it a little bit and go up Richmond Street as well. And people will still be able to access what they need to. And the other thing is that this does not include needles.

It’s only the inhalation supplies. So I’m hoping to have my colleagues support on this. Okay, any other speakers to this amendment? Go ahead, Councillor Ferra.

Thank you, Mayor. I guess I gotta speak to this one. Like I understand the intent of the direction, but this motion, I don’t really know. We really have any control on that.

Like I do hear that the service agencies have already voluntarily said that they would not distribute those kits. But I also know that if those kits are being distributed outside of the core area or a block therein, it doesn’t mean that those kits can be moved into the area or not. I would like to understand how that would be operationalized, how it would be enforced. And if it’s intent is to reduce open drug use, I don’t think people who are suffering from substance use disorder are going to be able to, I don’t think that’s gonna really have, I guess it’s gonna achieve its intent.

I would just wonder, I guess the first thing I would ask, and I know that we spoke at committee about this, but within our municipal service contract agreements, do we even require the service agencies to provide those kits? From what I understood, in those contract agreements, we say harm reduction approaches, but we don’t actually have any type of line items, budget line items that purchase those kits, or actually distribute those kits. And from what I understood, I thought the Middlesex London Health Unit followed the Provincial Health Standards, which does require that. So I would just wonder, we don’t have the ability to have the province change the Provincial Health Standards.

That is within their health standards, and then the Middlesex London Health Unit has to follow those health standards. So I’m just a little confused on the operationalization of this. I can provide some, I guess, enlightenment for me on this. Okay, so let me start with some stuff, and then I’ll go to staff.

So at committee, the question was asked, you’re right, and it was responded to by staff. There’s nothing in a contract that compels anybody to hand out harm reduction kits. The only exception to that is the emergency treatment fund with the federal government, which is out of money and completed by tomorrow. I think April 1st is when it ends.

But there’s no contract between the city that requires an agency too. The motion before us is essentially the municipality using its spending and contract power to say, even though we’re not asking you to do something, you can’t do something. So I’ll go to our staff for any additional context, but I’m happy to get you so many answers you need. Thank you, and through you, your worship, that’s correct.

The only reference to harm reduction kits or a safe use skier is through the Health Canada contract, and that is the ETF emergency treatment fund that actually expires today. We do have some other contracts that are with regards to outreach, those being at LOSA and London Cares, but neither of those contracts have any funds attached to the procurement or obtaining of any harm reduction kits. Go ahead, Councilor. Thank you.

So like I wanna see you open drug use in our core and throughout the city, obviously reduce as much as anybody else does. And I wanna see individuals get help as much as anybody else does. And I wanna see that help actually get translated into reality. I wanna see people actually have the resources or the spaces to get that help, to actually get that real wraparound healthcare support, to get that real pathway to treatment and recovery.

I wanna see all of that. But I also know that the more we confuse on who’s responsible for what or who can do what, the worse it gets. We need to, at this point in time, really start to figure out that we need to understand who’s responsible. We need to understand what we can do, what we can’t do and what we are doing and what we are not doing.

A motion like this, I feel like, fogs the understanding of really what’s going on here because we don’t actually do this in the first place. This comes from direction from the province. And I think that the more we kind of step in and say we can do this, we’re gonna save the day. And then we can’t because we don’t even actually have the enforceability for it or the accountability for it, that will confuse people more.

And that just muddies the water, muddies the water’s here. I think we should really start kind of focusing on a more of an enlightenment kind of perspective, really kind of pointing out really who’s responsible for what, what we’re trying to do, what the intent is, where the gaps are, what exists and what doesn’t exist. And the more we do that and have that conversation, the more we can all have the same voice and point to the same entity who’s responsible for these things and see if we can actually get some proper movement here. So I’m not gonna support the motion.

I wanna see, you know, nobody openly use in the city and in the core, I wanna see that. This motion’s not gonna solve that. This motion is just gonna confuse. And this motion is gonna get us further away from actually seeing a real tangible change for the good.

So I can’t support the motion as it is. Okay, any other speakers to this? I’m gonna go ahead, Councillor Troisab. Well through the chair, thank you so much for what you just said because it needed to be said.

I do have a question though for staff. Civic administration be directed to implement the following restrictions. How do you read that? What exactly, if this passes, what exactly would you do to implement this?

And it’s with respect to all city services, all city services and all organizations receiving funding. So how would you implement this? Be a second, not letting the confer, Councillor. Okay, go ahead.

Thank you and through your worship. I think we’d need to take it back and take an assessment of what we do fund and make determinations on any future contracts. I wonder if my colleague, Mr. Latiser, might wish to add anything to that.

Go ahead, Mr. Latiser. Through your worship, currently we don’t, we don’t offer funding as was mentioned earlier. It’s somewhat related to harm reduction in the current existing contracts.

We could ask certainly our outreach partners, but it gets into whether or not we have the legal ability to restrict them from doing it outside of the contract that they hold with the city. So that would be, I would suggest a legal question as well. That’s a true sound. I’m wondering if the solicitor would like to add to that last piece.

So I don’t have to ask my next question. I can see if that’s possible, go ahead. Thank you and through you. I think certainly if Council wanted some additional legal advice we could give it, I think we would have to go through the contracts and look at how much we could sort of micromanage what our service providers are doing.

Again, it’s difficult because we’re not currently funding these so we’re sort of dealing with proving a negative. Thank you and based through the chair based on your last response and when it came before that, I would suggest that this is a, I’m trying to choose my words very carefully so as not to have to deal with the point of privilege here, but I just don’t think this is a viable motion the way it’s written. I don’t think we can do this. I think it would be a burden on staff and I’m not sure, well, I’m sure it doesn’t make any sense from a policy point of view, but as draft did, I think it’s not necessary ‘cause we’re not doing it but we’re gonna do it anyway because somebody wants to make the point.

So I really hope that people don’t support this. I am not going to ask the further question to the solicitor as to whether we would even have the authority to pass this because I don’t wanna have to go into a closed session to discuss this. I think I know what the answer to that is but I’m not gonna put everybody through that. So I’m just gonna say this is an ill-conceived, poorly drafted, likely illegal and not practical.

Motion, that’s just my opinion. I’ll say that’s in my opinion, all those things I just said. So please don’t support this. We need to come together as a community and think about what our positive response is gonna be to the many challenges that we’re facing.

I feel that this is overly divisive and it’s not gonna result in any additional enforcement tools. The final question I have is say somebody is aggrieved and feels as if an agency has violated these rules. We’re saying that you can’t do this if you’re a funded agency. What mechanism are we going to put into place to test such allegations should they arise?

So I can go to our staff but I think their answer was, they don’t know that yet. They would have to basically think about that and see what would be possible. But go ahead, Mr. Latiser.

Through your worship, I think we’d have to take it back and evaluate the current contracts and the legalities around those contracts as well. So to give an answer at this point, I think we’d have to do a bit more research into it. And these contracts through the chair are expiring when? Go to Ms.

Wilcox. Through you, your worship. The ETF agreement expires March 31st. So today there are other agreements.

So the ones noted with that LOSA and London CARES, those were part of the extension that was approved by Council a couple of cycles ago, but they’re not with regards to the ETF. So I would add to my objections that we’re, even if we passed this and even if there was a good reason to pass it, we wouldn’t be getting a lot of value out of it in comparison to the amount of undetermined staff work that this would take. And that, you don’t have to respond to that. That’s just another good reason, in my opinion, to just reject this motion.

Thank you very much. Okay, and I appreciate the council that you tried to square it into my opinion. I’m still gonna just caution colleagues that you can oppose something. You can say, you disagree with it.

You can say, you don’t think it’s good public policy. Trying to say things like, it’s poorly drafted. A number of colleagues will get support from clerks in some cases and others, and are trying to draft pieces that council can deal with. So appreciate everything you said, but let’s just, I don’t wanna have to deal with points of personal privilege and things like that.

So appreciate that’s on people’s minds, but we can avoid those with just cautious language and thinking that colleagues are doing their best to get things before us that we can act on. I go to Councilor Pribble and then Councilor Ramen. Thank you, Chair. I will not be supporting what’s in front of us.

As already stated, the community organization is already working with our London Police Services, already one section of Dundas or downtown Dundas Place. And the organization is open to enlarge the area so I really think that for us to achieve something, we don’t have to always pass a motion. We have two great organizations or a couple of them that are working together already and they are open-minded to enlarge this area. So therefore, I don’t think this is necessary in addition to the other points that were stated in the last five minutes.

I will not be supporting it. Thank you, Chair. Councilor Ramen. Thank you and through you.

And I mean, it’s not often that Councilor Pribble and I agree completely, but that was one of those moments. So thank you, Councilor Pribble, for what you just said. I will say, I think we had some discussion about this. The operationalization of this motion is quite challenging.

But what I agree has happened is that through the discussion, we were able to hear about those collaborations that are already happening, the conversations that are already taking place, which I always think is great in the public space to be able to have those types of conversations. So I won’t be supporting what’s in front of us. I don’t think that it’s operational. It can be operationalized at all at this point and would require quite a bit of work from our staff who have a number of items in front of them already.

So thanks for the time. Okay, any other speakers? All right. So this is on the amendment that’s before you.

I wanna open that for voting. Councilor Pribble votes no. Opposed in the vote, motion fails two to 13. Okay, so back to the item as it came through committee, which is put on the floor by Councillor ramen and the other speakers to that.

Okay, seeing none, we’re gonna open that for voting. Told the floor votes yes. Opposed in the vote, motion carries 15 to zero. Go ahead, Councillor ramen.

Thank you, that concludes my report. Great, thank you for that. Next up, we have the fifth report of the Strategic Priorities and Policy Committee. I will have Deputy Mary Lewis present that report.

Thank you, worship and through you. I have been asked to deal with item five. That’s the draft economic development strategy separately. Councillor Stephen wishes to vote in the negative as she did at committee.

Otherwise, I have had no other request to pull items. So I’ll have to see if anything else needs to be pulled before I move one, three, four, six, seven and eight. Okay, so five’s gonna be dealt with separately. Anybody want anything else dealt with separately?

Okay, seeing none, looks like you can move that motion. All right, then I will move one through four and six through eight. All right, those items are on the floor. Any discussion on those items?

Okay, I don’t see anybody with discussion. So we’re gonna open that for voting. Let’s roll with purple votes, yes. Councillor Stevenson.

Opposed in the vote. Motion carries 15 to zero. And you worship, I’m now prepared to put item five. This is the draft economic development strategy on the floor.

All right, that’s on the floor. Any discussion on that? I see none. So we’ll open that for voting.

Let’s roll with purple votes, yes. Motion carries 14 to one. And that you worship concludes the fifth report of SPPC. We’re on to infrastructure and corporate service committee.

Councillor McAllister, were you intending to present, have the vice chair to present, or were you gonna present that remotely? No, my intention was for Councillor Frank to present that. All right, Councillor Frank, you’re prepared to present this report. Thank you, yes, it is a gift.

So I have many items to be pulled. I have pull request for item 10, 11 for the staff circulated at it 14, 15, 16, and 19. And I’m not sure if there’s any others. I can repeat myself though, ‘cause I think some people, okay, so 10, 11, 14, 15, 16, and 19 to be pulled.

I’m not sure if there’s any others. Well, let me just check the C. So right now we’re gonna deal with 10, 11, 14, 15, 16, and 19 separately. Is everybody okay?

Does anybody want anything else done separately? I don’t see any, so why don’t you make a motion then? Sure, yes, I will make a motion then to move the remainder of the items. Okay, so just for clarity, we’re gonna have one through nine, 12, 13, 17, 18, and 20 through 23.

All moved by Councillor Frank. I’ll look to see if there’s discussion on any of those items. You don’t need a seconder. We’re just gonna need a second to get all this up.

I have myself on the list for one item. I’ll turn it over to Deputy Mayor Lewis. I will take the chair and recognize Mayor Morgan. So colleagues, I’m gonna comment on item 23, which is the contracts related to the N-Wave steam service transitions.

I didn’t speak at committee. I actually had a call with the provincial government to get to, but I just wanna express my extreme disappointment in how this is played out. This is a significant amount of taxpayer dollars that we will tie up in providing boiler services to multiple municipal buildings across the downtown. A service that when you have a utility providing a service, you expect to be there for the foreseeable future.

Not only has the low pressure steam line decommissioned, but segments of the medium pressure steam line have. And now we’re hearing that further segments of the medium pressure steam line that will likely include places like RBC Place will be impacted beyond the costs in this budget here. Every time we spend a dollar on something like this, we don’t have a dollar to spend on say the downtown plan when it comes forward or the economic development plan or fixing roads or sewers or parks or bridges. And this is a significant amount of money.

We’re not talking about a few hundred thousand dollars. We’re talking about approaching 15 million dollars without the costs of places like RBC Place and others impacted. And that is one of the frustrations as well. We are not even aware of the private sector impacts of other buildings because there’s no obligation for N-Wave to disclose that to us.

We know the public sector buildings because we’ve received the notices on those and we know partners have shared with us. But this is a situation that you would think would be untenable in a modern city with a modern downtown, right? Other regulated entities aren’t able to do this in the same way that this particular entity is. And I continue to say to the executives at N-Wave, you got to financially contribute.

This shouldn’t be on the backs of the taxpayers. We got more than enough good things to spend money on in this city, filing boilers to provide heat to our buildings because a service wasn’t able to be continued by utility that was providing that for multiple decades. You know, that’s not a good use of our money. That’s not a good use of our time and it’s completely unacceptable.

So I will continue to be very clear to N-Wave and I will continue to advocate to the province to say this is not a situation that any major downtown should be able to face. And unregulated entities like this need to have some level of oversight in the future to avoid this from happening. That being said, we’re stuck with the current regulations today, which are pretty much none. And there’s no choice but to move forward with the item before us because we have to provide heat to the buildings.

You know, notice has been given. We’re not going to have that option in the future so we don’t have a choice but to spend this money. But I think, and it’s my opinion, N-Wave should be paying these costs, not us. And that’s my expectation of them, whether we have any legislative ability to make them, we don’t, but it’s still the right thing to do.

And I still call on N-Wave executives to make a financial contribution to these public assets because they’re no longer able to provide the service. To me, that’s just fair and that’s being a good corporate citizen in a downtown core of our city. And I want to say like, downtowns are in different states of recovery across the country. Ours, we’re investing a lot of money in.

Whether it’s the open air drug strategy, whether it’s the investments in Canada Life Place, whether it’s our activations, whether it’s the plans we’re coming forward, the quick start actions, all of that can be set back when you stick municipal partners and private sector businesses with a significant bill at a time when they can least afford to do it. From our perspective, it ties up our money that we can’t use elsewhere. On the private sector, you’ve got struggling businesses and business property owners downtown trying to get people to grow their businesses, trying to recruit people back to the core. We’re now spending significant capital dollars on heating their buildings or transitioning to the boiler systems.

Now, it’s just the impact is too great on the downtown right now. And I wanted to stand today and express my extreme disappointment in N-Wave for providing these notices and discontinuing the service. Thank you, Your Worship. I will return the chair to you, noting we have Councillor Trussau and Councillor Ferrera on the speaker’s list.

Councillor Trussau, go ahead. Thank you, through the chair, I wanna agree with and applaud everything that was just said by the mayor. I think we’ve been left in a terrible situation here. We have to do this work.

I mean, I know what this means for the library and the museum. We have to do this work. We can’t not do this work. And we’re not in a position to negotiate.

Well, I think we do what we are. I’ll get to that in a second. But I just feel that we’ve really been treated very poorly here. And we’re being backed into a corner where we have to make what I think are very excessive expenses.

And I don’t know what we can do. So my procedural question is, is passing this today without prejudice? Is passing this today without prejudice to our ability to seek redress from the company later? Councillor, I’m first off, I’m not given any sort of advice ‘cause I’m not introduced.

But let me just clarify what’s before us. Before us is not any sort of acceptance of a position. Like the notice has been provided, we’re gonna have to issue contracts to actually complete the work to actually heat our buildings. And so I don’t see this as related to any other, any other things that you might be contemplating because at the end of the day, we know we have to provide heat to these buildings and civic administration responsibly is bringing forward the transparent and clear costs to us doing so because we’ve been given the notice that the service is being terminated upon a certain date under the provisions of the contracts that exist.

So I don’t know if anything could be added. I don’t wanna speculate on anything else, but I just wanted to be clear what’s before us today. And I don’t know if I see miss all it nodding that that’s the case. You have nothing to add?

Thank you and through your worship. I think that’s an accurate statement. These contracts are critical to maintaining the heating. And so I don’t see that it would have implications other than that.

Go ahead, Councilor. Thank you and that answers my question. I’m certainly gonna support this ‘cause we have to do it. And in terms of whether there might be something coming else later, that remains to be seen.

So thank you very much and thank you very much. And I’m very satisfied to just vote yes on this for now. I was thinking of adding an amendment saying that I’m not going to do anything. I think this is fine.

Thank you. Councilor Ferrer, you can go ahead. Thanks, Mayor. So I agree with everything that you said.

And this is one that I struggle to keep my inside voice in and my outside voice out because as you correctly said, downtown has got a lot of struggles. And now we have this extra one, which is huge when it comes to the financial implications here with the city, but not just with the city with private residences. We got condos who have already high condo fees. And now they’re scrambling to figure out how are they gonna maintain heat?

And it just seems as though that on way, but did inform us that we were gonna get some help or we were gonna get any type of support. I don’t see that. I remember when on way first made the announcement for the low pressure line, they gave a very comprehensive understanding and information that really showed that they were working on this for a very long time. And yet they told us a couple days before they made the announcement.

And I didn’t really like that. That was a very clear indication of, you know what’s going on. You could give us a little bit of runway or at least help us understand so we can at least budget a little bit further down the road. And I said this when I was speaking with on wave as well.

Like you clearly have been working on this for a while. Why are you telling us now? And didn’t really get any answers for that. And then I said, and I think I said this on the public record too, I would expect that if this is what I’ve seen already, it’s probably gonna happen again.

And then we get the medium pound pressure line being shut down. And the same thing, very short notice on that. And clearly a lot of work. So they probably knew about it for a long period of time.

Maybe even when they said they were decommissioning the low pressure line. And anyway, purchasing London District Energy only a few years back, where was the due diligence there? Did they not see that the infrastructure was crumbling? It was too expensive to repair.

I just, I have questions. And I see a lot of the things that are happening, you know, it would be helpful if the city were at least informed a little bit more. And it would be helpful if there was at least, you know, at least some type of move or some type of understanding that there’s a lot of people impacted here. There’s thousands of people that are impacted here.

And all of the taxpayers in London and City Hall. So, you know, I agree with everything the mayor said because we have, you know, plans that we’re trying to implement and we need money to implement them. And this is taking away from that cash. So I’m really, you know, I’m disappointed, frankly, of just kind of what we’ve seen.

And again, I really hope that if there is another decommissioning of the line, which we just got a recent one. And again, you know, when I reached out to Conway saying, “Hey, can you at least let us know of some of the properties “who are eventually gonna reach out to me? “So at least I could be prepared?” No, Privacy Act, okay, thank you. I’ll find out anyways.

But it would be nice if we could at least get a little bit more leeway or a little bit of support. Like you say that you’re gonna give us. So I agree with everything that was said. Struggle for me to keep that outside voice outside.

So I’ll just maybe leave it there before I go off the rails. But I appreciate everything and yeah, thanks. All right, any other speakers to all the items before us? All right, seeing none, then we can open that for both.

Councilor Perble, second call Councilor Perble. Marking Councilor Perble, absent. Opposed in the vote, motion carries 14-0. Go ahead, Councilor Frank.

Thank you, I’ll put item 10 on the floor, the contract award for Highbury Avenue South Reconstruction and Councilor McAllister indicated he had an amendment. Councilor McAllister, go ahead. Thank you, and sorry, this was a late addition. So I can read it out for Council.

I didn’t have it circulated, but just so everyone can hear it. Okay, so that the motion amended to add a new part that reads as follows, H, the transfer responsibility to the province of Ontario for Highbury Avenue from the Thames River South Branch to the South City limits be endorsed by City Council, and this resolution be forwarded to the Ministry of Transportation. Yes, and I’ve agreed to second that for Councilor McAllister. So if you wanna provide some commentary, you can.

Thank you, and through the mayor, first off, I wanna thank our mayor, as well as Mayor St. Thomas, Worden and Flogen, and then all the city staff from, again, City of London, Elgin, St. Thomas. This is one of those rare opportunities.

We’re all in agreement. I think there’s good alignment in terms of this being something that we want the province to take on. Highbury was downloaded to us in ‘91. We’ve all kind of had our respective struggles with it in terms of having to upgrade that infrastructure.

And as part of the discussion we’re having today, we’re having to allocate the $27.5 million. This was a project, as we talked about at committee, where we had to save up for a few years to do this. So it’s a big undertaking. I’m at, apologies for my absence today.

I am at Good Roads. And we had a very productive conversation with the Ministry of Transportation this morning. Our delegation was very well received. And the reason why I’m bringing this forward to you today for Council’s consideration is the province said in terms of their next step, that they wanted to see Council endorsements from City of London, Elgin, and St.

Thomas, to ensure that we collectively are agreeing that this is something that we would like the province to take on. I know from my perspective, I’m not gonna speak for any of my other colleagues and curious to hear what people have to say, but this is a road where we see a lot of opportunity. Obviously PowerCo gets a lot of attention, but all along the highbury, there’s a lot of potential in terms of the economic growth. And so uploading this, I think is very important from a regional point of view in terms of the future for our whole area.

I think this is something we as a Council should endorse. The province is very keen on it. And so I would highly encourage my colleagues to support this. We rarely get opportunities to upload things to the province.

So this is one of those rare moments where I really think we need to take advantage of it. And I hope I can get your support. So I’ll leave it there. And thank you to the mayor for a seconding this.

I know he’s done a lot of work to see with our colleagues at Elkin and St. Thomas as well. So thank you. Yes, and I have myself next on the list.

I’ll turn it over to Deputy Mayor Lewis to chair. Thank you, worship. I’ll take the chair again, and please go ahead. Yeah, so I hope colleagues support the amendment as you’ve heard.

This is something that the province is seeking from us, St. Thomas and Elkin County, those two jurisdictions will pass or take similar resolutions to their councils to align with the province’s desire to see more breadth of support than just the mayors and wardens coming in asking them to do something, but they want to see some endorsement from municipal councils, which I think is a very positive step in the process and discussion. I will say, I’ll tell you where this came from. I have a regular set of meetings with our regional partners.

As you know, operating as a region, economically, from a planning perspective and thinking about how this region grows and moves people around together, is something that has been a priority of mine and a priority of my other colleagues in the region. We have a regular set of meetings. One of the meetings when we brainstormed how we could work together a regional transportation. And again, thanks to this council and the most recent budget for supporting in partnership with the province and others transportation between our cities through the Middlesex Connect Transportation Service, but this is an important transportation corridor that we both recognize.

Both us, Elgin and St. Thomas, all see a need to make improvements to Highbury Road in the future as an important economic corridor. And as we discussed the possibility of aligning EAs across multiple jurisdictions, the idea came up that this used to be a provincial highway and this could be coordinated much better as a critical economic corridor as a provincial asset. And us all being in agreement, we set out the approach to see if there was interest.

Minister Flack is on record saying, this is a great idea as the Minister for the region. I think it’s really great to have his support. That doesn’t mean it automatically gets done. It means it’s in good stead with the provincial process.

So today’s vote is a great next step much later in the process to say we’ve got enough interest, that we’ve got to formalize these endorsements from the local civic governments and then we’ll discuss the next step. So I want to thank Councillor McAllister for representing us at Good Roads. I asked him to be there rather than here in the city for this council meeting so that he could do that delegation and I appreciate the good work. And thanks to the Mayor of St.

Thomas and Elgin County for supporting you in that joint delegation as well. So I’ll ask for my colleagues support on this and look forward to the next step. Thank you Your Worship. I will return the chair to you.

I have no one else on the speakers list at this time. Okay, any other speakers? This is on the amendment as is now moved and seconded as Councillor McAllister articulated. I see no one else so we’ll open that for voting.

Closing the vote, motion carries 14 to zero. Okay, and now I need an as amended motion. Councillor Frank, you were presenting. Councillor Vameyerberger and you’re willing to second the as amended.

So this is for all of the clauses altogether. Any discussion on that? Okay, we’re gonna open that for voting. And carries 13 to one.

Okay, Councillor Frank, go ahead. Thank you, I’ll put item 11, the contract award for the consulting engineer for Western Road and Cerny Road on the floor as there was a typographical error that’s been circulated and needs approval. Do you have the amendment before you so you can just read it out? Or we can, let me read it out for you.

That the motion be amended in part B to correct the amount of the approved project contingency to 1.3 million excluding HST. The number is incorrect in the document. So that’s the correct amount. So I’ll second that.

So it’s moved by Councillor Frank and seconded. Yes, Councillor Troso. Yeah, I just threw the chair. I wanna briefly say how pleased I am that this is finally coming to our table and it looks like we’re going to be making progress on this.

I think we were just in our first couple of meetings in this council term where we were still working on the plans for this. So I’m just so pleased that there’s been some bumps and there’s been some minor, I’d say minor disagreements, but this is just wonderful. I already see that work is being done on very badly potentially like saving work is being done on Philippa Z. So this is just great news that this is here.

So thank you to everybody that worked on this and thank you for bringing this board. Okay, so again, on the amendment, any other speakers? Nope, we’re gonna open that for voting. Wasn’t the vote motion carries 14-0.

All right, Councillor Frank, you move the as amended, I’ll second. Okay, so as amended now, any further discussion? Okay, that as amended motion is now going to be open. Councillor Pribble, second called Councillor Pribble, marking the Councillor absent, Councillor McAllister.

Thank you, closing the vote, motion carries 14-0. Councillor Frank. Thank you, I’ll put item 14, respectful workplace policy on the floor. It was requests for pulled from Councillor Stevenson.

Okay, that’s on the floor. I don’t look for any speakers, Councillor Stevenson. Yes, thank you all, just make it quick. I’m not gonna be accepting this report.

I don’t think it even comes close to being an adequate response to the concerns that were raised regarding harassment over the last year or two. I mean, there were some real issues that were raised and this report that only addresses one piece of the reporting and that I just, anyway, I’m just disappointed that this is all that the response is to what was raised. Okay, any other speakers? Okay, seeing none, we’ll open that for voting.

So, Toronto, thank you, closing the vote, motion carried 13-1. E-scribe is having some issues. Okay, go ahead, Councillor Frank. Thank you, I’ll put item 15, revised, respectful workplace policy on the floor.

Okay, that’s on the floor. Councillor Stevenson, I see your hand up. Yeah, thank you, I made a submission and I made comments at committee, so I’m not going to belabor it here, but again, there have been concerns raised around what’s in and not in and how this policy’s been interpreted and applied in the past and so I will not be receiving or approving these revisions to a policy that has so many apparent issues with it. Any other speakers?

Okay, we’ll open that for voting. Closing the vote, motion carries 13-1. Councillor Frank. Thank you, I’ll put item 16, final program designed for better homes landed on the floor.

All right, that’s on the floor, any discussion? Seeing none, we can open that for voting. Closing the vote, motion carries 13-1. Thank you, I’ll put the final item, item number 19, smart commute landed on the floor.

Okay, that’s on the floor, I’ll look for any speakers. Seeing none, we’ll open that for voting. Closing the vote, motion carries 12-2. Councillor Frank, all done, perfect, thank you very much.

That brings us to the Planning and Environment Committee, I’ll have Chair Layman present that report. Thank you Mayor, please put the fifth report of the Planning and Environment Committee. On the floor, I have had a request to pull item 13, I know there are items that would be called. All right, anybody want anything else pulled?

Item 13 is gonna be dealt with separately, anything else? Okay, seeing none, you can make a motion then. So I’ll move all those items. I’ll move one through 12 and 14 through 16.

Okay, so one through 12, 14, 15 and 16 are on the floor, Councillor Hopkins, do you have some comments? Yes, thank you Your Worship, I just wanna make a comment on number 11, which is six, seven, 12, James Street, I wanna thank the committee for adding an amendment that I presented, this is a development in my ward, there are many, many trees coming down with this development and the committee did support that they would use an added direction to use best efforts to offset the anticipatory loss from this development, hopefully finding other developments that we can add extra trees in, so thank you to the committee. And Councillor Ferrico. Thanks, Mayor.

I just wanted to make a comment on item 10 for 325 Grey Street, just a thanks from the residents, one of the sweetest human beings around. She came to my office, just requesting an issue with her fence and I really appreciate the report adding the communication from Zalinka, that blue cactus holding is gonna repair that fence. So my sincere appreciation is on behalf of the resident and thank you. Okay, any other speakers to this grouping?

Okay, seeing none, we’re gonna open that for voting. Opposed in the vote, motion carries 14 to zero. Councillor Lehman. Thank you, Mayor.

Hold on a second, you’re okay. All right, sorry, we just had to wrap that up. All good. Go ahead, yep.

Okay, so I will put 13 regarding 929 Cheap Side Street on the floor, Deputy Mayor has this to be called. Okay, Deputy Mayor Lewis, go ahead. Thank you, Chair, so the reason I’ve asked for this one to be pulled is to make a referral on this, the application for from 929 Cheap Side Inc. on Teeth Brown Planning Consultants related to the property at 929 Cheap Side Street be referred back to Civic Administration to allow for the submission and review of a revised application, addressing elements of the requested special provisions in the original application, including but not limited to the parking ratio and the Civic Administration report back to a future meeting with the Planning and Environment Committee on the revised application.

It being noted that the applicant has requested this referral and has voluntarily committed in writing and on the public agenda dated today to suspend any appeal to the Ontario Land Tribunal for a non-decision for a period of 90 days. And I believe I have a seconder and Councillor Hopkins. Then I’ll speak to it. Councillor Hopkins nods that she’s willing to second.

So that referral is on the floor. I’ll, if you want to speak to it now, you can. Yeah, I’ll speak to it now. Colleagues, I think it’s very important that we send this back, particularly given the applicants indicated and put on the public agenda that they will not appeal for a non-decision.

I think we have to look at the very specific staff recommendation that was refused at committee. There were three components to that. Clause A was a base level zoning. Clause B dealt with the special provisions and was actually recommended by staff as a refusal.

And we’ve refused the refusal. And then we also voted down the site plan. There matters to be referred to site plan. We’ve actually put ourselves, in my opinion, in a very tenuous position with respect to the Ontario Land Tribunal, but also with respect to the base layer zoning.

Had we upheld the staff recommendation and refused the special provisions, the applicant would not have been able to move forward until they could have met conditions that would have not required those special provisions. However, we did not do that. We voted the whole thing down, the approval of the base zoning, as well as the refusal of the special provisions. So I’m going to suggest, particularly, as the applicant has indicated, that they’re prepared to bring forward a revised plan that will address the parking deficiency, as well as the paratransit labor concerns and actually reduce the building footprint and unit count.

I think that this should be referred back to civic administration to review. That doesn’t mean that civic administration is going to come back necessarily with a recommendation to approve it all. But what it will allow them to do is have time to do the technical analysis of the revised plan and bring forward a new recommendation to us that we can then consider. Because I think the alternative, as has been indicated by the applicant in their written submission, is that this will go to the OLT.

And we are not in a position, in my opinion, to defend what committee voted on in actually refusing the refusals. So I think that we should be consistent with similar applications that we’ve received in Councillor Hopkins’ ward as one of a number. And I know she and I discussed that. But I think we need to be consistent where we’re looking at the base layer zoning and the London plan framework and then the special provisions that come in on an application.

So I’m asking for your support to refer this back. Other speakers, Councillor Hopkins, go ahead. Yeah, thank you. And thank you to the Deputy Mayor for bringing this motion forward.

I am gonna be seconding it. I think it’s very, very important that we are consistent. I was disappointed in the recommendation coming out of the Planning and Environment Committee. I had grave concerns about the appeal that could have taken place.

Really pleased to hear that the applicant is willing to refine this application and have an extended period of time that will not take us, that the applicant won’t take us to the appeal process. I think it’s really important that we make decisions in London for London. So pleased that the applicant is willing to have those conversations. I also wanna thank the community too, for their involvement in the application.

I know we received a lot of responses from residents. It’s important that we hear from the community and I hope the community to learn about the process and what we can and can’t do as a municipality. I wanna thank staff to partial refusal. I didn’t hear much of a conversation about that at planning.

I know staff did a lot of work on this application. So thanks to staff for their work. And again, hoping council will support the referral. I have councilor Stevenson online.

Thank you. And thanks to the members who are there in the gallery, the residents, I should say that are there in the gallery and that have been communicating as with the tenacity that they have over the last little while. This one has been a challenging one. And I’ve heard really loudly from the neighborhood that they believe that six stories is too high.

And when I looked into it, that only just came to pass last July. So it’s a very recent change and that council passed it in September of 2024, but it didn’t get enacted until the province did the approval in July of 2025. So it’s a really recent change. So when we say, well, they’re allowed to do six stories and that’s what I understood, I didn’t realize that it was so recent.

I also, when I went back and looked at the public notice and the communication, it wasn’t really clear. And even in table 11, which shows it’s this piece of property, it’s a neighborhood connector, it fronts onto a neighborhood connector, and then there’s a neighborhood connector on one side of it and a neighborhood street on the other. So the intersection of two neighborhood connectors allows it to be six stories. But the other side of the property is a neighborhood street and a neighborhood connector, which usually only allows four stories.

And so I really think that this is something that is gonna impact neighborhoods across our city, that residents really didn’t have this discussion as to whether they wanted this in their neighborhoods and whether they were okay with six stories. So that’s the part that has me concerned, is that we’ve given them up to six stories when I emailed back and forth with staff and thank you for all the emails back and forth. They say, well, it’s not a given that you can go to six stories, you know, it’s up to, but then we get told, oh, well, at the OLT, it’s like you gotta have a really good reason to not allow six stories. So as we go forward and we set, you know, blanket zoning and blanket regulations, I think the public opinion in my understanding of it has changed in the last couple of years.

This rush to build units and to want more density everywhere, there’s a real pullback on it, and we’re seeing it in other cities as well. In Calgary and in Windsor, where they’re saying no. Point of order, go ahead, point of order. We have a referral on the floor.

The councilors debating now the light plan review that was conducted over a year ago. If we can stick to the referral, please. One second, yeah, so I’m actually gonna agree with you, Deputy Mayor. At the start, I think the councilor was pretty clearly on the referral has kind of strayed from that now.

So to Councillor Stevenson, this is a referral back, has described in the motion. So if you could keep it tight to the rationale for either supporting or not supporting the referral, that would be beneficial to your colleagues. Yeah, no, and I understand that, but there is a bigger picture again. When we make these decisions, there’s a bigger picture in mind and it is impacting other, and it will continue to impact neighbourhoods across our city.

So, you know, I really appreciate the developers’ willingness to make changes, but we still have this issue of changes that were passed and made and what are the implications going forward. I am concerned about what the Deputy Mayor said. I may support this referral. I’m gonna listen to the rest of the debate, but I will be speaking with the residents and the public in general, and really trying to understand what it is that we’ve done in the changes that we’ve made and the impacts that these are gonna have across our city and what our options are when a revised plan comes forward.

Just, you’re just starting us right there again, so I appreciate you wrapping it up. Other speakers to the referral? Go ahead, Councilor Trossam. Well, I’m glad to the chair that we’re not talking about passing this tonight, ‘cause I think that would be something that I would not be willing to support.

I’m not sure about the referral. My problem with the referral is if we do a referral, are we going to be able to have another public participation meeting with respect to the many amendments that are gonna be made? Go ahead. Thank you, through your worship, yes, that’s correct.

There will be another public participation meeting. Go ahead, Councilor Trossam. Well, I’m always worried about the deadline, but it sounds as if we have something in writing. My worry about sending this back is I would prefer, and I think it would be cleaner, to just reject this application, which of course would be without prejudice to them bringing it back.

If going the root of referral, if going the root of referral may save us the expense and risk of litigation, I’m good for that. But my sense is, when all is said and done, if we don’t give the developer what the developer wants at the end of the process, he’s gonna take us anyway. So I guess I would like to get some guidance. I guess I would, just stop my time for a second.

I’m just gonna look this way ‘cause I’m getting better vibes over here. I guess I’m just going to say that I’m uncomfortable with the referral, but what I would like to know from Steph is how much of a risk would it be to just say no to this, understanding that the developer can come back and just refile an application that has the changes in it. May I ask that? Yes, and let me just provide some context for our staff in their response to this.

I think just for you to help preface your comments, I think part of the questions that I’m hearing from colleagues is committee says no. I think there’s members of the community very happy with no. One of the concerns that the deputy mayor raised in the referral was when we said no, we created a bit of a double negative staff for extra layering on some significant restrictions in part B of the clause. If we just say it right now and it goes to the OLT, that there could be some level of risk that we’ve taken no position on those restrictions.

And obviously you can’t predict what would happen at the OLT, but I think the councilors are trying to ask, is it good to do the referral to not only have a discussion about what might be there and that there would still be public engagement, but how does that relate to any sort of OLT proceeding and I don’t know how far you can comment on that? I think that would be helpful to all of us if you could provide some context within that space. Through you, worship. If should this go to the OLT, the report itself, the planning report would be the evidence that would be provided.

And so those matters that the planner would report on would be dealing with those special provisions that are outlined. So we’d look at the properties a whole. Having said that, the chair or the member of OLT would have to take those matters into consideration, but there was always a counterpart represented by the applicant. So really it is, it’s a 50/50 chance, but ideally they would be looking at the policy framework, being provincial planning statement, the official plan being the London plan, the zoning framework in terms of what those permissions are.

What isn’t in the recommendation and what we’ve heard from the public is about the height. And so height of six stories is a permitted permission within the London plan. And so there wouldn’t be that debate at the OLT. Yeah, I’m inclined not to support the referral, although I still want to hear the rest of the debate.

I just want to tell people in the neighborhood through the chair that I think that these are the types of issues that come up all the time. And one of the things that I’m worried about is don’t, if this gets referred, don’t let it wear you down. You gotta come back and come to the next meeting through the chair, of course. But I’m very impressed with the quality of the comments that I’ve received.

And I’m very concerned about this project. I represent, I’m just across the way in Adelaide. And I have very similar concerns from my neighbors in Old North and elsewhere. So I really think that I’m glad to see this is not going through tonight, but I guess we’re not, I guess one way or another, we’re not done with it.

So here we are. Other speakers, go ahead, Councillor ramen. Thank you. And on the referral, I just wanted to get clarification because I think I’m understanding this differently related to a potential, how this would be perceived by a tribunal on this matter.

So my understanding is that whatever decision we render today, they would look at the entirety of the application, which includes the special provisions which were recommended for refusal, and the part on the zoning, which was recommended for acceptance, they would look at the response from the committee, which was non-support, and any decision we made at council. And from there, they would look at all those, that information as evidence and make a decision. I understand what staff is saying on the six stories. I do believe though, is there not a way for us to clean that up?

So I’ll go back to the question about the tribunal is in the request for the refusal through the amendment that was brought forward, it seemed as though the decision between, or the information around the acceptance of the zoning, and the refusal of the special provisions was going to be seen as decoupled, but my understanding is these are all part of the same application, so when they’re looked at, they’re looked at as a whole in the application, not decoupled into set sections in the conversation. I’m just trying to get clarity, I don’t know if that was clear to you, but. Go ahead. - Thank you, through your worship.

Yes, that’s correct. That’ll be looking at the application as a whole, what the applicant submitted was with those special provisions to allow the reductions that staff did not support. So that would be that, we’ll say debate at the OLT, it’ll be the staff position and their opinion, which is contrary to the applicant’s position. Thank you, through you.

So I read this as contemplated as a partial refusal, but I actually think then to follow that chain of thought, then the decision coming out of planning, and then whatever decision this council makes, and let’s say in this case, the speculate that it’s not approved, then to me, that’s actually a stronger case for saying, we don’t support what was proposed at this time, the way that it was conceived and brought forward, I think where it creates a challenge is actually supporting the referral, because if we support the referral, then we’re saying, well, there were portions that yes, we all agreed with, but coming at a committee, committee did not agree with those things, and having listened to that discussion at committee, I actually think I’m more comfortable not supporting a referral, because I think it creates a level of indecision that actually creates a harder case to take to the OLT. We had a strong recommendation coming out of PEC, and that was not to support this. So we weaken our position if we don’t, if we move forward with the referral. That’s just the way I read the situation.

I’ll add myself to the list of Councillor Frang, Chair. Thank you, and recognizing the mayor. So this is a really good discussion, because I think there’s a number of us who are trying to support some concerns of the community, but we have a bit of a difference of thought on what might be the best way to do that, ‘cause here’s my understanding of the OLT process. The city gets standing, and the developer gets standing, and the kind people in the gallery don’t get to say anything there.

And so if it goes to the OLT through refusal, basically what’s gonna happen is, our staff are gonna talk, the developer’s gonna present their original piece, and someone there is gonna figure all this out. And I don’t disagree with Councillor Roman that we could be pretty definitive on our position, but we basically leave it up in the air, and what we do know is that there is a base, there is a base permission for six stories there. So that probably doesn’t, I don’t know, I’m not gonna predict what the OLT will do, but basically that’s that situation. In what the deputy mayor is suggesting, although I would agree there’s some risk that we haven’t really finalized the council position, we put it back into a process where we know there’s a commitment not to appeal, there’s a commitment to modify the development, and there is a whole other opportunity for the public to say whether they like or not what comes out the other end of that process before we actually have to go to an appeal.

And I, although I respect what Councillor Roman said, I actually think that from the public’s engagement perspective, that might be a better process to ensure that what comes out the other end might be a modified proposal that our staff have given, planning committee feedback on, public has weighed in on, then we go fight that at the OLT perhaps or not. Maybe it’s acceptable to the public, maybe it’s not. But I think I’m gonna support the referral because I think that gives an opportunity to change the development and reduce the units, address some of these concerns, gives the public another opportunity to present with a revised application, and we’re not just leaving it up to the OLT to decide with no public standing whatsoever there. So I’m gonna support the referral, not because I disagree with what some of my colleagues who support the referral will say, I just think it gives another opportunity for modification.

We don’t have to, we don’t let someone at the OLT decide the final piece on this yet, and we give the public another opportunity for a say on whatever comes out the other end. So I’ll support the referral, and this discussion won’t be over, but it’ll be on something else and not what’s necessarily been proposed originally by the developer. Thank you, and I’ll return the chair back to the mayor. Okay, others, speakers.

Okay, so this is on the referral. We’re gonna open that for voting. Is it wrong? No, and my screen is frozen.

Noted, thank you. Closing the vote, motion carries, 10 to four. Councillor Layman. Thank you, Mayor, that concludes the fifth report of the Planning Environment Committee.

Okay, so the fifth report of Planning Committee is done, we have added reports now, so we have two items that are coming out of in-camera for public consideration and vote. Councillor Frank has kindly volunteered to kind of volunteer, volunteered to read out the end-camera piece, so I’ll turn it to you, Councillor Frank. Sixth report of the council enclosed session. Your council includes session report.

One, RBC Place Double Tree Lease, that on the recommendation of the city manager with respect to the RBC Place Double Tree Lease, the following actions be taken. A, the request from Lening Convention Center Corporation with business name RBC Place London to enter into a lease agreement with Holloway Lodging Limited Partnership to lease space in the Double Tree Ballroom located at 300 King Street, London, Ontario, from January 1st, 2028 to December 31st, 2030, if the purpose of doing so is for the object of the London Convention Center Corporation, set out in subsection two of the London Act, City of London Act 1992, being to maintain, operate, manage, market, and promote the Convention Center for the benefit of the city and the people of the city of London be approved and be the civic administration be authorized to undertake all administrative steps necessary in connection with this lease extension. Two, property acquisition, Hamilton Road, slash Southeast Thames River Parks, that on the recommendation of the deputy city manager finance supports with the concurrence of the director of parks and forestry environment and infrastructure on the advice of the director of realty services with respect to part lot eight concession one Westminster and part one foot reserve abutting Cardinal Lane plan 747 designated as parts four and 25 on 33 R nine three seven two, except part eight on plan 33 R one nine seven six seven, being all of pin zero eight one nine eight dash zero one three six and part lot eight B F concession B Westminster designated as a part one on plan 33 R one eight seven eight seven, being all of pin zero eight one nine eight dash zero one two five, being the property in the city of London as shown on appendix B, the following actions be taken. A, the offer submitted by Robert Klein the vendor to sell the subject subject property to the city for the sum of two hundred and thirty five thousand seven hundred and twenty dollars be accepted subject to the terms and conditions as set out in agreement as appendix C and B, the financing for the acquisition be approved as set out in the source of financing report here too as appendix A, that progress is made with respect to items four point two and four point four noted on the public agenda.

Okay, that’s presented here. Let’s like you’re presenting a report. So you get to stay there and that’s on the floor. Any discussion or debate on those two items from colleagues?

If not, then we can vote on them. Okay, we’ll open that vote. Noting Councilor for absent and Councilor Trosso absent closing the vote motion carries 12 to zero. We’ve got no deferred matters.

We’ve got no inquiries that I see. No emergency motions that were submitted. We’re on to bylaws. We have a few pages of bylaws.

And I think we can divide it up this way. We’ll do bill. So Councilor Stevenson, I think you’re online. You, I think you were contrary on bills 133, 137 and 141 but you were the only one.

So I could put those all together. So if you want to vote against those bylaws, you could. And we could do those as a set. 133, 137, 141, okay.

Councilor Van Mirbergen and Stevenson, I think you voted against the Wellington Gateway Project and the East London Link Project. Bill’s 147 and 148. We could do those together, if you guys are okay. And then we could do everything else.

And then the added bill, okay. So everything plus the add-ins from the camera would be next. That’s kind of everything everybody could do on. And then the last thing we’ll do is the licensing amendment that Councilor Frank passed, which I think there might be some.

That’s the alternate version of the bylaw, an amendment to the bylaw, based on the changes we made to the age 12 thing. All right, so we’ll do that way. I see everybody nodding. Great.

This will be a lot faster by packaging them together that way. So is there anybody who is good with everything we did today? Oh, usually this is the two of you. Deputy Mayor Lewis and Councillor Cuddy are gonna move and second everything ‘cause they’re very agreeable.

So we’ll do that. And we’re going to do 133, 137, 141. These are related to the items, Councillor Stevenson wanted separate. We’ll do first reading of that.

Present vote, motion carries 12 to one. Okay, and we’ll do second reading. Any discussion on second reading? Seeing none, we’ll open that for voting.

Present vote, motion carries 12 to one. And third reading of the same bill, same mover and seconder. And carries 12 to one. Okay, the next we’ll do bills 147 and 148, related to the Wellington Gateway and East London Link.

I’ll have that moved by Deputy Mayor Lewis, and seconded by Councillor Cuddy, and we’ll open first reading. Motion carries 11 to one. Okay, second reading of those two bills. Look for any discussion.

Okay, seeing none, we’ll open that for voting. And carries 12 to? Third reading of those bills, we’ll open that for voting. Motion carries 12 to one.

So now we have everything else, including the audits, with the exception of the stuff related to the Airbnb stuff. The business licensing piece. So it’s everything about that. I’ll explain what that one is in a moment.

So if you wanted to vote against that, it’s not coming out. It’s everything else on the agenda, including the audits now. Okay, so this is, first reading’s gonna open for voting. Motion carries 14-0.

Okay, we’ll open second reading. Is there any discussion on second reading? Okay, seeing none, we’ll open that for voting. And carries 14-0.

Third reading is open for voting. Motion carries 14-0. Okay, the final item we have is the business licensing by-law item with the amendments that Councilor Frank asked earlier. We’ll open that for first reading.

It carries 13-1. And second reading, any discussion? Okay, seeing none, we’ll open that for voting. And carries 13-1.

Okay, third and final reading. We will open that for voting. Motion carries 13-1. Okay, that concludes all of the items before us.

We only have a motion to adjourn left. Councilor Van Mirbergen and Councilor Ferreira moved and seconded. We can do this one by hand. All those in favor of adjournment?

Motion carries. All right, we’re adjourned. Thank you very much. Enjoy watching the moon launch tomorrow, four night.