Budget Committee, Feb. 24, 2021
Meeting recap (the important stuff):
The $175.2 million capital budget (1.95 police budgets) was approved yesterday along with an update to the administrative order allowing the city’s CAO to put out tenders for the capital projects. Although there was some minor opposition, just Councillor Russell, in giving the CAO that power, it was ultimately decided by the committee to get tenders out the door to take full advantage of the short summer construction season.
Councillor Lovelace tried some political wrangling to fast track an extension of the highway for Sylvania Terrace, which would give the subdivision’s residents an alternate route in their community. Although councillors were generally in support of Lovelace’s intent, they said they couldn’t support her motion, with Cleary dubbing Lovelace’s attempt to get a capital project into the budget ‘parking lot’ “the Lovelace Gambit.”
Later in the meeting, Hendsbee also tried the ‘Lovelace Gambit’ to try and expedite the improvements to Trunk 7 (Main Street) which is one of a dozen major road redevelopments in the works (it can be found here on page 171). In his proposal, he said that it would be a huge step forward in implementing the city’s African Nova Scotian Road to Economic Prosperity Action Plan. And building needed infrastructure to support African Nova Scotian communities is a major part of this plan. These road improvements will better connect East Preston, North Preston and Cherry Brook to the HRM, as well as benefiting AKOMA’s redevelopment.
Both gambits were unsuccessful because councillors correctly pointed out that if the budget process can be hijacked by individual councillors’ priorities, then the whole process breaks down. And that’s absolutely true and a very valid reason to vote against both motions.
However, when examining what systemic racism looks like, this is it in action. Yesterday councillors were given an impossible choice. The choice was in essence a vote to allow the city’s budget to be unfairly distributed in the future or to help correct an ongoing historic injustice caused by budgets being unfairly distributed for give or take 400 years. Regardless of what councillors may have wanted, the budget system did not allow for racial justice.
On infrastructure renewal, a large chunk of the meeting was dedicated to traffic calming. Brad Anguish, Executive Director of Transporation and Public Works, explained repeatedly, in detail, for an eternity (probably only an hour, this meeting was really long you guys), the problems and potential solutions to the city’s traffic calming Administrative Order. Which he also did on Jan. 12, 2021, to this committee. In an effort to see what can realistically be done Councillor Cleary asked for $1 million to be added to the budget ‘parking lot’ for traffic calming. Even if this money doesn’t make it into the final budget, part of this motion will produce a staff report outlining what the city can actually accomplish with its current staffing resources, if given more money.
Continue reading below to see how the meeting played out.
Who said what (paraphrased):
Russell: Roll call!
*Councillors are talking about bullying, and this op-ed from Suzanne Rent for the Examiner explains why Pink Shirt day is at best ineffective, and at worst harmful reputation washing*
Russell: Everyone’s here but Mason, he’ll be here later. There are no public speakers signed up for this, but you can sign up here and every budget meeting has this opportunity. Up next capital plan budget, presented by the CAO.
*Awkward waiting for the slideshow to be put on screen*
CAO: There’s a lot of planning that goes into the capital budget, what’s the difference between the budget and the plan? It’s this:
CAO: Here’s how we pay for capital funding:
CAO: But Jane Fraser has frequently explained how this works. Capital projects are more than just big spending the projects need to be evaluated based on need. We have no shortage of good ideas, we have a shortage of money. The decisions on what to fund can be hard without a methodology. The pressures of ageing buildings and not wanting to raise taxes is a big catch-22. Here’s how we evaluate our long term capital planning:
CAO: Capital planning is an ongoing process, it’s not a once-a-year budget process. Once the assessment is done, we figure out if we can do it. It’s possible that we don’t have the space for it, or it can’t be done in the current schedule. We can’t renovate the Metro Centre when the Memorial Cup is on, for example, or we need to find the money. It doesn’t make sense to take money to pay for something if we won’t build it for a few years. We usually prioritize projects using these questions while eating pizza.
CAO: We realized this year we can’t keep up with what we need based on current funding. So it’s going up, but can and will be adjusted as we move through this. But we’re not spending enough to meet our needs. We’re very lucky in the HRM to have such a strong leadership team. Here’s how our new capacity vs renewal break down. New is grey, maintaining is blue:
CAO: Here are the changes, this year is blue, next year is black:
CAO: The changes are due to new information and updating our assumptions with data. Here’s the breakdown of what we’re looking to spend in the future. This plan is subject to change at every budget process, this is just in-principle approval for long term projects and just gives us more information about what we should be planning to do. And then here’s how we plan to pay for it:
CAO: Here’s our planned projects:
CAO: We also work to make sure we have partners to reduce the cost to the city. We need your approval to do multiple-year projects because in approving multi-year projects you’re also saying you plan on paying for it until it’s done. Here’s the legislation and recommendation to you:
CAO: Questions?
Outhit: Most of us understand that you can’t do the Windsor exchange and Cogswell for example, but until we do Windsor Street exchange a lot of plans are on hold, BRT and Bedford plan, and we have federal money for it that we’ll need to reapply for. We also need to think about where we want growth. My concern is how are these things all going to dovetail together? How will this impact our regional planning?
CAO: You want the motion on the floor before I answer?
Russell: Motion, please.
Outhit: Can we just answer the question? I can’t see the motion in the chat.
CAO: Windsor and Cogswell can proceed sort of as planned, we’re delayed by a year, obviously, but we have a plan and I’m not worried about it. There’s a lot of planning that requires the exchange to be done. We’ve looked at this, someone else can give more detail, but we’ve made sure it will all flow together.
Kelly Denty: The issues are of budget envelope and disruption. Bedford Highway is a corridor and we need to make sure the construction happens at the right time. The concern is generally, if the money isn’t there is it not happening? But it is happening, and we’re just making sure it lines up with when funding is available.
Outhit: It makes sense but where it’s murky is when do we find out if it’s happening for sure? We know development and growth needs to paired up with infrastructure. We don’t want to stall development, but the days of ‘build and trust us’ are gone.
Denty: We can look at traffic on an individual basis (they do, but it’s hugely flawed). If there’s additional capacity we can do it faster. This is just making sure everyone knows there’s a plan.
Mason: *Reads the motion for agenda item 5 as written* One question, we’ve had years and years of finding efficiencies and making the budget tighter and trying to cut back, and you’re always looking to do that. We’re not going to find $10 million in the budget laying around, we’re going to be talking about more debt and more taxes (taxes are good). But snow removal on sidewalks, where are we with addressing the equipment problems we’ve been having?
Jerry Blackwood: Since the storm on the 7th there have been questions about service standards and equipment breakdowns. We have three different types of sidewalk snow removal tools. We had a plan for buying two more machines, but after the storm we looked at the plan and what we’re going to do is defer road equipment and divert it to an additional five trackless machines which we hope to have next year. We can move forward with those tenders, it gives us a lot more options and helps with service standards.
Brad Anguish: Where we were functioning was one machine per route with no backup, this new plan will give us backups for 50 per cent of our routes. Blackwood’s also changing the repair standards and coming up with plans to make sure we can react faster. Most machines are up, save one.
Mason: The state of good repair isn’t just buildings, it’s fleets too, we have a lot of trucks, and we have to stop deferring it eventually, but that’s not for today.
Savage: For the new councillors this is a lot of new information and work, there’s a temptation to say ‘it’s not on the list!’. Our capacity doesn’t meet demand, it never has in Canada or North America, and it never will. Capacity doesn’t meet demand. It’s a fact of life for governments, businesses and families. I think it’s important to juxtaposition us against pre-amalgamation. The national debt in Canada has doubled since 1995, the provincial debt has doubled, the debt of Halifax has gone down by about $100 million. Municipalities get 8 per cent of our taxes but provide 60 per cent of government services (There’s a fun strategy that provincial and federal politicians use to balance budgets, which is cutting items from their budget to reduce the cost, but then just punting the service down to the lower level of government). In the years to come, we have big projects and we have to fund them. No government will be able to do all the things it wants to do, we’ve had to do projects where other levels of government bailed on us and we had to pay for them (see the parentheses above). Question for Fraser, every year the financial indicators say we’re in good shape, but flag the reserves.
CFO Jane Fraser: The Dept. of Municipal Affairs and Housing does it, and we always score very high on the fiscal indicators, but we’re not perfect on reserves and capital reserves. We’d need about $400 million sitting around for the Dept. of Municipal Affairs and Housing to give us a passing grade on those. The purpose of the reserves are to deal with unforeseen circumstances or opportunities.
Austin: I’m generally happy with what’s in front of us, it’s good to see our plans laid out in a specific plan like this. The $50,000 streetscape renewal, Portland Street where the old brick streetscaping was put in place, and we have no maintenance budget for it, and if we do that the new things fall apart. Where are we on the streetscaping plan to fix this stuff? We’re not going to fix it by doing one little thing at a time, they don’t have capacity.
Anguish: Our road operations team are going to pick up where they left off last year, and we remain hopeful that we’ll finish it this year. There’s some re-capitalization planned. We’re also going to renew the garbage cans and paint the planters.
Austin: I have to complain it’s been two years now and we’ve only covered twice the space of this *blurred out* room. The Burnside transit garage, it’s a multi-million dollar plan required for electric busses, where is that in the budget? What’s the status of our request to the feds?
Dave Reage: The Burnside rebuild is in the plan, but not part of the initial plan (Dartmouth always coming in behind the peninsula). It’ll come in future years, and electric busses can go to Dartmouth.
Austin: Not much mention of the strategic reserves, we’re only withdrawing $500,000 from it? Is there a plan to withdraw from it in future years?
Fraser: We’re going to come back, year to year and re-asses, but we do have funding allocated year over year as well. It’s a much broader conversation.
Smith: This is a very in-depth budget book, and I enjoy this part of the budget because it show’s where we’re planning to go. The Fort Needham washrooms, how far along are we on that? The washrooms were phase 2? George Dixon Centre, the estimated budget remaining is $4 million, is the rest of it for maintenance? It’s a very old building. Common pool, the detailed design aspect, are we going back to the community for that? Or is the common plan the engagement for that?
Denise Schofield: Fort Needham, the washrooms are part of phase 2, there’s a plan for the field too, but we’re going to do that when it’s up for renewal. The washrooms are close to being tendered and everything else will be when it’s up for renewal. The money for Dixon is to keep the building going until it’s included in a plan. We’re talking with the YMCA and what could be done there if it’s a new facility. We’re planning for a replacement or major rehab. The common pool, the masterplan is the primary consultation for that pool.
Smith: The Dixon, when it comes to maintenance, how are we dealing with the pottery lab? It requires a lot of maintenance? And could be coming to end of life? It’s the only accessible pottery lab on the peninsula.
Schofield: There’s new regs about pottery labs, and the St. Andrew’s Centre has an accessible pottery lab. We’re trying to figure out if we can meet the new regulations for air quality.
Kent: I’d like to revisit splitting up the motion into three or four separate motions. I think it’s important for councillors to focus on one over the other.
Russell: We normally don’t need a motion to do that, but we can talk about it.
Kent: If we don’t need a motion to do that, the other question I have is on our five minute speaking time. Is it our speaking time or our speaking and staff responses?
Russell: If you speak for four minutes and the staff speaks for three your time is up.
Kent: I’m going to talk about the same thing I always do, traffic calming and speeding on streets. I know there’s planning on coordinated projects, I also know we still have the list of traffic calming around a framework that’s not going to fit our need. I need some clarity about where I can see some kind of indication that we have the ability to strengthen our approach to traffic calming and speed on our streets in this capital project. I need to know we’re taking the concerns around traffic seriously. I want to know how we can change away from the model, using that list that is too long. I appreciate we’re never going to be able to meet the demand, but within street safety, it’s very localized. What’s reasonable to expect out of this budget?
CAO: Traffic calming is a multi-faceted issue, the RCMP, HRP, CPW and transportation standing group are all involved in that work. If you look at the streets and the numbers, we’re looking at putting traffic calming in streets that don’t need it, quite frankly. We’re coming up with a pilot to use cameras to catch speeders. About the list, we’re prioritizing it for schools and four or five hotspots in your districts. I don’t want to divulge in public what the police are doing in tactics, but they’re on it.
Anguish: The current AO is not functioning as needed for council, but that’s how council is operating. It was amended a couple of times, but the priority streets are anything 40km or above. It’s 2900 streets and would take about 100 years or so to complete. Understanding this, we asked staff to take a look at this and we’re ahead of other municipalities, some of the things we have to fix. Speed threshold is too low leading, the AO has a points system that doesn’t allow staff to use their expertise. We don’t prioritize vulnerable street users (pedestrians) we just prioritize speed, which means we can’t do anything about it. Speeding concerns aren’t flagged in this if you have a low street speed but people speeding on your street, that doesn’t get flagged. We removed community consultation which has not been great. The priority is reducing injury collisions, but that isn’t happening on the streets that qualify for traffic calming. We’re looking at implementing cameras, it’s not buying the cameras, it’s how to you make the pictures legal enough to give tickets. My operating budget hasn’t come to you yet, so you haven’t seen our plans. The other problem with the AO is adjacent streets. If we put traffic calming on one street we’ve just moved the problem to other streets. We’re hoping to get a new AO to you next fall. What do we do in the interim? Get us your hotspots. We want to make sure your view and understanding of your communities are given to staff. The plan is failing in the recapitalization and the IMP. That’s why streets that are way down on the list are getting traffic calming, and it’s causing confusion in residents. In summary, what have we done? In 2018-19, 19-20 we did 13 streets each year. Last year we did 30. This year we’re looking to get 52 streets done, and it’s in our recommendation to council. Is it enough? Debatable, but it’s an increase over where we are.
Hendsbee: I’m pleased to see the Sheet Harbour Community Centre and fire station here. Cain Street in North Preston is getting recapitalization (finally), also like the trail plan to connect the Atlantic View Trail to the McDonald House. The rural transportation plan, when do we start doing some of the design for it? We need some funding to help move the rural transit plans along. Is there a plan in the budget to take over rural roads from the province? When’ll we get the cost/cost-sharing for fixing those roads and the Crane Hill Bridge? Do we have plans for that? Ross Road realignment (HOLY CRAP IS THIS ON THE BOOKS? THIS IS AMAZING NEWS FOR ME SPECIFICALLY). It’s an excellent opportunity for a park’n’ride since the Preston communities don’t have transit access, we can get more busses in there. The study for multi-modal transit on HWY 7 is needed. Two last questions; street light inventory, where are we at with the street lights that are in the ‘gray zone’ (not quite explicitly owned by the city or province)? We need a review of the solid waste strategy, if we’re going to demolish these facilities we’re not upholding our promises.
Anguish: Rural Active Transit can only be enabled through LIC (FYI everyone hates TLAs, IMO) and we’re working on it, we’re hoping to have it to council by April, maybe May. The planning is very detailed and we can hit the ground running. It’s not a plan to get a plan is what I’m saying. The road takeover, it’s ~300km and we’re looking at modernizing the transfer and making sure it can take place. Crane Hill is on the transfer package, don’t have the details yet though, it’ll cost the city about $5 million a year. Light inventory, data transfer from NS power has been a real point of frustration, it’s a top priority, we think it can be resolved quickly, but we can’t do it without the data. Solid waste strategy, we have a plan and are drafting our terms of reference. Trunk 7/Main Street is in the capital plan.
Denty: On Ross Road, we are pursuing the land to get the corridor built. It not being in the capital plan is because we don’t have a plan yet for it. We’re making the plan for it.
Lovelace: I think it’s important to have these discussions to figure out what we want vs what we need. We need accessibility play structures. I don’t see, which I know we need, a second exit for Highland Park. I think it’s important we prioritize safety issues. While I know rural provincial roads cost $5 million, but this budget book is on municipal things. Where do cemeteries and wharves fit when they get transferred to municipalities? It’s my understanding when we get wharves they go to parks so they can’t get industrial use anymore. Are green bin replacements free? There’s a typo with the cost of the landfill on page H2, but how often are we doing silt transfers at the landfill? The speed camera plan, is this a capital budget item?
Schofield: Accessible parks, we have over 400 playgrounds, we can’t do them all. We’re prioritizing schools and community parks. This year we’re doing an accessibility audit though, to inform us on where we should be focusing. We own and manage six cemeteries, if you’re talking about the policy that allows for private cemeteries (we privatize our eternal slumber, nice) to be taken over by the city hasn’t been used yet. One of the cemeteries we do need to work on is the Camp Hill fence because it requires a lot of maintenance as is. The wharves are primarily personal use, no industrial components.
Anguish: Green bins are free to replace. We ran out this year due to COVID, but it’s free. The silt dredging is done every five years. What’s the typo?
Lovelace: The carryover.
Anguish: Ah, yeah. We agree.
Lovelace: Is the issue a stormwater issue?
Staff (Andrew, no last name given): It’s about clean runoff water, we just dredge the runoff lake as needed when it accumulates.
Lovelace: The question was why are speeding cameras capital?
Anguish: A lot of the studies that require capital spending are done using capital money.
Blackburn: Where are we with the Lucasville Greenway? When will we start to see that in the budget book? The Margeson Drive master plan and park’n’ride, what’s up with those?
Reage: It’s a good project that just doesn’t fit with the current plan. Right now Margeson Road park’n’ride is in 2025/26.
Blackburn: Are there plans to expand the Wheatons terminal?
Reage: Not at this time.
Dave MacIsaac: Lucasville Greenway, we continue to do functional planning, a.k.a. prep work. We’ve also submitted it to the province for funding. It’s still a little bit beyond the four year outlook for when construction can start. It’ll depend on hearing back on provincial money. It’s important but expensive.
Denty: Margeson master plan is being currently worked on. It’s advancing but slowed down a bit.
Cuttell: One question about Herring Cove functional plan, that still hasn’t come forward but says it was done in 2019. The total estimated cost is $27 million, the budget over the next four years is a huge gap. This project is important because there’s been a large amount of approved development in this area, and we already need a functional plan. What is the long term plan for that? Right now it looks like it’ll be done in 2030? It’s nice to see Herring Cove Road and Woodcrest Avenue where that unfortunate accident happened. We don’t want the fatality to happen to justify the action (the decision to add the traffic lights to that intersection happened in early 2021, Sarah Richardson was hit by a van losing her twins in December 2020) When I look at the list of traffic calming initiatives have they been ID’d by the existing AO? There hasn’t been a traffic calming initiative in District 11 since 2017. Blackburn’s had 20 since 2017, and has a bunch of projects coming forward. I’ve been told District 11 doesn’t have speeding issues, but that’s just not true. How was this list put together? How can we address this differently in the future?
Denty: Herring Cove Road functional plan, the amounts you see are for the design work, and then later, there’ll be larger amounts for construction.
Anguish: In terms of traffic calming, staff is using the AO, we do some judging on smaller scale stand alone projects. We use the priorities on the list, but if it’s up for recapitalization, we’ll put traffic calming in when we do that. The streets that aren’t making it are streets with a very low 85th percentile speed (words, mean things, sometimes, to some people). As for speeding on every street, it’s not properly captured in the AO (for reasons he explained in answering Kent above). In the meantime, if you have streets you want us to look at, please, please, give it to us to look at.
Cuttell: I am disappointed to see the lack of traffic calming in District 11.
Russell: The budget book can be found on the HRM’s website (which you can find by clicking here).
Purdy: The Caldwell Road redesign, I didn’t see it, did I miss it? Is that still a go in the next couple of years? And thank you to Mr. Anguish for explaining in detail the traffic calming issues.
Denty: I turned my camera on too quickly, it’s Anguish.
Anguish: I need to call Dave Hubley.
Dave Hubley: Caldwell Road is on our five year program, it’s not in the budget because we’re going to do it in-house. We’re probably going to start it next year.
Deagle-Gammon: There’s a typo on page D7.
Schofield: Yes it’s a typo, we’ll correct it.
Russell: No more first time speakers.
Kent: I like that there’s money to add trails to get water access in the Passage. Off-leash dog park in the Passage, is there funding for it? I don’t see it here. How would I see budget items come forward for the Eastern Passage Commons plan in future years? Can district capital funds be used to help make this happen faster? (You wouldn’t know her district includes Portland Hills.)
Schofield: Council has approved an off-leash park strategy. Once the consultations are done and we figure out where to put them, then you’ll see the money. We try not to budget for them until we know where they’re going. Ditto splash pads. We’re focusing on the bigger splash pads before we focus on the community specific ones. We don’t get too specific on land acquisition because it weakens our negotiation position, but yes, water access is coming.
Russell: It’s lunch, back at 1 p.m.
*Break for lunch*
Russell: And we’re back.
Lovelace: I think Outhit is first.
Russell: You’re the last person to speak for the first time.
Lovelace: I’m speaking for the second time.
Russell: …just go ahead.
Lovelace: Where are we on the assessment on our area rates? Some have a lot of funds and volunteers, some do not. How are projects assessed? Some places have a lot of money but might not be a registered society. Some might need things but don’t have the money or organization to do a budget.
Schofield: The administration of the area rates falls under finance. But every group submits a business plan, and there’s a spectrum of how well resourced the business plans are. We include the projects when they’re ready, but getting them ready, I don’t know how we support those groups.
Fraser: We work with the groups, and amended the AO to streamlined the process for area rate groups. Often they’re not doing capital stuff, they’re doing operation stuff, so we’ve made that easier for them too.
Lovelace: For groups that aren’t under the area rates, like parent associations, do they go through a different process? Since they’re contributing money?
Schofield: We have a service exchange agreement with the HRCE that lays out how playground replacement works. If parents have money there’s a process they can do at HRCE. We only replace playgrounds when it’s needed at end of life. If PTAs want to do a new playground, there’s a policy.
Lovelace: Are school playgrounds not a municipal asset?
Schofield: They are, but we want to make sure there’s equity in our playground policy. We don’t want affluent neighbourhoods to get all the nice things. We need to make sure each child at every school has a similar play structure.
Smith: Looking at the Forum redevelopment, we had a discussion about this and we had $50-60 million, but the budget book only has $26 million, has anything changed in terms of scope? Other opportunities? The new Needham, we’d have a new one now in an ideal world, but we’re looking at 2028. What’s going to be the approach there with the pool issues at Needham?
Schofield: Needham is one of our next top priorities, but the opportunity to get federal funding meant we had to do Sheet Harbour first. We also can’t have multiple recreation assets down. The Forum, we’ve deferred that out a year to find potential partnerships. The cost is still as high as we talked about, but they’re not within the four years captured by this budget. We’ll have more information on the Forum in the spring. Centennial is still leaking, we’re going to come up with a plan to address it in the summer. The replacement of the pool, we’re starting that process now. In order to add a pool to the Forum, well it’s probably too tight, due to the two rinks. But we’re looking at options. And Centennial needs to be replaced, and we’re starting that.
Smith: Needham and investment, we’re going to keep putting money into it until we replace it? How much will that cost?
Schofield: We’re doing the work, but I don’t have the specific numbers on cost.
Jerry Blackwood: No real detailed costs on Needham, but it’s a classic example of lifecycle costs on assets that are towards the end of their life.
Morse: At the very end of the binder, $2 million for HalifACT 2050, what’s that? $275,000 on tree planting, how will that be distributed? The March 31 federal funding deadline, what are we applying for?
Denty: HalifACT 2050, it’s a large account for various initiatives, right now we expect it to be mostly to EVs. The trees, we’re still evolving the projects, and we’ll get more detail as we get closer to planting.
Fraser: We submitted a bunch of applications for money to the feds, 27 projects, public transportation, green infrastructure, there’s a whole slew of ‘em. There have been some projects that got approved but not many. In May of 2020 we also kind of expected shovel-ready project money, but that program never materialized.
Austin: Sawmill River, it’s not going to be this year, but it is coming within four years, so that’s good. In 1971 Hurricane Beth caused us to divert a river underground but that pipe is coming to its end of life. But we’re going to bring that river back up to being a river. There’s a lot wrapped up in the plan to develop Dartmouth here. What happens to Prince Albert/Alderney/Portland? If we leave the project to Halifax Water we’ll get a nice concrete fish ladder, but can we make it nicer? Does it work to make the lower half of the canal greenway part of this project?
Schofield: Not at this time, but we’re going to align with Halifax Water because you’re right, they wouldn’t do it right for a park setting.
Austin: But if it’s not built into the budget, but Halifax Water can’t wait forever, it’ll require a dollar figure from us.
Schofield: We’re going to continue to refine the budget and it’ll be captured in that.
Austin: Do we have this identified for park planning? I’m worried we’re going to miss this opportunity like we did in the first phase.
Schofield: This one’s been on our books for 2021 or 2022, we’re not going to miss that one.
Hendsbee: Blueberry Run Trail, I just sent you a picture, it’s the last missing section that we need funding for. I’m seeing on E4, emergency capital, would this qualify to use some of that money for?
MacIsaac: We do have funds set aside, but they’re more for climate things, like annual washouts. Regarding Blueberry Run, there’s work to get a plan together.
Hendsbee: I was talking to Andy Fillmore about the active transportation infrastructure, if we put an application in they’ll look at it. How do we get an application in?
MacIsaac: That would be part of the overall plan we’re developing, it would happen at a later stage because the facility is on provincial land and operated by a community group, I’m not sure the city would be the organization to submit an application.
Outhit: I want to support Kent and Cuttell’s comments, I’m quite disappointed at the lack of traffic calming in suburban districts in this year’s plan. As far as surveying and voting I fought hard to get rid of that and I hope we don’t have votes to see if we should enforce our laws. We want traffic calming in school zones but schools on hills can’t have speed bumps. What’s the plan to make sure speeding isn’t okay if the school is on a hill. The change to street speeds, where are we with our application to province?
Anguish: Seven 40km zones were implemented this year, we got six on the books for this year. We think the province is listening, but we don’t know for sure. It’s in our Traffic Safety Act review to the province. The schools, speed bumps on hills can get cars airborne, so we don’t want that. We’re tracking those. We’ll keep going with the budget we have. We are now looking at streets that are dangerous with recapitalization being a long way out to see if we can bring them closer.
Cuttell: School zones again, there are 10 this year, but there’s only $150,000 allocated? Is that enough to do more than 10? Is the budget somewhere else? Wharves, the assessment of the wharf condition is to be done in the spring, can we do it before budget? There’s at least one that’s been damaged by ice this year. Councillor capital funds, are they going to be restored to pre-COVID levels? Climate action, there’s a budget allocation for buildings, but we’ve talked about sea-level rise, the project deliverables talk about building stock and transportation, can you talk about the costal issues?
Schofield: Wharf, we assessed, and there’s no need for capital budget, it’s operational. That’s why it’s not in there.
Anguish: School zone traffic calming is enough for 10, it’s one hump before and after the school zone. It’s not always exactly two humps, but it’s mostly that.
Fraser: District capita, they have been reinstated up to $1.5 million in section H. There’s no sheet in the book though, we’ll get that to you.
Russell: Is it also on page A1?
Fraser: Yes.
Denty: The HalifACT is a vulnerability assessment, the details will come later. And the things you’re asking about would fall under the details section. But when we do recapitalization on waterfront, we make sure we do sea level rise assessments.
Mason: I think we all recognize the traffic calming policy needs to evolve. We changed it to make it better, and now we need to fix it again because the list of streets that qualify is too high. If we give our staff standards that aren’t good enough, they’ll be doing what we say and we’ll hate it. It’s really important that we have no political say in where traffic calming goes, it should be based on evidence, not the loudest and noisiest residents, which is usually the ones that have more time and money. I like that the process is using evidence, I think we just need to tweak the evidence we are using to evaluate.
Savage: Source of funds, the capital from operations is built into our framework?
Fraser: Yes.
Savage: Other government programs is only $6.2 million, what is that? Is it dedicated? Is it a guess?
Fraser: It’s dedicated, we have a list.
Savage: Last year, two years ago, we got a doubling of the gas tax, which went into roads?
Fraser: Yes, more or less, it went to the reserves.
Savage: Gas tax is huge for us (it is, HRM’s three main revenue streams are property tax, deed transfer tax, gas tax). What happens if that happens again?
Fraser: We’d see what projects are underway and see what makes sense with the projects on the go.
Savage: Other cautionary $4.5 million?
Fraser: It’s LICs.
Savage: Can someone make a note to let me know what the $4.5 million is? Other government money at $6.2 million, it’s been higher in other years, and we’re planning on ten times as much next year, that green transit funding? Have we factored in provincial cost-sharing?
Fraser: Yes.
Savage: But it’s a guess?
Fraser: Yes, we have an understanding of what the cost-sharing is, but we don’t know if we’ll actually get it.
Savage: Properly funding our strategic initiatives is important to our success in growth, but as we grow the demands on us will also increase.
Kent: Anguish, the Miller composting purchase, is this a purchase that we are making and then operating? The Shearwater connector road can you give me an idea of what’s planned? The administrative order on traffic calming, there’s nothing here to prevent the traffic calming from being added to the list? Capital investment doesn’t go ahead for something else, can we add that money to traffic calming?
Anguish: The composting purchase council approved, the money is approved for the buyout. The traffic calming question, was more about shifting money?
CAO: I think it was directed at me, if there are any new projects or ideas that come forward, there’s a process, so that’s how it’d work. We do have an AO, which we have to follow, but we’re hearing that it’s not working. And if it doesn’t work we need a different model.
Kent: This was more about administrative order changes, would there be anything in the changes to the AO that would help us or make it more challenging.
CAO: Can’t answer that without knowing what a new AO looks like, but if we change it, it better be to make it better.
Denty: Shearwater connector, budget included $50,000 but the plan will come with the Portland Street connector plan, probably this fall.
Stoddard: I don’t want to beat traffic calming to death, but why wouldn’t speed bumps have been put in a school zone if it was freshly paved.
Anguish: Depends on the street, let me know what street it is, and I’ll tell you.
Stoddard: When snow is removed from sidewalks it damages front lawns and medians, and then we spend money to fix it. It seems to be a vicious cycle where we pay to remove it and pay to fix the damage we caused removing it.
Anguish: It’s operating budget, kind of, but there’s many reasons damage happens. In terms of fixing these things, the expectation is we’ll fix it, and if it’s a repetitive issue then we can address it. Things are improving though, and we’re doing our tendering process better so our equipment is better.
Stoddard: Just wanted to confirm that it was the contractors who paid for the fixes, not the city.
Lovelace: The horses, the Lancers, they’re an iconic experience for people who live and visit here. What’s the $200,000 for the Lancers for? They’re good at fundraising. The accessibility stuff they’ve done has been great. What’s the plan to make sure the investment is adding overall to the bigger vision?
Blackwood: It’s for state of good repair and to meet programming needs.
Schofield: The municipality owns the building, the Lancers just lease it, so we need to maintain it. The Lancers have submitted a proposal to update the common master plan which will outline how we move forward with the common. There’s more interest in things to put on the commons than space to put the things we want to on the commons.
Austin: Traffic calming piece, I agree with Mason. Policy should not be based on who can yell at us the loudest. Climate change and the trees, where are we at with the regular tree operation budget why is this different? Are just moving operational money into HalifACT to make it capital?
Anguish: I would never try such trickery! The tree planting is in our budget, which you have not seen yet. Tree planting was cut due to COVID. And we reached out to see if we could augment the tree planting with HalifACT since we couldn’t plant last year. But the cost of trees are going up because they’re in demand, as a result they’re $800 per tree.
Cleary: I also agree with Councillor Mason on politicizing traffic calming. I would like to move into the ‘parking lot’ an additional $1 million to traffic calming. When this comes back in the ‘parking lot’, can staff give us the straight goods. Let us know if for another million we can in fact add another 20-some-odd streets. Councillors should not be involved in picking streets (my fingers are cramping). I really don’t buy the idea that we can’t do all of these streets in a reasonable amount of time. I hope everyone votes to put it in the ‘parking lot’ so we can continue this discussion.
Austin: I’ll support this going into the ‘parking lot’. We tried to do this last year, but it didn’t work because we didn’t have enough staff. If we give you extra money, can you spend it? If not, what do you need to do it?
Anguish: As simple as it sounds to put humps, it’s pretty technical. We’ll come back with the parameters of what we think we can pull off this year. But I’ll also try and come back with what we need to put this in hyperdrive for a couple years.
Austin: Perfect, that’s what I asking for.
Mancini: Nothing like throwing a million bucks into a parking lot to have a conversation to make someone sign up to speak. I think it’s a worthwhile discussion. We finally have traffic calming on Montebello, but we’re testing it, but I’d like to understand the rationale behind testing this stuff instead of just putting in bump outs. When we install or consider installing traffic calming, I’d like to see the plan for communication.
Mason: I’m going to support this because it’s just as much finding out what we can do as spending money. This is a good exercise to demonstrate to council what the real costs are. This is one of the things I’d raise taxes for because it’s something the public is demanding.
Lovelace: I am also going to support this, it’s important for us to figure this out. I think we need to be careful about expectations. I don’t think the list we have is adequate, I think we need to take a different approach, but it’s the enforcement that stops speeding. People speed over speed humps (the new designs of both cars and speed humps mean it’s quite easy to speed over them, as anyone who has ever used the ‘Hampton Green bypass’ can attest to).
Hendsbee: There are temporary speed bumps that can be removed in the winter, if we want to do this we might have to be creative. Perhaps staff can at least think about it.
Deagle-Gammon: I’d also support this going to the ‘parking lot’, but just to clarify it’s $1 million and also what we need to do to improve our traffic calming strategy?
Cleary: We have an AO that dictates what we traffic calm, and they have to draw from that list unless we have a new AO in the next few weeks.
Deagle-Gammon: The AO they’re using isn’t working, *technical issues* that’s the clarity I’m looking for.
Anguish: His intention is to just hammer through the current AO list. Going into COVID the traffic counting program was cut, so there’s 200 streets that were cut. This ‘parking lot’ item is just plowing through the list generated by our current AO, so it’s seeing how we can improve going through it.
Cuttell: School zones are a priority and have been identified and there’s money for them. There’s also an ask to get councillors to identify five priority zones, where does that fit in?
Cleary: Point of order, I just want to be clear, there’s a lot of misinformation about the AO, they’re referring to a bias in an AO, there’s no bias built into the AO for traffic calming. There’s no bias against a region or people.
Russell: I would agree with that.
Kent: I appreciate you putting this forward, I support this motion, a question about the AO. It’s not doing what we need it to do. There’s some flexibility with identifying hotspots, could that not also be applied to this million in the ‘parking lot’?
Savage: I was inclined to vote against this, but when it comes back there’ll be some idea of what you would need?
Anguish: More or less.
Morse: School zones would be my priority and the AO is too broad. I’m only wanting to focus on school zones if we have evidence. I would like to see more consistency, some schools in my district have a lot of traffic calming and safety measures, but there’s at least one school in the area that has nothing.
Anguish: We absolutely have evidence, and that’s how we know some aren’t working. Schools are our priority.
Outhit: I was going to bring something forward, but this is a discussion we need to have. Those of you who ran campaigns repeatedly told me the number one and two issues were traffic calming and affordable housing. We need to do this.
Austin: All the 209 streets that need data collection, more than 200 of them will qualify. Is this a traffic calming program or a red book issue? Are we just not designing streets well enough? We all have the same goal, but we’re trying to do two different things in the same place.
Russell: I agree with part of this (OUT OF ORDER, CHAIR). We have streets in my area that have been waiting 30 years, I don’t see any other speakers (YOU’RE NOT OUT OF ORDER, SORRY).
M/S/C – Vote – Aye – Unanimous
Russell: Main motion, next speaker, Hendsbee.
Hendsbee: Quick comment about trees, Trudeau wants to plant trees, so there will probably be money for that we should take advantage of. The IT stuff in this budget, how much is hardware vs software? Upgrades? Licencing? In-house vs contracted out? Project management? There’s a lot of IT in this budget that we haven’t even scratched the surface on this. How far behind are we in tech terms?
Fraser: That’s quite an opener. There’s a mix of everything depending on the project. We’re doing a lot of work in cybersecurity. Where we are from a tech standpoint, on foundational pieces we hadn’t really looked at it. And we saw that in HRM finance, and it’s changing the way we do business and procurement. It’ll let us look at the way we deliver services and allow more evidence-based decision making. We should have done this project before we did a bunch of other ones because it would have made other projects easier. There’s a lot of stuff in here, it’s really quite a mixture, but if you have specific questions I can answer them.
Hendsbee: How much are we paying in licencing fees?
Fraser: It’s mostly operating costs. I can give you a breakdown.
Smith: HR and business transformation, it has a carryover of $14 million and spending $11 million, are these combined?
Fraser: It’s a $26 million buy.
Smith: Can we get more details on that? It’s IT, so we don’t physically see it, but it’s super important. Mackintosh Depot replacement, I have had no discussions with staff about replacing it. Any update would be useful, but are we planning for the future of having different vehicles? What’s the long term plan for the replacement? Or are we building something that meets today’s needs? Are the staff who work there consulted as they know their needs.
Blackwood: The depot is long overdue for a replacement and it’s planning for the future. Staff is consulted.
MacPhearson (project manager for the depot project): The project was tendered and closed and you’ll see it at council next month. We are planning for the future in the design. Staff was part of the discussions.
Smith: Which staff? Managers? Workers?
MacPhearson: Reps from each group of people who work there.
Smith: It’s important to consult the frontline workers, if that’s happened I’m happy.
Cuttell: There can always be bias in data collection, with what data you choose to collect and what data you choose not to collect (algorithms can be racist). It was in reference to what Anguish had mentioned, it would be very worthwhile to look at the data selection for the criteria because it’s not working right now. There’s a lot to go through in this document, this capital budget is based on things that started years ago, is there a way to amend this if they’re not priorities right now? The Brunswick Street improvement has streetscaping and putting power underground. Why isn’t that streetscaping with the other streetscaping? Are there parts we can prioritize over others?
CAO: This is the process to develop the capital budget, this is the opportunity to add or remove things. Just need a motion or motions. At the end of this meeting today or Friday (please today), we’ll get a motion that finalizes (in principle) this.
Fraser: What we’re doing today with the amendment is to approve the capital budget ahead of the operating budget in order to make sure the stuff that needs to be done this year gets tendered this year.
Austin: A1 in the capital plan, is this the $10 million we’re expecting to borrow this year?
Fraser: Kind of, I have a complete list that I can send you.
Austin: Are we withdrawing the $10 million then, this year?
Fraser: Yes, whatever’s left over after the cost-sharing.
Austin: We’re only taking out debt we need?
Fraser: Yes.
Austin: Just to plant the bug, when we have the discussion of surplus funds, I think we should direct it at strategic capital and it reduces the amount we have to borrow which saves us in the long run.
Smith: I’m back, four more questions and I’m done. HRP digital communication digital intercept system, what is that? HRP intranet refresh is $780,000. What type of engagement do we have with intranet? Is that a good investment? I haven’t used intranet that much even when it’s been available. I don’t know how much it’s being used though. IMP land acquisition, are we on track to get all the land that we need?
Fraser: Intranet refresh I have that for $360,000?
Smith: Yeah I used the total, not annual.
Fraser: For the HRP it’s for security.
Smith: Understanding we got the report from the AG. I’d rather do the security issues first, rather than the intranet. Because the intranet is not as important as that. Can I make a change like that?
Fraser: I’d defer to Chief Kinsella on that because it’s a business decision. There may be opportunities to change that.
Kinsella: The intranet refresh, not for this year, is about creating a robust and stable platform to share information internally. Included in that is access for all members. There are some public safety issues we could discuss in an in-camera session.
Smith: I would rather, see us push this to 2023/24 and get the IT security stuff done before we get the intranet done.
Russell: We have two speakers left, so potentially we won’t be back for Friday!
Traves: Where it’s a budget item for 2022/23, it’s not something that needs to be addressed in this budget, so there’s time for this conversation at BOPC before next year’s budget.
Lovelace: I’m putting something on the table for us to talk about past promises to our community. But I have done some homework. The long-standing issue for Highland Park only having one exit, council moved in 2019 to pursue the construction of a second exit. It hasn’t been budgeted for three years. It’s subject to a lot of approvals, but it’s not in here. What exactly is the issue for this community to get their second exit? If it’s the developer that doesn’t make sense because they want to develop it. I would like to put a million dollars in the ‘parking lot’ to make it happen?
Anguish: There’s work that has to be done to get to construction before we fund things. These books, they’re great books, but they’re fluid.
Peter Duncan: Land acquisition has been initiated, it’ll probably cost about $1 million with current rates.
Hubley: It’ll probably start in 2023.
Lovelace: It’s in the budget?
Hubley: No, it’s in our five year plan, in our dept.
Lovelace: The issue is that it’s tentative, and keeps getting kicked down the road. I have an opportunity to do something right now for my district. Which will also alleviate the issue of collision. I’d like to put a motion on the floor to get the design work done.
Russell: Motion to put $1 million in the ‘parking lot’ to get this moving?
Cleary: This is out of order? It’s not for this year, but there is a plan? And we’ve given staff direction already?
Austin: This is harder now with a new councillor. I can’t support this because our staff didn’t support this, and it was an 8-7 vote then. And I’m not going to vote for it now just because a new councillor is here.
Traves: Can Lovelace re-read the motion? I don’t know what the money is for?
Lovelace: Place up to $1 million in the ‘parking lot’ for the realization of the Sylvania Terrace extension.
Mancini: Point of order. If it’s not for this year’s budget is it in order? It’s bizarre to be adding this to the list today, right now.
Traves: It’s up to you. It’s not out of order to consider it.
CAO: If this was adopted by council and you got a report, the money wouldn’t be spent this year, so there’d be a carryover. We will not construct that this year even if it passes this year, so we’d just carry it forward.
Traves: Putting an item in the budget for carryforward still needs to be funded through taxes or whatever. So do you want to do that this year, if it won’t be delivered this year?
Hubley: It is going to take us one to two years to get it ready for construction. And the design work may or may not happen in-house. But it’s two to three years to spend money on this.
Mason: This is my fault because I said this process was going great. Everyone should blame Mason. (I am blaming Mason). We all have things we’ve promised that we haven’t been able to deliver, so that’s not enough for me to support you. Needham is like a decade late, at least. And I have a lot of things that I could put forward with the same urgency. And it’s going to affect taxes this year even if we can’t spend it for three years. We got people who don’t want to raise taxes and projects already funded, I can’t support it.
Kent: I don’t want to raise taxes (you should, collective buying is amazing, that’s why we have Costco memberships). We all have projects like this, I applaud your tenacity to bring it forward, but I can’t support it. Our ‘parking lot’ is growing and that’s concerning me. It’s putting the cart before the horse in this case.
Outhit: Is there a workaround here? Can Lovelace move that it’s put in the 2022/23 budget? Can we put the design cost into the ‘parking lot’?
Fraser: It’s not uncommon for us to put budget items in future budgets. Sometimes there’s allocation of money for things like land or planning. But I’d defer to the dept to see if they’re ready for the money.
Hubley: There’s some land issues, it’s owned by the province I think, I don’t know if I have time to check with our team, do you need an answer today?
Outhit: It’s just to pass a motion that would be in order.
Russell: Supplementary report?
Hubley: I’d hate to say something that’ll get me in trouble, but a supplemental report would be good.
CAO: It’s premature for Hubley to weigh in now. Passing a motion to get a supplementary report would be good. So let the motion stand and take your chances or talk to Hubley and come back with a better crafted motion.
Traves: I think there’s room for a compromise, a motion to add consideration of the design costs to the ‘parking lot’, which’ll trigger a supplemental report to see if the money can be spent.
Hendsbee: Let’s get the design aspect started! We gave approval in 2019! Do we need to buy the land before designing it? I have the same issue in Porter’s Lake! I’m in full support for something moving on this right now.
CAO: I think we should get a report on this, and then move. Lovelace is asking a great question ‘when do we see results?’
Lovelace: Thank you for this conversation, I couldn’t take advantage of this budget committee to put forward this long standing issue. We have hundreds of homes that need to exit this subdivision. I’ll withdraw the motion.
Russell: Back on the main motion, Hensdbee’s up.
Hendsbee: We have 12 major modal corridor studies in this budget, the Main Street/HWY 7. We need to move this up by a year, it’s budgeted for next year because in the African Nova Scotian Action Plan for Economic Development it talks about how necessary this is. Is there a way we can move this up by a year (if the answer is no, it’s systemic racism in action)? Not moving it up will be holding back Akoma.
Denty: It’ll depend on work plans and cash envelopes. Without a motion, the answer is no, and I can’t make any commitments right now.
Hendsbee: Do I have to make a motion?
Traves: Yeah it’d be a ‘parking lot’ item
Russell: Yes. ‘Parking lot’.
Hendsbee: So moved.
Cleary: Hendsbee is using the Lovelace Gambit! I’m not going to vote for it.
M/S/C – Vote – Aye – Purdy, Stoddard, Lovelace, Hendsbee – Nay– Kent, Austin, Mancini, Mason, Smith, Cleary, Morse, Cuttell, Blackburn, Russel, Outhit, Deagle-Gammon, Savage – MOTION FAILS
Smith: IMP lands, are we still getting those procured? Electric busses, can I get an update on ‘em? Police fleet replacement, and fleet in general, we spend just under a million dollars every year, how many vehicles are we replacing?
Staff: We’re in the process of buying the land. We hired the people we needed for the bus team, and the bus delay was probably due to COVID, but we don’t really know until we place the order.
Denty: We have money for IMP land acquisition, which will cover the Bayers Road project.
Blackwood: Municipal fleet, which is cars and trucks. Emergency fleet is mostly firetrucks and we have our police fleet it’s got everything, there’s even a boat in there. In 2016 we did a major renewal and spent $1.8 million because the Taurus stopped having a police package. In the past three years, it’s been about $800,000 and that’s the plan for this year. Sorry for the lack of detail at the moment, but we’re looking at 11 patrol cars and SUVs, hybrid. And three vans for the ident unit. We also have a little bit of money to replace the boat. The police fleet, as far as use goes, they’re on the road a lot more.
Russell: No further speakers, except me! The motion itself is to approve the capital budget, the next three years in principle, and change some administrative orders. The changes that are going to be made, instead of awarding a contract if the funds have been approved and funded. But changes it to make it so that the CAO can just spend money if it’s in a budget. I would like this part of the motion to be split out of the motion.
Traves: The challenge about whether it could be split off depends on intent. There’s no value in council passing this capital budget without the procurement AO (which is what Russell is trying to change). The AO means if the capital budget is passed prior to overall budget we can put tenders out. Without it, businesses might not bid. This only applies if a capital budget is approved. I do not recommend doing it, but you can limit it to this fiscal year, instead of defeating it here and making us go back and re-draft this. If there’s concerns we will, and you can ask the CFO and CAO anything you want.
Fraser: The key in the amendment is that it’s budgeted but not yet funded. It’s not budgeted until you pass it. Things in the ‘parking lot’, for example, couldn’t be unilaterally awarded by the CAO.
CAO: I understand the concern, and had the same questions. What Fraser said.
CFO: The approval thresholds aren’t changed with the AO.
Traves: It lets us move forward, but it doesn’t limit what you can do.
Austin: Most of the time I don’t think there’s any issue in this. There was a slight issue with the integrated mobility plan which required extensive discussion, that this might have exacerbated, or helped. Is there a way to make this manually renewed instead of automatically renewed as written?
Traves: You can manually say no by voting no on the strategic budget, before the votes on the operational budget or tax rate setting. This is a weird year, due to COVID, and we’re kind of behind, this allows us to make up some of that time in procurement. That’s where this comes from. It still comes back to council. This gives future councils flexibility IF they pass the capital budget.
Austin: The year we had issues with capital, was that dealt with through the adjustments or deferring the strategic budget?
Traves: Since I’ve been here, eight years, it’s been the adjustments. I think this fits with the priorities of council.
Mason: Hi. I support the change to the AO, one of our biggest challenges is that construction season is this big *holds his hands up real close together*. The advance tender process allows us to hit the construction window. People complain to you when stuff doesn’t get done, and if we don’t get it out the door now, it won’t get done. This helps us do that.
Smith: If we were to approve this today, a month away from April 1, would tenders going out prior to April 1 have the social procurement?
Fraser: Depends on our advance tender list. The social procurement and living wage, by and large, isn’t captured under the capital budget. We are ready for April 1 for that.
Smith: I think there would be some tenders of capital that should have a living wage policy, that won’t have them if they go out early.
Traves: We’re only here because of the lateness of our budget, the stuff that’s going out is already planned that would have been budgeted at not a living wage.
CFO: That’s correct, the amendments to the procurement policy coming into effect on April 1 is the living wage bit, every other social procurement part, like the environment part, is already in effect.
Cuttell: I’ve not done the budget process before, I’m not sure what’s next. The adjustments list? The ‘parking lot’? How do they impact the overall budget? The capital budget? The risk of putting out the tenders early is that people might work on things that don’t come to fruition, and we need to be mindful of that.
CFO: There’s one item in the ‘parking lot’, and it’s not included in the budget. At the end of the business unit operational budget list, there will be a list of everything in the ‘parking lot’ and the risks and costs associated with ‘em. And that’s when you decided to fund them, or not, and it all comes at once so you get a full picture. The tenders are a bit mixed up. The advanced tenders mean people can do bids, and we always put ‘pending funding.’
Traves: The budget adjustment list is the ‘parking lot’, it’s the same thing with a different name. They’re done at the end all at once to be fair to all the business units.
Cleary: I support the amendments to the AOs. We have a short construction season. There’s been an increased lead time required in the past four years. It’s like a live-fire exercise, you’re not really in a firefight, but you’re using real ammo with real risks. The advance tenders do have a real risk, but it’s minimal and manageable. But our staff is goo, and substantial changes don’t usually happen.
Hendsbee: There’s a report coming forward, and there’s a past report on the Forum, but I think we need to revisit the whole Forum decision at a future date.
Clauses 1-3 of the main motion
M/S/C – Vote – Aye – Unanimous
Clause 4, amending the AO
M/S/C – Vote – Aye – Purdy, Stoddard, Lovelace, Hendsbee, Kent, Austin, Mancini, Mason, Smith, Cleary, Morse, Cuttell, Blackburn, Outhit, Deagle-Gammon, Savage – Nay– Russel
Russell: We do not need to meet on Friday morning an-
Mason: Motion to adjourn.
*Meeting adjourned*
Present:
Councillor Paul Russell, Chair (District 15)
Deputy Mayor Tim Outhit (District 16)
Councillor Kathy Deagle-Gammon (District 1)
Councillor David Hendsbee (District 2)
Councillor Becky Kent (District 3)
Councillor Trish Purdy (District 4)
Councillor Sam Austin (District 5)
Councillor Tony Mancini (District 6)
Councillor Waye Mason (District 7)
Councillor Lindell Smith (District 8)
Councillor Shawn Cleary (District 9)
Councillor Kathryn Morse (District 10)
Councillor Patty Cuttell (District 11)
Councillor Iona Stoddard (District 12)
Councillor Pam Lovelace (District 13)
Councillor Lisa Blackburn (District 14)
Absent:
N/A
Interviews:
N/A – COVID
Previous meeting and current agenda:
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