Being the Best We Can Be

For several years I have talked in Council and out about identifying ways in which municipal services can be delivered in the most responsive, efficient and cost effective manner.

We are often complimented by other municipalities and our residents about the fine job we do in most areas of delivering the services our tax payers need.

Sometimes, however, residents and Councillors do point out that we could increase our efficiency and effectiveness. Without a doubt there are ‘out of the box’ ways, and ‘common sense’ ways to make better use of staff and resources. Thankfully, residents do care enough to communicate these ideas to their councillors. Well, elected officials take you very seriously. Never hesitate to call your Councillor with your comments.

Last week Council put out an ad to hire a team of professionals to come in and evaluate our way of doing business. By doing this, Council has shown its commitment to raising the standard of customer service in the delivery of municipal services. We created a terms of reference that will guide efficiency experts to review our policies and operations to raise the bar on customer service and response. Yes, the municipality does a good job but we want to do a better job for our residents. We want an ‘outside’ professional to evaluate our way of doing business and give us some ideas on how others do it differently to save tax payers dollars and deliver better customer service.

Highlights of May 31st Council Meeting

In the last Council meeting in May, administration requested direction from Council so that it could put together a 2012-2014 Business Plan and 2012 Budget. 

Administration provides guidelines and a package of options- from which Council is asked to choose. The options are crafted by professional accountants who draw on the experience of senior managers and knowledge of economic and municipal trends. I believe we were presented with a realistic picture of what could happen given the forecasted growth rate, increased capital expenditures on infrastructure. There are variables over which we have no control - national and global economic factors have in the past and will continue to affect our province in the future. Provincial politics and the economy shape our municipality’s destiny. Funding formulas and amounts directly impact the major recreation and road expansions building initiatives.

Added to the problem of changing variables is the need to ascertain our residents’ most valued priorities. You chose to live (or to remain) in Strathcona County for a reason. It is time to be very clear with your elected officials what you value most about the community you live in. For example - I value a safe and caring community. I know that in order for our families to be happy and healthy – we need a vibrant local economy. So, for me, that translates to a solid emphasis on the base services of fire, police and ambulance services as well as strong support for recreation opportunities, our arts and business community.  I do believe that fiscal accountability and a direction toward more managed growth is required. A flexible strategy will help us as funding formulas and priorities change in other levels of government.

Voicing your opinions will help elected officials to make the most informed choice. I ask you to take the time to review the business plan and 2012 budget, and then contact your Councillor. Focus in on slide 17 through 26: read about our projected municipal operations deficit of 19.3 million that could impact our tax rate with a 10.4% increase and a 5.7% utility rate increase. Read about our projected capital deficit of 192.2 million dollars, out of a total budget of 637.3 million in competing priorities.

In order to change the predicted increases – we have to decrease municipal operations costs (which include our capacity to deliver services) and/or decrease capital deficit (which includes new capital infrastructure, maintaining and building roads and building maintenance that supports service delivery). The capital plan should be looked at for modification - and there are other options. Taxes and fees need not be a municipality’s only source of revenues. This municipality needs to put increased efforts into getting creative. We should put together a comprehensive inventory of corporate sponsorship opportunities; reassess P3 partnership opportunities; and put more muscle into implementing efficiency recommendations from previous and upcoming efficiency reviews. We also need to carefully evaluate and manage growth. What good is it to grow exponentially if we have to decrease the quality of life services that our residents equate to living here in Strathcona County? 

Because there has been much discussion in the media about renovations being needed as a result of security gaps - I presented a Notice of Motion on Security of public, staff, and elected officials. This will direct administration to bring forward the evaluations of any security issues that were outstanding at the time the new Community Centre was built and address questions on the need for added renovations. 

Council did approve my Motion on Task Force Guidelines after some debate. Administration will now bring forward clarifications on the definition and parameters around the authority and responsibility of a task force.

Debate took place on  Councillor Riddell’s Motion asking that Council direct Administration to revisit and report to Council on in camera process of what is allowed on the agenda. According to the Municipal Government Act, only matters such as those pertaining to FOIP, human resources, land transactions and legal privilege can be discussed in camera. Council approved the motion. I believe that we should adhere strictly to the MGA guidelines and not allow the in camera (and out of public eyes) agenda to get overblown with issues that elected officials have a duty to keep their public informed on. 

Administration brought forward findings and recommendations from the pilot study on driver feedback signs that I initiated with Council support in 2010. Five signs were bought with Councillors Priority Funds for placement in the five urban wards. These signs proved to be a valid tool in the traffic safety toolbox! 72% of drivers corrected their speed when they saw the active display and some residents indicated that the driver feedback sighns increased awareness of their driving habits. The signs were successful in bringing drivers attention to the speed they were driving, lowering speeds, creating good will of residents, and collecting data (in stealth and active mode).

Administration recommendations included using a double sign set up to capture two way traffic; using the signs in conjunction with Give Our Kids a Brake Signs and RCMP Hot Spot programs. In addition Citizens On Patrol volunteers suggested last year that this program be synchronized with their Speed Watch locations.

Both Councillors and Administration support the reduced spray policy which contributes to long term community health but will mean residents will have to endure the impacts of high mosquito numbers this season. 




Agendas, reports and minutes 

Highlights of May 24th Council Meeting

Commissioner Singleton brought forward a status report on the Office of the Mayor’s renovations at the request of Council. This report outlined the renovations to date. Council has requested that costs be brought to Council upon completion of the project.  Now that this issue is in open session, elected officials are legally able to comment and answer questions on the issue. Council is not allowed to comment on information that is ‘in camera’ (meetings that are closed to the public). Neither can we give direction or approval to an item at an in camera meeting. We can give opinions, but must give direction by a vote in a meeting open to the public.

Several ‘Notices of Motion’ were delivered to be debated at our next public meeting. A notice of motion is a "heads up" that a councillor is requesting an addition to the next council meeting agenda. 

Councillor Riddell’s Notice of Motion asked that Council direct administration to revisit and report to Council on in camera process of what is allowed on the agenda. According to the Municipal Government Act, only matters such as those pertaining to FOIP, human resources, land transactions and legal privilege can be discussed in camera. 

I presented a Notice of Motion on Security of public, staff and elected officials. This will direct administration to bring forward the evaluations of any security issues that were outstanding at the time the new Community Centre was built and address questions on the need for added renovations. The last Notice of Motion I brought forward is on Task Force Guidelines. If approved this motion would help define the authority and responsibility of a task force.

Administration brought forward the winter maintenance update as a precursor to budget discussions. One P3 clearing, numerous Priority 1 and 2 clearings on our major thoroughfares and two P4 residential road clearings were required to deal with the 155cm of snow that fell (117.5 cm in January). The 2011 snow removal costs now total 5.408 million. Costs include 74,259 staff hours and 16,759.5 contractor hours. Residents often ask how much the residential road clearings cost - this year it averaged out to 1.251 million dollars.

A report on an interdepartmental youth initiative Sustainable Plan-It was brought forward to Council. Four departments created an economic sustainability program that focuses on building strong neighbourhoods. It has been expanded since 2009 to be used by teachers and grade six students from New Horizons, Westboro Elementary, Our Lady of Perpetual Help Elementary, and Wes Hosford Elementary schools. View and vote on your favourite projects.

Strathcona County Library presented its annual report to Council. I found this to be an informative and comprehensive document. I was especially pleased to see that the Library offered 461 youth programs in 2010, with an attendance of 23,218. Bookmobile visits increased by 27% last year – indicating an impressive expansion in outreach. Past Boards and staff have done an outstanding job in planning the expansion – earning the Alberta Trustees Association Award of Excellence, presented at this Council meeting. Library Chair Ernie Jurkat indicated that focus for 2011 will be on service enhancements especially those related to programming and outreach. 

Seventeen residents from Glencoe Place brought issues to Council on the planned traffic calming circle on Glencoe Blvd. Both Councillor Gariepy and I are involved in this traffic calming initiative on the interface area between our Wards. We have requested a further report from Administration.

My Councillor Report included a special thanks to Sherwood Park Mall and the volunteers that worked so hard to organize the Slave Lake fire donations event last Friday. In response to residents’ requests I asked Administration to report on the severity of the mosquito infestation as well as the feasibility and impact of spraying for mosquitoes before the next batch hatches! 

Additional Information from Council

Strathcona County Council has released its second set of priorities that include:

• Develop four additional governance policies that will provide Council direction relating to priority funding, communications, social media and elections.

• Develop terms of reference for an organization-wide review, focused on cost-effectiveness, organizational efficiencies, and a customer service culture to our residents and business/industry partners.

• Develop terms of reference for a rural strategy and engage members of those communities.

• Review and update the Heartland strategy to foster greater understanding and alignment.

Agenda, reports and minutes

Council Meeting Update

The May 10^th public Council meeting was an interesting one with a diverse agenda. Detailed reports.

Council approved a hunting regulations recommendation (based partially on an Agriculture Services Report) to expand the length of days (from five to seven) that deer hunters can cull deer. The intent is to decrease economic and safety risks from the flourishing deer population and align our hunting guidelines with the rest of the province. A letter will be sent to Alberta Sustainable Resource Development with our request.

Public attending heard an update from Air Products – a company that has as its vision the enabling of development of the Alberta oilsands resources through its network of Hydrogen and industrial gas production facilities in Strathcona County.

Council approved its first Social Media Policy. With almost 4 million Twitter users in Canada and about 22,000 in our region – it is time for Strathcona County to go where the customer of today and tomorrow are. For more than two years I have been urging our municipality to use social media (including but not limited to facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, Twitter and blogs). Strathcona County should be commended for pausing to create guidelines before diving into the internet – most non profits and municipality users are in a catch up mode – looking for policy.

Social media can be used to efficiently and effectively to support and enhance: communications; community building efforts; public engagement efforts; emergency response needs; customer service needs and promotional opportunities. We will have to step up to the challenges of resources to meet acceptable response times – but I predict the gains are well worth the pain. Residents are invited to a workshop May 17^th at Council Chambers, 7 pm to have a presentation on the roll out of these features.

The long awaited web casting update was delivered. Live streaming will begin early June with public meetings being archived for six months.

Recreation Parks and Culture presented CREST at the Council meeting. This new Community Recreational Events and Sports Tourism investment program will help to attract and support recreation and sports events that are regional and national in scope. Council approved the program. Guidelines for the program.   

A report on the Community Energy Strategy was introduced to Council. This topic will come back to Council on May 24^th as, I predict a hot topic. On that date administration will be asking for direction on community energy funding sources and voluntary versus regulatory approaches. The community should watch this dialogue carefully. Municipalities do have the right (Municipal Government Act section 33) to become exclusive providers of a utility – heat is considered a utility. Strathcona County Council will have to debate the long term benefits to both itself and its residents on compulsory connection to existing (eg Centre in the Park) and future community projects. Using grants and compulsory connection regulations decreases financial risk but what is the full impact on our residents? What keeps the rates in line and competitive?

Next blog: Strathcona County Council’s new Priorities list – impacting our future and budget deliberations.

Some Updates

Emergency Planning
Are you prepared for an emergency?
Strathcona County is inviting residents to attend the "Get prepared, Strathcona" event on Sunday, May 15 to learn about emergency preparedness. Hope to see you there.

 news release:          

Cuff Report Results in New Governance Policies
Months of work by Councillors Bonnie Riddell and Peter Wlodarczak were reviewed and accepted by Council. I urge residents to read and ask questions on these policies: the Council Code of Conduct, Organizational Roles and Responsibilities, and Organizational Success Discussions
available on the Strathcona County website.

Traffic Feedback Signs
You remember the Driver feedback signs that notify you of your speed in residential areas - new last year? You can expect to see one in each ward sometime the first two weeks of May.  The first locations will be:
Ward 1: Main Blvd
Ward 2: Jim Common Dr
Ward 3: Estates of Sherwood
Ward 4: Clarkdale Dr
Ward 8: Regency Dr West of Ridgemont
The Office of Traffic Safety, Transportation Engineering, Transportation and the RCMP are working together to develop a list for more locations in each of the urban wards. 
Engineering and Enviornmental Planning will be bringing forward a report to Council very soon regarding the results  of the pilot project that took place in 2010. I will be reporting back to you on that as soon as it comes to Council.
 

As always, I welcome your calls and comments - and oh yes - the next Ward 2 Open House of May 17th is very different!!! Open to all - this session will be a workshop on social media!! Book the date and watch this Friday's Sherwood News (my column) for all the details!

Answers to Residents Questions on County Youth Strategy

Are 40% of the beds at Edmonton’s Emergency Youth Shelter Society (YESS) used at any given time by kids from Strathcona County?

The Mayor's State of the County Address indicated that 40% of the beds (134 of the 334 beds) at Edmonton’s Emergency Youth Shelter Society (YESS) are used at any given time by kids from Strathcona County. I do appreciate the corrections given by Youth Emergency Shelter Society Executive Director Deb Cautley. She indicated that 83 of the 334 YESS clients served in the past 10 months came from Strathcona County. I wanted to find out more about this Shelter that has assisted youth from our County. At the Shelter’s website, I found that the Shelter provides long and short-term residential programs for youth from St Albert, Strathcona County and the Edmonton area who are under 19 year with no viable living alternative. Services include outreach, support line, family mediation, life skills training, referrals, school presentations, and a day program. It offers 24/7 crisis-based walk-in and phone support.

The 2009 YESS annual report stated that 10% of clients (43 out of a 436 total) came from Strathcona County. There are 6,805 youth between the ages of 15 to 19 in Strathcona County. Council has asked that YESS be invited to speak to Council on the very important service they deliver to youth in our region.

Does Strathcona County have a Youth Strategy?

On April 29, 2011, the Edmonton Journal reported that Mayor Osinchuck stated “the county is working on an overall youth strategy with input from the Youth Council, churches, and other groups that will include examining whether a shelter is needed.” This is not true.

On April 27, 2011,  Council was asked by the Mayor in a priorities establishing retreat to add a Youth Shelter as a new initiative. Council rejected that as too narrow an approach to a larger more complex issue. Council talked about a possible future strategic direction of consulting with stakeholders and the public on a Youth Strategy that would review existing programs and partners and examine how to engage and provide services. The County has not contacted our existing internal or external program providers: schools, churches, agencies or regional service providers. This future initiative must be given structure, timeline and budget implications before it is brought to Council for consideration and prioritization. A Youth Strategy has not been framed or scheduled for public engagement at this time.

At that same retreat Council agreed that it would take on only five action items in the near term – these will be ratified at the next Council meeting. Prioritizing these strategic and near term action items would ensure that financial and staff resources will be sufficient to achieve the objectives. Some of these goals are long standing needs in our municipality such as a Rural Development and Industrial Strategy.

Does Strathcona County Need a Youth Shelter?

We do not know if Strathcona County needs a youth shelter. No studies have been done to provide facts and recommendations.

The Mayor has stated many times, most lately on the front page of ‘CityPlus’ of the Edmonton Journal that Strathcona County needs a shelter. As elected officials, we all campaigned on various platforms. We all have personal aspirations for the County. I continue my support of a safe, caring community that offers a high quality of life to our parents and children. The Mayor has campaigned for a youth shelter. As elected officials we need to examine the needs of our municipality and prioritize them against the financial and human resources we have to do the job.

The need for a youth shelter has not been examined or researched to any degree by any department in this municipality. Our parents are struggling with the many challenges of raising their children and youth to be responsible citizens: sexual assault; cyber and playground bullying; alcohol, prescription and street drug abuse. Locally and regionally there are hundreds of professional people and a myriad of programs designed to support families and youth at risk. Our Family Community and Social Services Department, works with provincial social service agencies, the RCMP, Parks and Recreation, schools, and existing non-profit service providers like Saffron Centre, Parents Empowering Parents. This County needs to do a comprehensive analysis on what issues we can address most effectively with limited resources. We need to capitalize on what our neighbouring municipalities are offering and work collaboratively on regional issues. Research speaks to troubled youth leaving the family unit to go to large metro areas where they can obtain drugs, money and action in anonymity. Would a Shelter in Strathcona County be used by our own youth?

Current shelters have great difficulty obtaining funding. Would another local Shelter compete for funding from existing shelters? Are our tax dollars better spent on preventive measures like outreach programs and services that resolve conflict and address the reasons why youth leave their homes? Instead of bricks and mortar, should we focus more dollars on proven successful programming like DARE, putting more family and youth workers into our schools? Provide more support to Girls and Boys Clubs, Cadets, Scouts, church youth groups etc who support our give our youth a safe place to go with good behaviour models? Do current programs that support youth staying in their homes have enough funding to do the job?

There are many more questions than answers. Before bringing in the construction crew to build a youth shelter, it behoves those responsible for our residents’ quality of life and the public purse to conduct a professional analysis of the situation, a review of the achievements of existing programs inside the municipality and out - and create a rational plan for moving forward in a timely manner with the input of all stakeholders.

April 26 Council Meeting

Detailed reports of the meeting can be found on the County website. 

Centre in the Park Parking

Council took the controversial Centre In the Park parking issue head on. A few months ago Council recognized the public’s concern over limited ‘free’ (subsidized) parking by supporting my proposal for 23 surface parking spots that the public could use without paying.  After much debate and discussion – a weighing of all sides – Council reached, in my opinion – a fair compromise.

Council approved administration’s recommendation to increase the Library and County staff paid parking in the covered parkade by another 30 stalls. The rationale was to create an additional 30 public parking on the surface lot by moving staff inside - bringing the total to 50 public stalls in the north surface lot. Council also approved limiting the parking time to 2 hours per stall. This will encourage optimum utilization and opportunity to find parking.

Further improvements included adding 4 handicapped accessible stalls within the P1 level of the parkade, where they will not be charged for use but will also have a 2 hour time limit applied. This addresses the need to accommodate the segment of facility users that have restricted mobility.
I believe that the public now has reasonable access to parking. In addition administration assured Council that significant improvements will be made in signage and payment direction over the next month. Given the improvements I felt confident in approving the amended parking bylaw that will now allow Facility Services to enforce parking violations within the parkade, and in future in other designated paid parking areas.


2011 Tax Rate

Council reviewed and made official the 2011 tax rate. It is significant that municipal residential taxes contribute 26.5% towards paying for municipal services. Our industry partners contribute 31.1% - a far cry from other less well positioned neighbouring municipalities with less industry who are forced to burden their residents with 90% of the tax burden. About 68 cents of the municipal tax dollar provides us with our essential services of road maintenance, public transit, ambulance services as well as fire and police protection. This year’s tax rate increase will come in at 3.45%. Audited financial statements and slide presentation.

Watershed Alliance

The North Saskatchewan Watershed Alliance presented to Council. I highly recommend as a ‘must read’ the discussion paper for the Development of an Integrated Watershed Management Plan for the North Saskatchewan River Watershed  We depend on this magnificent 57,000 sq km watershed, made up of 12 sub watersheds  to provide homes, industry and businesses for 1.2 million people. This study is a foundation for collaborative watershed management and is a credit to the province’s capacity to protect water quality and flow for future generations.

Governance Policies

Finally the long awaited group of Governance Policies on conduct and relationship between  elected officials and administration.  This document should be up next week on the County website, along with the minutes of the meeting.

When all is said and done – these guidelines are foundation documents – core to communication and collaboration between staff and elected officials. They should have been in place decades ago. On top of that – the sad reality is that in the final analysis it is you the voter that judges are performance. We are here to serve you – at your discretion. I urge you to demand accountability and transparency of us. Hold us to our Code of Ethics. I appreciate your review of these policies and any comments you care to make.