Council Preview Nov 28-29: Mayor's Budget Task Force Final Report, VPD/Fire 2023 Budget top off, Childcare Strategy, city procurement retreating further behind walls (staff want to approve $5 million contracts without Council), and more

digitalmonkblog

Nov 25

Vancouver City Hall (from Queen Elizabeth Park)

There are two meetings of City Council coming up next week, with a Regular Council meeting on Tuesday, November 28th, 2023, and a Committee Meeting on November 29th. A Special Council Meeting on the 2024 Budget will take place on the following week, on Wednesday, December 6th starting at 9:30am. Budget meetings had historically been held in the evenings, which make the proceedings more accessible for the general public, but Vision Vancouver changed that starting with the 2015 Budget.

The long-awaited Mayor's Budget Task Force Final Report is the first item on the agenda for the Tuesday, November 28th Regular Council meeting. Unfortunately this report has not yet been published at part of the meeting agenda, so no previews are possible.

There are a number of 2023 budget increases and extra over-time costs requested for the Vancouver Police Department (VPD) (2.47 million and $3.6 million) and for Vancouver Fire and Rescue Services (VFRS) ($2.52 million and $3.34 million).

There are a number of Business Improvement Association renewals on the table, with 5 and 7 year terms. The Mount Pleasant BIA is looking to expand on Main Street from 19th Avenue to 29th Avenue and add another 125 properties and 200 businesses (this would increase levies on those businesses to fund the BIA).

There's a 7-year Lease Extension with Covenant House Vancouver for 326 West Pender Street (from the current 35 years), in order to meet CMHC funding requirements for renovations. There are a number of miscellaneous items, such as repealing outdated internal City Hall policies (mostly employee-related), funding applications, and Rental Rates for Vancouver Civic Theatres.

At the Council Committee meeting on November 29th, a staff report on the City's Childcare Strategy will be reviewed. The report notes that the City has 'facilitated the creation of 2800 full-day spaces' from the 1970 to 2023. The report also recommends streamlining childcare approvals by cutting red tape.

The most significant item on the agenda has a title that sounds like a sleeper, with the title being: Changes to the Procurement Policy and Delegated Authority. This report is a really large ask by staff to facilitate a lot less transparency in procurement. Staff want Council to raise the limit on the value of contracts that they can approve from $2 million to $5 million. Currently any contract that has a value of $2 million must go before Council for approval. During that process of Council oversight, the public will see the details of the contract and more information about the scope of the work and how the provider was selected (as well as potentially contact Council with any concerns). Now staff want to 'streamline' the process, and have contracts in the range of $1 million to $5 million be approved by the Bid Committee. There is some limited information available on the City's Bid Committee decisions page, made available after the time of the award. The upper limits of contract awards that had lower limits would also be raised (such as Department Managers approving contracts of $400,000, up from $200,000). There appears to be no attempt to provide the public with more transparency into procurement awards, while at the same time hiking award limits for internal staff approval. In Council deliberations, we would like to see mayor and council demonstrate awareness and have some serious discussion about preventive measures to avoid temptation and prevent/preempt inappropriate or corrupt practices.

(As a side note, there are other examples of a general trend of reducing accountability to the public. One is the increase in the municipal election cycle from three to four years. For example, municipal elections were held in 2005, 2008, 2011 and 2014, but then (after Vision Vancouver mayor Gregor Robertson's support) then premier Christie Clark's B.C Liberals (now known as B.C. United) did a last minute shift to four-year cycles, so the next elections were 2018, 2022, 2026, and so on. In effect, reducing the accountability of mayors and councils to the public. Another example currently in the works (Nov 2023) is Bill 44 and a package of housing-related legislation under the B.C. NDP, which would effectively eliminate public hearings province-wide on rezoning applications if they are consistent with an official community plan. Aware of such trends, CityHallWatch urges citizens to demand simultaneous improvements in checks and balances, including better FOI implementation, lobbyist registries, powerful whistleblower protections, controls on the revolving door between public and private sector jobs, solid funding and protections for the office of the auditor general, and stricter controls on political donations.)

There are also agenda items for a Liquor License application at 111 West Hastings, fee increases for Mountain View Cemetery, and a UN-Habitat Quality of Life Initiative (limited Pilot Study for staff).

The Motions on Notice include the following:

Trans, Gender Diverse and Two-Spirit (TGD2S) Inclusion and Safety Action Plan (Clr. Boyle)
Regularizing Road Paint Maintenance for Safety (Clr. Fry)
Uplifting the Downtown Eastside and Building Inclusive Communities that Work for All Residents (Clr. Bligh)
Transparency and Accountability in Conducting Council Business (Clr. Fry)

The final motion on notice seeks to have a little more transparency to the 'in-camera' meetings of Council which are off limits to the Public, as well as to allow Councillors to ask for clarifying questions of speakers at a in-camera meeting. Clearer explanations of rationale for in-camera meetings are sought, as well as the possibility of including votes for some instances of when the decisions are made public. There's often a significant time lag to release minutes of In-Camera meetings to the public, even when the decisions are no longer sensitive.

We reminder readers that since Vancouver's former Director of Planning, Theresa O'Donnell, was sacked, the planning department has no one officially in the position to guide the City through crucial planning discussions and implementation now underway. Still just an "acting" director of planning. This is a serious matter. CityHallWatch has called for a proper hiring process for such an important position (see https://cityhallwatch.wordpress.com/2023/10/22/openletter-please-hire-chief-planner-properly/). We are not aware of any announcements having been made on such a process.

For reference, the meeting agendas have been reproduced below: