What's Happening at Town Hall

In an earlier article ("Wanted Five Good Men Or Women") I wrote about the qualifications that I thought were important for town councillors. In this article, I will try to describe some of the things that councillors deal with at council meetings.

The current mayor and council were sworn into office on November 7, 2022. Two years into a four year term, what has council been doing? Short answer, a lot of meetings. I did not attend many meetings in the first year, but managed to make it to most in the second year. Because my memory is not what it used to be, I went to the Document Library on the town's website to review the minutes of the meetings to see what happened. As I mentioned, a lot of meetings. So many that I may have missed a few in counting, however, by my count: 23 meetings open to the public, 15 meetings closed to the public and 22 meetings that had both open and closed portions (for my views on closed meetings, see the article "Behind Closed Doors"). In addition, there were a number of Committee of the Whole meetings.

There was a lot of business conducted at all of those meetings, although it is difficult to point to any that produced what could be called major accomplishments. To be fair to council, running the town involves a lot of minor problems that need solving. However, some of these could, perhaps, be better left to staff to deal with directly. In addition, a number of items initiated by previous councils have been slowly plodding along. The Waterfront Expansion, Saahtlam Park, the Waterfront Viewing Platform and the Kiwanis Residences come to mind. While these may not have been the current council's initiatives, it did have to allocate time and resources to them.

So what else has council been doing? A review of the minutes of council meetings provides some clues: skatepark, pickleball, bus garage lands, Mount Arrowsmith Biosphere Region and grant applications. By my crude analysis (hand written "spread sheet"), these items appeared before council more than any others.

There were also a number of development applications that seemed to take on lives of their own with a number of applications to council: 230 Second Avenue West, 365 First Avenue West, 630 Hemlock and 172 Fern Road West come to mind. Of these only 630 Hemlock and 230 Second have broken ground.

On the flip side, the Tree Protection Bylaw was introduced and received first, second and third readings in just one meeting, with one more brief appearance at a special meeting of council for adoption. The Tree Protection Bylaw made another appearance at a Committee of the Whole meeting, approximately one year after adoption, for the public engagement that was neglected at the outset. This after the fact involvement of the public was described as a "check in" at the Committee of the Whole meeting. Nothing further was heard about the Tree Protection Bylaw after the "check in", other than by way of appeals of decisions made under the bylaw. The amount of time spent by council dealing with appeals of Tree Protection Bylaw decisions may be more than it took for presentation, three readings and adoption of the bylaw. A a recent meeting, there were three separate appeals of decisions.

Two quick turnarounds by council were the golf course bridge and the art piece at the Memorial Avenue roundabout. Commission, construction and installation of both projects seemed to occur almost overnight.

So, halfway through the current term, what is in store for the next two years? Most of the items that will come up in the near future will be determined by council in the strategic/budget planning sessions that are currently occupying much of council's time. The Strategic Planning Sessions were set for October 21 and November 1, with related Budget Planning meetings on November 13 and 20. The purpose of the strategic planning sessions is (in the words of the agenda) "to set priorities in support of the community". The focus areas identified by council for the next four years (the current strategic planning session is for the years 2025 to 2029, notwithstanding the term of the current council ends in the fall of 2026) are Housing, Good Governance, Economic Prosperity, Progressive Infrastructure, Climate Action and Community Health and Wellbeing. Lofty goals but not particularly informative. For further insight into specific initiatives falling under these generic topics, I refer you to our article "Strategically Un-strategic" that deals with some of the initiatives presented at the October 21 Strategic Planning Session.

The Tree Protection Bylaw was brought up at the October 21 meeting with the staff recommendation that the "update" commence in 2028. After discussion, it was suggested that this item be "parked" for the time being and discussed further at the November 1 meeting. At the Strategic Planning Session on November 1, council passed a motion that "a consultant be retained to undertake public engagement, research and update" of the Tree Protection Bylaw "with a budget allocation of $40K in fiscal 2025". It is not clear to me whether 2025 will see the retention of a consultant, updating of the bylaw (whatever that means) or merely the allocation of the $40,000.

Two other items "parked" at the October 21 meeting were also dealt with on November 1. These were, first, a proposal for a budget to fund a fee for service agreement with the Qualicum Beach Chamber of Commerce whereby the Chamber would provide healthcare practitioner recruitment services to the town. This proposal was kiboshed by council in favour of further meetings with Flowerstone Society, Island Health and the Division of

Family Practice. The second parked item was a proposal for the establishment of an Arts and Culture Committee. Even though I was at the meeting, I am not certain of the actual outcome. All I can report with any certainty is that no funds were committed and a committee was not established.

The November Strategic Planning Session also focused on what were termed "Blue Sky Projects". These were explained as being discretionary items that are not currently part of the core capital program. I seem to recall the phrase nice to have: with respect to these initiatives.

The Blue Sky Projects that received council approval were: 1. the installation of a shipping container at the community park for storge of soccer equipment; 2. the implementation of safety improvements near the intersection of Memorial and Railway; 3. the installation of permanent bicycle racks along the waterfront (subject to Chief Recalma's recommendation on location); 4. a design for parking on Harlech Street; and 5. the installation of a cenotaph at the intersection of Memorial and Railway. These projects may be advanced if they survive the budget process.

The remainder of the Blue Sky Projects presented at the November 1 meeting were: 1. A path through Clock Square to link downtown to the east village Uptown; 2. a pump track at Christleton Park. You are not alone if you do not know what a pump track is. I did not learn anything further and probably do not need to as staff required a number of prerequisites for this to proceed; and 3. the construction of an elevated walkway at Saahtlam Park. The staff recommendation was to not proceed with this project. The town's position was further clarified by the Mayor who commented that the project had been raised with Chief Recalma who stated that the park needed to be left in its natural state and had given a thumbs down to the walkway.

So, no path to East Village, no pump track and no elevated walkway at Saahtlam Park. At least, not in the current council's term. We can only wait to see what Council puts forward and passes in 2025. Stay tuned. Or better yet, go to some council meetings to see the process in person.

Jim Noel

November 4 2024

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