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Council Highlights
Archive
October 2008 |
 The
Council Highlights are provided as a service to
constituents in Ward 25. The following is a brief
summary of Council's meetings held on October 29 and 30,
2008.
1.
Labour disruptions to public transit - TTC Essential
Service (EX24.3)
Despite receiving overwhelming support from the public
and the media, my motion with Councillor Cesar Palacio
to have the TTC declared an essential service was
narrowly defeated at City Council last month by a vote
of 23-22. While this result is unfortunate, in my
view, the essential service debate is far from over.
First, it is clear that public
opinion expressed before/during/after the April strike
and most recently, is massively in favour of designating
the TTC as an essential service. The people of Toronto
clearly indicated that the TTC is essential for them to
get to work, to get to school and to get to medical
appointments, etc. That is unlikely to change as each
year more and more people become increasingly reliant on
the TTC.
Secondly, it will certainly become a significant issue
in the 2010 municipal election. Candidates for Mayor
and for Council will have to take a position on this
issue, which is so vital for so many of our citizens.
Thirdly, it is also now clear that no provincial
government would permit any future TTC strike to
continue for more than a day or two before introducing
back to work legislation with mandatory arbitration.
Hence, we effectively have an essential service
environment now - except that our citizens first have to
endure two or more days of loss of vital TTC service.
While our main motion was defeated last week, some minor
progress was made on two related issues. Council did
decide to communicate its support for declaring TTC
Wheeltrans service as essential and for legislation
mandating a minimum 48 hours notice before any TTC
strike can legally occur. It is now up to the
provincial government to act.
2.
Improving Toronto's economic competitiveness (EX24.1)
Council approved the creation of two new City
corporations, Invest Toronto and Build Toronto, to
replace Toronto Economic Development Corporation (TEDCO).
Build Toronto will use the available land owned by the
City and its Agencies, Boards and Commissions to attract
targeted industries, stimulate the creation of desirable
employment and regenerate neighbourhoods. Invest
Toronto will engage the private sector in marketing and
promotion activities to increase business investment and
create desirable jobs in Toronto. The new corporations
will implement the recommendations of the Mayor's Fiscal
Review Panel which recommended that the City establish a
new structure and strategy for maximizing the City's
real estate holdings. While the stated intent is to
strengthen Toronto's position in the global marketplace
and to enhance economic competitiveness, I remain
concerned that the predominant result could be simply
the liquidation of City assets (like the Toronto Hydro
Telecom sale), thus resulting in little or no continuing
revenue, and in the proliferation of investments which
rely heavily on tax rebate TIEGs (Tax Increment
Equivalent Grants).
3. Woodbine Live project (PG19.1)
Council adopted a community improvement plan to provide
financial incentives (via a 20-year TIEG) for the
Woodbine Live project. The proponent is guaranteeing to
provide local employment opportunities of at least 2500
jobs. The City expects to achieve $291 million in new
property tax revenue, of which $120 million would be
rebated through the TIEG. The project will transform
Woodbine Racetrack in northwestern Toronto into an
attraction that will include a venue for live
entertainment as well as a hotel and retail operations
supplementing the horse racing operation. Later phases
of the project include further mixed use development
that may include office buildings and up to 2,500 units
of residential housing.
4. Local food in City childcare centres (GM18.4)
Council approved a policy and implementation plan that
will increase the amount of locally grown food used in
childcare centres. The Local Food Procurement Policy
will be phased in by the Children's Services Division in
2009 in order to learn more about the practical
implications of increasing the proportion of local food
used in City food operations. That experience will help
the City work out details for expanding the strategy
into other operations in the future to further help
reduce harmful truck gas emissions that are generated by
importing food from outside Ontario.
5. Right of Entry (LS16.1)
Council adopted a new by-law, to replace a mixture of
previous by-laws in the former municipalities, which
will provide a protocol for entry to perform repairs
and/or alterations when adjoining neighbours can not
reach a mutual, voluntary agreement. The new by-law
provides for a system of permits with certain
conditions, including notice periods, City inspections,
time limitations, security deposits and the ability of
the City to issue orders. This item is noteworthy for
the input of Ward 25 residents, Eileen Denny, Hilde
Reis-Smart, David Bawden and Bobby Burton. Having
concerns with the first staff proposals, which were very
one-sided and put the entire onus on the neighbour to
grant access or otherwise face a potential $5000 fine,
they worked with city policy staff to research other
options and to make several alternate recommendations.
Those recommendations were largely accepted and adopted
by Council, resulting in a much more even-handed
by-law.
6. City to increase its court capacity for 2009
(GM18.9)
Council authorized the leasing of an additional 17,000
square feet at 481 University Ave. for Court Services to
build four new courtrooms for use in early 2009,
addressing the problem of a backlog of court hearings
and related loss of potential revenues from fines. The
new courtrooms will allow an estimated 125,000
additional trials to be conducted annually for parking
ticket disputes, minor traffic offences and other
provincial offences charges.
7. Green fleets (EX24.2)
Council directed staff to review the City's vehicle
idling bylaw to eliminate any unnecessary
exclusions that are currently offered for City and TTC
vehicles. In addition, Council wants to consider the
feasibility of installing a flashing light or buzzer
in non-emergency City and TTC vehicles that will alert
the driver when the vehicle is idling longer than it
should. Those requests were made as Council endorsed
Green Fleet plans for Toronto Fire Services, Emergency
Medical Services, the Toronto Police Service and the TTC
aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
8. Cleaner parks on long weekends (PE19.3)
In support of strengthening Toronto as a tourism
destination, Council approved an operational change to
adjust work schedules for Parks crews to provide litter
pickup and garbage collection in downtown parks and
other high-volume tourist parks during the five long
weekends from May to October. The intention is to make
sure the parks are clean and inviting. Until now, the
parks clean-up service was provided the day after a
holiday.
9. Councillor/Staff "Read-Only" Access to Systems
(DF25.1)
Council voted to refer a question for Judicial Review by
the Ontario Superior Court of Justice on whether
Councillors and their staffs should be able to directly
access City information systems in order to be able to
respond to constituent requests for information on such
matters as nearby developments and complaint status.
Councillors' staffs currently deal with such requests by
passing them on by phone or email - subsequent responses
(with varying completeness and timeliness) are then
passed back through Councillors' staff to the
originating citizen. The City Clerk has interpreted
direct access by Councillors and their staffs to be a
violation of the Municipal Freedom of Information and
Protection of Privacy Act (MFIPPA). A large group of
Councillors obtained an outside legal opinion which
distinguished between access and disclosure - MFIPPA
does not preclude access, but does preclude disclosure
of certain personal information. Certain to follow as
an issue is citizen access to non-personal information
held by the City, such as development application
information.
10. "OMB Folly" new street name (NY19.19)
Council ratified the name "OMB Folly" for a new street
name in the Yonge-Finch area of the City. The new
street was created as a result of a decision of the
Ontario Municipal Board. Councillor John Filion
described the decision of the OMB as its "worst ever"
for not abiding by the City's Official Plan. He
consequently proposed the new street name in
recognition.
Non-Council
Items
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New Development Charge (DC) by-law deferred by
Executive Committee:
With the expiry of the current (very inadequate) DC
by-law looming in 2009, Council directed that staff
prepare recommendations for a new DC by-law. As
required by the provincial Development Charges Act,
City staff performed the pre-requisite Background
Study which showed that the City will need $2.5
billion of new infrastructure in the next 10 years
to support population growth. But the current
by-law is generating only about $50 million per year
in DC revenue - i.e. a rate of only 20% of need.
Staff performed various calculations required by the
DC Act and recommended DC increases of 100% - 130%
phased-in over four years under certain conditions
after a one-year freeze - i.e. after five years, the
rate might at best only get to 40% - 50% of the
City's need. However, at the recent statutory
meeting, a large delegation from the development
community objected to even that modest proposal and
demanded a deferral to seek further concessions.
Mayor Miller readily acquiesced and the Committee
unanimously adopted his motion to defer the item to
February. Council's policy of low development
charges means that growth does not pay for itself,
contrary to the City's Official Plan and the DC Act
- instead it requires existing taxpayers to provide
a massive subsidy, one that has grown to
approximately 10% of every annual property tax
bill.
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Garbage and the new Grey Bins:
The City continues to have difficulty in meeting
residents' orders for the new bins. The City's
Works Department has now committed to deliver a new
bin to every resident by January 31, 2009. In the
meantime, they have supplied pink tags for residents
to use on garbage bags while awaiting delivery of
the new bins. Many residents are also pointing out
the amount of driveway space consumed by the new
bins on collection day - they leave little room for
a vehicle to get out of the garage and to the
street. And lastly many residents are concerned
about pushing large bins when their sideyards and
driveways are full of snow. In my view, this is
bearing out the predictions of many people that this
ill-conceived scheme burdens our residents with a
costly, impractical regimen when we could have and
should have been investigating simpler "Clean Energy
from Waste" solutions.
3.
Public Service Notice:
Next month, a group of volunteers from
Ten Thousand Villages will bring the world to
Willowdale with a sale of unique handcrafted gifts,
including musical instruments, pottery, home décor,
jewelry, toys and textiles - from developing countries.
The sale will be held from
10am to 6pm on Saturday December 6 at
Earl Haig Secondary School, 100 Princess Avenue, North
York. Volunteers are welcome to assist with the sale
-setting up for the event, selling merchandise,
distributing flyers, and more. Students can earn their
volunteer hours by helping out. For more information,
call Allyson Eamer at 416-224-5521. Ten Thousand
Villages is a non-profit organization that provides
vital, fair income to Third World artisans by marketing
their products and telling their stories in North
America.
For more information on City matters, please see my
website
www.cliffjenkins.com, or call my office at
416-395-6408. If you wish to UNSUBSCRIBE to my Council
Highlights, please let me know by return e-mail.
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