Staff Report: CAO Update

CAO UPDATE

RECOMMENDATION:

THAT the report dated March 5, 2025 from the Chief Administrative Officer titled “CAO Update” be received for information.

PURPOSE OF REPORT:

To provide Council with information regarding material events and happenings at Town Hall.

BACKGROUND:

The Administrator’s report for the Committee of the Whole meeting to apprise Council of the highlights of significant activities of the Town.

INFORMATION:

Office of the CAO:

Representing the Owners’ Group (Langford, Colwood and View Royal), the CAO spent 4 days with the engineers and architects working on the validation process for the West Shore RCMP detachment expansion.

The CAO has participated with the other 9 South Island municipalities affected by the download of 911 dispatch costs, assisting in formulating group responses to the Minister of Public Safety and Solicitor General.

Finally, the CAO was honoured to be invited to present at the CAO Pre-Forum Workshop held at the Delta Ocean Pointe Resort.

Corporate Administration:

Front counter staff continued to be busy with secondary suite type 2, dog licence, and business licence renewals right up to the end of February.

The spring/summer View Royal hard copy newsletter is being finalized and will be distributed toward the end of March and into early April. Communications time is also being directed towards the Official Community Plan engagement further described in this report in the “Development Services” section.

Staff attended a legal seminar in late February, learning of case law updates as well as recent legislative tools.

The RFP described in past “CAO Updates” for the records information management project as described in Project Summary C-004 is underway. The focus of work has been preparing responses to proponent enquiries and further refinement of project details.

Staff have turned their attention to WorkSafe BC’s Occupational Health and Safety Regulation changes that align BC’s requirements for first aid kits and occupational first aid training with standards set by the Canadian Standards Association. This change resulted in a new type of first aid training upon recertification in February for one of the on-staff first aid attendants.

Finance & Information Technology:

Finance staff worked in collaboration with other departments to prepare the 2025-2029 Draft Financial Plan, to be presented to Council in March. Staff have also been focused on finalizing the 2024 financial statements, in preparation for the year-end audit scheduled for the week of April 7, 2025. As in recent history, the Town’s auditor, MNP, will conduct most of their audit work remotely.

With cybersecurity being a priority as we continue to protect View Royal’s information, IT's focus through February has been the ongoing cybersecurity upgrades which included the Thrive backup upgrades and Firewall migration. Firewall migration at the Town Hall has been completed as well as the backup servers for both Public Safety Building and Town Hall locations.

Development Services:

The Development Services team continued to be busy for the month of February responding to a consistent number of zoning, land use, building, and business licence inquiries, and reviewing and processing development applications. In February, Development Services (Planning and Building) received 14 new applications, which are summarized in the following table:

The Official Community Plan (OCP) review and update is currently in the consultation phase. A visioning survey, which focused on updating the OCP vision, ran for several weeks in February. The Town received 216 survey responses, including 86 survey responses from youth. A What We Heard Report will be presented to Council in the spring.

In February, staff drafted a Community Growth Survey, which was presented to the OCP Advisory Committee at their meeting on February 24, 2025 for review and comment. This survey is focused on updating the existing Community Growth Framework, including neighbourhood centres, community corridors, and Town Centre, which identify areas in View Royal that are likely to develop and grow in the future. Feedback on this survey will be used to inform high-level growth and development direction for the Town. Similar to the visioning survey, this survey will be promoted on social media, e-newsletter, newspaper, posters, and Town’s website. This survey will be launched on March 8, 2025 and closes on March 31, 2025. The project webpage has been active with many views and a few interactive questions from the public.

Engineering:

Streets & Roads

The new transit priority bus lanes project on Island Highway between Six Mile Road and Burnside Road West is nearing completion. Installation of the final asphalt paving and road markings has commenced.

Sidewalk improvements on Island Highway fronting 1658/60 and Jedburgh Road are underway with scheduled completion in spring of this year.

Staff have been working for the last year on the renewal of the Town’s boulevard and road and drain maintenance contracts, which are set to expire at the end of May 2025. Council can expect an update on this shortly.

Sewer & Drain

Staff finished repairing a section of asbestos concrete drain pipe at 182 Werra that had become disjointed.

Staff have begun preparing tender documents for the Glenairlie Sewer Pumpstation Upgrade project, scheduled for construction this year. This project will go through the competitive bid process.

Development Servicing

7 Erskine Lane: The developer has commenced servicing works and are currently upgrading the drain outfall pipe.

Watkiss Way/Erskine Lane Intersection: Work continues at the intersection, installing traffic bases, tree pruning and tree removals. Minor delays are still expected.

9 Erskine Lane: Frontage improvements are ongoing.

Parks

Parks staff have been busy topping up main trails in Portage Park with a gravel mix. Many thanks were provided to Parks staff by park users.

Parks was busy dealing with lingering ice removals as the cold weather stuck around. These weather events keep Parks staff busy with snow and ice removal, ice melter applications and general clean up.

The Government of Canada’s Department of Fisheries and Oceans requested a site visit with View Royal Staff and Peninsula Streams Society to review the end product of the salt marsh that was installed in View Royal Park last year. DFO were satisfied with the works; as a result, Peninsula Streams are continuing dialogue with staff to potentially conduct similar projects in View Royal Park in the future and potentially utilizing their funding streams again.

Parks staff have come across some challenges with mounting the new “View Royal Park” sign onto the existing pedestal. Modifications to the pedestal will be required and scheduled in the drier months.

Greater Victoria Green Team (GVGT) had two consecutive days of activities in Portage Park: Friday Feb. 28th hosted a school event for 38 students, 3 teachers, and 2 parents from Shoreline Community School. Saturday, March 1st hosted 42 local residents and community members. In total, 28 cubic metres of invasive plants were removed, revitalizing approximately 1,500 square metres of the forest in the park.

GIS

GIS staff have been working collaboratively with the Development Services department to produce mapping for the Official Community Plan project. GIS also continues to be busy with day-to-day operations, asset management, and collaboration with the Fire Department.

Protective Services:

February remained steady with calls for service to the Fire Department. A mutual aid agreement has been signed with the District of Saanich. This agreement will allow both Saanich and View Royal to respond and assist in emergencies in both jurisdictions.

Further, enhanced response logics and automatic aid has been established with Esquimalt Fire. The agreement now sees Esquimalt Fire responding to emergencies in the Westshore and vice versa into Esquimalt. The program has worked well so far with structural fire emergencies being responded to and the correct resources and staffing being delivered as per regulations.

Work continues on improving integration of the Westshore fire departments with efforts being focused on shared fire prevention duties, streamlining fleets, and utilizing paid on call firefighters throughout the region. The other integration of note is the inclusion of the Langford ESS team into the existing View Royal/Colwood team. This integration will realize one Westshore ESS team and again, streamline response and logics.

The Fire Department recently concluded a paid-on call competition, welcoming 5 new recruits who will begin duties on April 1, 2025. This intake puts the paid-on call ranks at full capacity. As well, the department welcomed new Assistant Fire Chief, Kris Malinosky. Assistant Chief Malinosky returns to View Royal from Oak Bay Fire Department where he was the Administrative Assistant Chief. Assistant Chief Malinosky began his firefighting career in View Royal in 1997, leaving for Oak Bay in 2002. We are pleased to welcome Assistant Chief Malinosky back to View Royal.

RECOMMENDATION:

THAT the report dated March 5, 2025 from the Chief Administrative Officer titled “CAO Update” be received for information.

SUBMITTED BY: S. Sommerville, Chief Administrative Officer