Finance & Administration Report - CAO UPDATE

CAO UPDATE

RECOMMENDATION:

THAT the report dated April 8, 2021 from the Chief Administrative Officer titled “CAO Update” be received for information.

PURPOSE OF REPORT:

To provide Council with information from the Office of the CAO regarding material events and happenings at Town Hall.

BACKGROUND:

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

INFORMATION:

Administration:

A Joint Advisory Committee meeting was held on March 23 to welcome new members and provide an orientation on the background and functions of the Advisory Committees. This orientation also served as a refresher to those members who had been reappointed and to other members with continuing terms.

The Town’s “Spring/Summer Newsletter” was delivered to View Royal residents during the last week of March. Included in the newsletter is an ‘Auntie Archives’ article sharing some ‘Fun Facts’ about historical Town landmarks, services and their origins.

The Corporate Services Clerk recertified her WorkSafe BC Occupational First Aid (OFA) Level 2. OFA attendants perform a unique service in the workplace under the Occupational Health and Safety Regulations. In addition, OFA attendants must be well trained in all aspects of emergency care, from minor injury management to the most serious trauma care involving airway, breathing, and circulatory emergencies.

The auxiliary webcasting positions were advertised and applications shortlisted this month. Staff aim to have the position filled in the spring.

The Director of Corporate Administration and Records Coordinator/Archivist attended a webinar on Advanced EDRMS Training (Electronic Document and Records Management System) and Municipal Recordkeeping. This was a unique and valued opportunity to learn from a well-recognized authority on both records management practices and software. Principles and techniques learned in this course will be used as the Town’s records classification and retention schedule is reviewed and updated.

Archives volunteers are still actively remaining engaged through bi-weekly meetings and emails.

Finance:

The Citizen Budget online engagement tool was open from March 15 to March 31 in conjunction with publication of the 2021-2025 Financial Plan. This informal survey provides information about the five-year financial plan and allows people to see the impact of increasing or decreasing various service elements on their property taxes. The results from the Citizen Budget engagement will be reported to Council at the April 13, 2021 Committee of the Whole meeting.

Work continues with provincial counterparts on the Home Owner Grant centralization project, set to launch in May. The Town has communicated the changes to the grant program via social media and the Town’s website. The Town has also partnered with neighbouring municipalities on a joint newspaper advertisement that will inform the public of this change, provide the contact information for residents to direct their inquiries, and advise that municipalities will no longer be accepting Home Owner Grant applications.

In March, Finance staff finalized draft financial statements in advance of the yearly audit scheduled April 6-9, in preparation for presenting to Council prior to the May 14, 2021 legislated deadline.

Development Services:

Development Services is pleased to report that staff reports and attachments related to Development Permit and Development Variance Permit applications are now being posted on the Town’s website in the week leading up to Council’s consideration of an application. This elevates customer service and ensures that the community has access to accurate information regarding development. The new sections of the website can be found under “Active Development Applications”.

The Town was not successful in our grant application to complete restoration of the Lime Kiln on Hart Road. Staff continue to watch for grant opportunities related to heritage. Unfortunately, 100% funding opportunities are few and far between. Completing the restoration and interpretation of this site would be a feather in our collective hats!

The Town has heard back from FCM regarding the Climate Action Strategy grant application; staff are providing additional information on items that FCM highlighted. Staff hope to hear back in the coming months that the application was approved.

Engineering:

A Parks Maintenance Worker position has been posted as the current position will be vacated on April 1. In addition, one student position for Parks and one student position for Engineering have been posted.

Design work has begun for sewer capital projects. Initial site meetings were held for Helmcken Bay Pump Station (PS) Upgrade and the sewer gravity main upgrade from Packers PS to View Royal PS.

The pictures above show the completed Thetis Cove PS upgrade, and the first picture below shows the site before the upgrade. The second picture below shows the new “No Public Access” signage installed at Thetis Cove PS, Hospital PS and Norquay PS.

Additionally, all the emergency sewer PS generators have been programmed to run at regular intervals simulating emergency conditions. This will help ensure the generators are in good working order when called upon in an emergency.

In drainage, a comprehensive CCTV and mapping project of all the drain infrastructure around View Royal Town Hall was completed in March.

Potholes and road failures along Island Highway had formed after the winter months due to frost and heavy precipitation. The Town’s contractor paved sections of Island Highway near Stewart Avenue and Shoreline School during spring break when the least amount of traffic would be impacted.

A Development Permit referral was received for review for 9 Erskine Lane. Engineering staff have been engaged a consulting engineer to validate the servicing report provided by this development. Below is a photo of the Engineering Technologist using a simple mirror to illuminate the inside of a sewer manhole for inspection at the bottom of Erskine Lane.

Engineering staff have been corresponding with the civil engineering consultant for the BC Transit HandyDART development regarding road improvements and site servicing requirements.

The “Servicing Agreement” for the multi-family development at 242 Island Highway is nearing approval and construction of the onsite works is expected to start in April.

As the weather begins to warm up, the grass starts growing faster. The Parks Department is entering its busiest time of the year as they strive to keep up with grass cutting in the spring. Did you know that the Town Hall grass has been cut three times this year already?

A second major spring maintenance item is top dressing turf areas in our parks. This is done to fill holes and depressions as well as grade changes between the hard (asphalt/concrete) and soft (soil/grass) landscaping edges along the pathways, sidewalk and playgrounds. These are very high usage areas and are always changing. Below are some images of recent work.

MacLennan Trail – Before (left) and after (right) top dressing the asphalt edge

View Royal Park – Top dressing along the sides of the playground and the pathway to Paddock Place

A new server was set up in March to host the Town’s GIS services. The new server addresses some structural issues that had prevented a system upgrade to a newer version. This newer version allows the Town to take advantage of more services that ESRI offers and to get better support. Few differences will be immediately apparent, but it will provide a solid base to start expanding GIS to more departments and workflows in 2021.

RECOMMENDATION:

THAT the report dated April 8, 2021 from the Chief Administrative Officer titled “CAO Update” be received for information.

SUBMITTED BY:

K. Anema, Chief Administrative Officer