Transcript: Business Recycling Services Cut - Infrastructure and Corporate Services Committee - April 20, 2026 | Summary 115

Business Recycling Services Cut - Infrastructure and Corporate Services Committee - April 20, 2026

Good afternoon everyone. Call the seventh meeting of the infrastructure and corporate services committee to order. Uh please check the city website for additional meeting information. The city of London is situated on the traditional lands of the Anesnabek, the Hnesoni, Lenoak and Adwand. We honor and respect the history, languages and culture of the diverse indigenous people who call this territory home. The city of London is currently home to many First Nations, Matei, and Inuit today. As representatives of the people of the city of London, we are grateful to have the opportunity to work and live in this territory. Um, currently in terms of committee members, we have uh myself, councelor Frank, uh, councelor Stevenson, uh, councelor Ploa online. Um, okay. And we're waiting on councelor Van Miren. Terms of visiting counselors, we have councelor Trosk, uh, councelor Ferrer, councelor Pribble, uh, and councelor Helier. Okay. Uh, the city of London is committed to making every effort to provide alternate formats and communication supports for meetings upon request. To make a request specific to this meeting, please contact ICSC atlondon.ca or 519-661-2489 extension 2425. Looking for disclosures of community interest. Okay, seeing none, none online. Uh, we'll move into consent items. I do have requests for 2.8 8 and 2.9 to be pulled. We'll deal with those in deferred matters. Um so looking for a motion uh to move 2.1 to 2.7 uh 2.10, 2.11, 2.12. Uh unless there are any other poll requests, not seeing them. So I would look for those items I just mentioned to be moved. Looking for a mover. Councelor Frank. Uh I'll second. Okay, those are on the floor. and councelor Van Mner has just joined us. Welcome. Any discussion on those items? Looking for committee members first. Councelor Frank, go ahead. Thank you. And just on item 2.2 in regards to recycling services, I want to thank staff for coming back with this so quickly. uh as you can see from one letter and there'll be a couple others coming forward that there's a lot of small businesses who are impacted by this and I think they'll appreciate some other options as we've outlined. Um and I just was wondering through the chair to staff if we've heard any additional feedback. I know in the report there was um the letter from staff that had gone to the province and their response essentially was that we're allowed to go and pick it up ourselves if we felt like it. I'm just wondering if we had heard any other feedback at this point from the province in regards to allowing non-eligible sources to participate in the same recycling system. Um, I believe Miss Chambers, that's you. Go ahead when you're ready. Thank you and through the chair. I was just trying to find the letter uh that we received from the province. It was dated March 13, 2026. uh and we've received no further information since then uh to suggest other programs would emerge. Followup, councelor. Thank you. Yes. Then I suppose we'll continue to do our best to advocate. Uh I think that being able to have the non-eligible sources get picked up with the rest of the residential curbside makes the most efficient sense. Um but again, appreciate the work staff are doing to try and bridge that gap. Thank you, councelor. Councelor Stevenson, go ahead. Thank you. Um, I had a question on 2.1 and it was uh really just a general question. I remember earlier in the term receiving a report that showed uh the overbudget amounts on by project and I don't recall seeing that recently. I just wondered uh when the last time council would have been advised on overbudget projects and or andor when we might see that. Uh go ahead, Mr. Uh thank you, Mr. Chair. If there's a request for additional funding, it would be included in this report. So last year, we did have a couple of projects that required additional funding approval and they would have been included as part of this reporting out. And the remainder of the reporting on our capital projects with respect to their overall budgets is included in the midyear and end of year capital monitoring, one of which is before you today. Followup, counselor. Yeah, thank you for that. And so do you do you recall what report I'm thinking of where we had the projects listed and several of them said that they were overbudget one by one just so that we we'd be able to track what was originally budgeted and what the total cost was. Go ahead. Uh thank you Mr. Chair. So if we were requesting additional funds individual reports for each project would have accompanied the report today because we are not there are no reports to that matter. uh with respect to the status of all of our projects that would be captured in the mid-year capital monitoring. We have not prepared a separate report listing all projects and their financial status. So we would only report out if we require money beyond our contingency within our approved budget and we would have made that request today. I think we had two or three last year that required a small additional amount of funding a couple of the year before. At this time we have a couple we're monitoring but we are not asking for any additional funding beyond what has been previously approved. Okay. Thank you. Thank you for that. Um, on 2.2, um, can you just remind me I I I thought we saved quite a bit of money with the change in the blue box recycling and I I just wondered, is there an annual savings with the province taking it over? Go ahead, Mr. James. Thank you. And through the chair. Um, as of mid July 2023, we've saved approximately 3 to4 million per year. It kind of depends on how many recyclables we have going forward. Um that money though given the timing our green bin program rolled out January 1st 2024 at about $5 million a year. So anything offset for recycling we've basically put towards green bin. Um so we don't have additional savings at this time. The budget now reflects it's all been uh rectified there. Uh followup counselor. Thank you. So were those unexpected costs for the grain bin or did we uh reduce those and then end up with a surplus? Go ahead Mr. Thank you and through the chair. The $5 million is just the cost to run the green bin program um annually. There's no additional cost. That's just the cost it is to run it. Followup council. Yeah, thank you. I guess the point I'm getting to is that when it comes to just recycling, we saved $3 to $4 million a year. We'd already budgeted $5 million a year for the green bin. So I just wondered was there any consideration of using the 3 to 4 million in savings to then provide service to the businesses and the ones that were going to be impacted here. Uh go ahead. Thank you Mr. Chair. Uh the funding for the green bin and the blue bin savings were sorry the funding for the blue bin reduction when the province took over that program was given up in the budget at that time. We had not at that point identified uh the restriction for the non-eligible sources as that was actually only announced later last year. We did as part of multi-year budget last year uh give up the remaining funding for the non-eligible source blue bin program. We had previously managed as it would have been insufficient for a citywide program which would be substantially more money and would require new funding. Ask followup councelor. Yeah, just one on this and that is but that net amount that isn't big enough to cover the recycling is that because a good chunk of it went to offset the green bin. Go ahead, Michelle. Uh Mr. Chair, the funding that previously was given up in in large for the blue bin was return was removed from our budgets and that funding was no longer available. There was a small amount of funding still funding the NES that we had retained with the expectation we would be able to continue to offer a co-mingled service on the routes that were residentially picked up by the provincial pros and that we would simply fund that service for the the businesses receiving it previously. It was late last year that that funding uh was no longer required because we were not allowed to pay the provincial processors and collectors through that. So that money was returned to its original source which would have been used to offset increases in the mill rate last year. Okay. Thanks. That's helpful to have that just overall summary because this is a really big issue uh for our businesses. You know, a lot of them are committed to doing the recycling. They want to do it and they really don't have the time or the money uh to do this properly. Putting it in the in the garbage uh hurts a lot of them to do that. And I don't think it helps us either with our landfill goals. So, um, again, maybe I guess just one more followup on that is what what are what are next steps for the for the businesses? Like, are we looking at potentially for the next multi-year budget providing services to businesses or is it just advocacy to the province on this? Uh, M. M Sheer, what do you want to take that? Thank you, Mr. Chair. Uh, at this time, it would be very difficult to offer a city-wide service for the approximately 21 to 2200 small businesses that could be eligible. We previously had serviced about 535 businesses because they were on our residential routes. Because we're no longer allowed to combine the stream for collection and processing, there's no longer a geographic reason to only support those businesses. we would have to roll it out to all of their competitors who would be of similar sort of size and scale. Managing a program throughout the entire city which is extremely dispersed would be quite difficult. New businesses start up frequently. They close frequently as well. So the administrative side of trying to manage a city-wide program would be quite high. If council wishes us to explore that, we would be happy to bring back a business case, but it will be well over a million dollars to do that. Um, with respect to the 535 that could easily be reaccommodated should we be allowed to put them back in. If there were changes from the province allowing that comingling to happen again, they could be serviced for a much smaller amount if they could be if we could simply pay for them to be collected with the residential blue bin. So at this time, our focus is on providing the opportunity at the Envirro Depot, adding the green bin service, and continuing to advocate for more flexibility on the inclusion of non-eligible sources on residential routes. Followup, councelor. Uh, no, that's good. Thank you for the summary. Like I said, it's helpful. Okay. Thank you. Um, just noting, uh, Mayor Morgan, you have joined us. Um, 2.8 and 2.9 were pulled. Uh, but you did put up your hand, so I'll go to you. uh and looking for other committee members they want to speak first. So go ahead, Mayor Mor. Uh sure. Thanks. I'll add my my voice to uh the previous comments that councelor uh Frank and Councelor Stevenson has made about the um the ending of the blue box program. Um uh as colleagues know, uh the reason why we did this is it made a lot of sense. We were driving by anyways. We ran the program. Uh we contracted out to Millerway Services. They're driving by uh churches, small businesses, and uh why wouldn't we stop and pick it up? It's it's not a huge incremental cost on our part. Um given we don't run the blue box program anymore. We don't contract the trucks and um Miller Waste essentially has been directed by Circular Materials Ontario to only pick up from residential sources. To me, the easiest solution is there are trucks driving by already. They're they're not directed by us anymore. And there's an advocacy piece here with the province which has been a very pro businessfriendly government. I I think to have a meaningful conversation with them to say there's probably lots of communities where this could make a lot of sense. The costs are very incremental and I think that there's a fair discussion to have with uh I think a province that is relatively willing to listen uh to say you've got trucks driving by anyways now through Circular Materials Ontario. They've got all the existing contracts. They could just as easily service these 535 businesses in our city and others maybe across the province by making a stop and picking it up. So I'm certainly uh happy to continue that advocacy piece and engage with discussions with the province uh on that. Um I I agree with our staff like us then to constitute a program for just those 535 businesses would now be we're developing a whole new program for just a section of the city. It probably makes sense that we would develop it for 2100 businesses and and that is going to be something that would be a fairly substantial budget cost. So, you know, I think the path here as an interimm step to allow some drop offs, even though it isn't convenient, uh, is fair to help them transition. Ultimately, the best solution here is the trucks driving by, make an extra stop and pick up some extra materials as we were doing when we ran the service. So, I'm happy to engage in that advocacy. Um, I'm happy to have colleagues support me in that. I know we'll have an AMO conference coming up. will probably have lots of ability to have side conversations with ministers. But in the end term, I think that there's there is a really easy solution here and it's do what we were doing. Um, pick it up on the way by and and help the businesses out when when the residential routes are being collected anyways still. Okay. Thank you, Mayor Morgan. I'm not seeing any other hands from committee members. I have councelor Traso, Ferrer, and Pribble. So, go ahead, Councelor Traso. You go first. Ju just to make uh the bottom line really short here. I think we're all on the same page. I think we all want to support this. What's happened is uh really unacceptable. It's outside of our control. We're doing the best that we can. Back in November, this came to the um CAPS committee and we we um we instituted the um sort of a chain chain of events that resulted in the staff report we received back today, which was uh it it wasn't accepted unanimously, but it was accepted by the council and here we are. So, I just want to say um as as a member of that original CAPS committee that sent this off, it was ultimately dealt with by two different committees because we had a change in committee jurisdiction, but I think we're all saying the same thing. But one thing I would like to request though is you you state in the staff report that you you did send that advocacy letter to the province and they did respond by rejecting our request. And I want to be really specific that we've already done that and it would be helpful to have that letter um because I think there's a little bit of confusion when we say we should do some advocacy work. We've already tried doing that. We should step it up and do it again. So I agree. However, what's the the problem here is the text of the Ore of the regulation that says there has to be separate source for the recyclables. And I have yet, and I think I think everyone would agree, we've yet to be provided with any type of sort of rationale, justification from the province as to why that provision remains in the regulations. And that's what's causing the problem with being able to pick these things up as we go along. So, I think that this is just uh something we'll have to follow up on. I think uh the mayor is quite correct when he says maybe we can work with some other um uh cities who are similarly situated at at AMO. But all in all um my main my main point here today is thank you so much to the staff for getting this back to us so quickly and I think that we have a very good solution for the green bin and I think we have a very good solution to the blue box. But I think it's important that we um we we recognize that those are two different policy problems with different sets of rules. But I think we've done the best we can do here and I'll be supporting this at council. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, councelor. Uh councelor Ferrer, go ahead. Uh thank you. And I guess in tune with the last comments, I appreciate staff's work on this. I know you moved really quick on it. um especially when we knew what Circular Materials was going to come out with and it was going to be a producer responsibility, but then late in the game we kind of found out that there was going to be a whole swath of non-eligible sources that wouldn't be coming through with that. I remember the conversation I was having with Miss Chambers and Miss Sher on this and what we would do to move forward. So, I do appreciate um this report uh coming through. Um I in line with what the mayor was saying I think our first conversation was so the Miller waste trucks are driving by these locations picking up residential eligible sources and skipping the non-eligible sources and the first part of that conversation was about the economies of scale like it doesn't really make sense to me. Um so I do hope that the advocacy on that would be able to at least pick those up cuz the trucks are already there and it would be much cheaper if the trucks would be able to just pick that up and then however it works down on the back end. Um, but with this with this u I guess direction coming forward, like I appreciate the work that you've done. I do hear uh what businesses are saying like you know there's still that gap of how we're going to we're going to have to bring these materials to the enviros now, but I do see that we're trying to work with something that will bring uh at least some type of option forward. Um so I do appreciate everything what with what councelor Trusso said. I agree with with the regulations and just kind of how that splits it up. Maybe that could be a conversation that could be had as well. Um, so I'm not going to go all over those points, but I do want to ask some questions that I saw with the report and I do see with the Envirro uh depot recycling pilot portion itself, um, I guess when we compare it to what we what I read about the green bin the green bin part, there's going to be mailouts that are going out to the potential eligible sources for the green bin recipients, but I didn't necessarily see that for the Envir Depot uh, pilot project. So, I just wanted to know from staff if how are we going to contact potential eligible uh non-eligible sources um that they may be eligible for this uh project. Uh Mr. Chambers, go ahead. Uh thank you the chair. Uh yes, we did have the addresses already for the 535 uh through previous work we've done. So, of course, they can receive a letter. Um but as far as the depot drop off, we'll be working with our communications department to basically spread the word. Um, so that's the plan at this moment is to do it that way just through public communications and just say, "Hey, small business owners, uh, check if you qualify and you can bring your recyclables because technically those folks haven't had really a recyclable option at all previously." Um, so we'll just try to do it through uh, word of mouth. Followup, counselor. Okay, thank you for that. So, if I have businesses reaching out, which I do, and they're requesting if they would be eligible or not, I would be okay to just forward that off to staff and see if staff can see if they're eligible or not. Go ahead, Mr. James. Thank you. And through the chair, uh, yes, you would be able to contact our staff and we'll confirm that they're eligible. We'll have to um register them as such as well. Followup, counselor. Okay, thank you for that. And, um, will there be another staff report coming back? I guess before or during the roll out or as soon after the roll out just to see I guess how many of the non-eligible sources were able to um plug into this project on both sides. Go ahead, Mr. JS. Thank you and through the chair. Yes, the report back is somewhat implied um in the fact that we're doing the pilot. So, we're using the pilot to inform more or less the next multi-year budget process because at this moment we don't know how many participants there are. Therefore, we don't really know the cost going forward beyond this coming year. Uh so there will be another report going forward. It may just form a business case as part of the budget though. Go ahead, counselor. Thank you for that. And um I guess it's implied that the um the green bin portion will go on into continuity moving forward, but the Envir Depot portion is supposed to end at the end of 2027. So um if we are successful with the province then this pilot project ends and then we are able to I guess have uh the circulars material Ontario uh program pick that up and if not I guess that would be another conversation to have. So I just wanted to know um my confirming question would be really is is the green bin is going to be continued and the enviro section I guess depending on how things go we'll have to go from there. Go ahead Mr. Thank you to the chair. So the green bin program is uh expected to continue as it's much like the previous recycling program we're offering where the trucks aren't even going by. We have uh care and control over the contract for organics. Uh so it's well within our abilities to pick up those 535 businesses. So that will continue on um beyond there's no pilot. It can just be implemented uh for those who are interested. They can reach out to us and we'll get them on board. Um, with respect to the other item of the non-eligible sources for businesses, um, they we'll see what happens. To your point, um, we'll continue with this pilot. We'll be reporting back on the business case. If anything changed with the province, definitely we can pivot. There's no question about that. And, uh, would welcome that going back to the 535 as curbside for sure. If the, uh, waste could be co-mingled, uh, with the Orag being updated basically. Followup, counselor. Okay. Thank you for that. No follow-ups. I appreciate the answers. I guess some comments. It seems that we are all aligned here. So, I appreciate the work that we've done so far. I would obviously like to capture more of the non-eligible sources than we have right now, but this is at least something moving forward and I'm hoping that we have some success with the province so we can capture everybody or all the entities that were I guess removed from this program who want to be who want to be part of it. Um, so I'll be supporting this at council and uh I appreciate the work and thanks again to staff. Okay. Thank you, councelor. Uh, councelor Perble, you're next. Go ahead. Thank you chair and s chair to the staff. I'll start with 2.1 the uh Sunningdale Road West and I just want to ask uh in the report it says $24 million and uh we did receive and if you can confirm it $18 million from the province and I just want to have a couple of questions. Is the 18 on top of the 24? Is the 18 including the 24 and how it's recorded in terms of the funding of this project? Um, council, you said Sunningdale. Do you mean the Southdale project? No, Sunnydale 2.1 Renew 2.1. Oh, in within that project. Yeah, within that. Sorry. It's on page 22. Yeah. Uh, staff. U Mr. McCrae, is that you? Uh, through the chair, those uh dollar values are exclusive. We'll have detailed uh financial information on that project when it comes to tender which is anticipated in I believe the next council cycle. Follow up council. Thank you for that. So just to confirm let's say if it end up ends up being 24 from uh from uh province uh 18. So there would be six from uh municipal funding. Correct? If those amounts are accurate. Go ahead Miss Mar. Yeah. Can I can I recommend that we uh talk offline? I just don't want to misquote any any dollar values. Um yeah, I'd be pleased to clarify the information with you uh after the meeting. Okay, councelor. So, you can follow up between now and council and I certainly will do so. Thank you. Questions? Thank you. 2.2. very happy to of course very happy to see that there are small businesses now that when I talk to them uh they are not recycling and everything ends up being in the uh garbage bags. Uh so I do have a question though in terms of the downtown because downtown didn't have the program uh before in the past. Is this going to be potentially an option for downtown businesses as well to do the environ depot or is it going to be just the ones that have been so far uh lost on the program that were on it before? Go ahead, Mr. Chambers. Thank you and through the chair. Um the depot program will actually be open to all businesses citywide. So there is a bit of an improvement there that actually everyone will have access to a drop off location um for folks who are willing to go there. Um I will note just for reference because I could have mentioned this earlier the small businesses were generating maybe about 300 tons annually and our whole annual collection is usually around 21,000 tons. So it just gives you a bit of order of magnitude everyone about kind of how much we're losing. Not that we want to lose anything um but just that in terms of the cost benefit aspect. Okay. Follow up councelor. Okay. follow up actually and I'm going to go back I think p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p p page 39 and there were some municipalities that actually are continuing with a curb and if I understand this appendix A correctly, there are some municipalities that are actually continuing with the program and did we kind of follow up with them how they do it in terms of the both uh uh kind of the calendar in terms of the collection and also the funding. Go ahead, Mr. Uh thank you and through the chair. We did do quite a bit of homework on what other municipalities were doing. Um a lot of them are offering different programs. For example, in Ottawa, all of the businesses pay for their garbage collection. So they've kind of just added that on as an additional fee that they'll pay for their recycling. Um we've had other people that just went with extending services as a part of an existing service contract. So they were kind of already doing things like this. Hamilton, St. Thomas um they were already offering these types of services. So other municipalities operate their administration differently is the short answer. Um so in some cases it might make more sense than others. Uh in the couple examples the report we noted it's their choice to do it at a higher cost. Um we don't know of the timeline that those municipalities are willing to pay that extra cost, but again when we look at that kind of magnitude of one to $2 million again to capture maybe 300 tons um that's a lot of the reason why we're not really recommending it for this very very dispersed program. Followup councelor. Okay, thank you for that answer. 2.4 for the Southdale Road West and there's an increase of 50% and I know it states there in the report what it's for or the reasoning but I want to ask you is this because originally the Southdale sector are we enlarging it the project or is it something that uh we kind of after we started this we decided to go with the slope stability improvement environmental storm water so I just want to know if it those additional asks we had for the 50% or if we en enlarge the Southdale sector. Go ahead, Mr. McCrae. Through the chair, there are infrastructure needs outside of the limits of the original project. Uh it's been uh on our minds to address these because it's uh affecting the road stability. Uh so now that we have uh additional information to uh address that section, we are expanding the limits of the Southdale Road project to address uh those issues uh at the same time for better coordination uh with with the Southdale Road project. So that is the bulk of the addendum and uh and then included in that is the other items. The major uh the major reason is expanding the limits to address all the needs in the area. Followup counselor. Okay. Thank you for that answer. And last one 2.6. Uh it's a pro to two projects and it states there if I read it correctly that it's part of the renew project but when I looked at it the Edinburghough street and bridal path and country lane they were not included there. And my question is are all the projects uh included in the 2.1 or there are potentially some smaller amount ones that are not included. Thank you. Uh Mr. McCrae sorry through the chair um just to get a little bit of clarity on the question of smaller projects. This is awarding um the resident inspection and contract administration for two of our capital projects going on. Um and this award is for those two projects. Okay. Does that answer your question, counselor? No, actually uh so in 2.1 we have the entire program 2.6 and uh if I read it correctly, it states that both of them are part of the Renew London which is 2.1. When I went to 2.1, I did not find them there. So that's my question kind of if uh if in the 2.1 all are included or it's just in 2.1 certain aspects of the projects included. Thank you. Okay. Uh Mr. Yan, go ahead. Thank you, Mr. Chair. 2.1 highlights our top 10 projects that are being delivered in 2026. There are dozens of other smaller infrastructure renewal projects throughout the city. Those have been contained in the ward maps we've shared with you, but if you want more information on any of them, please reach out. We're happy to provide it. Okay, councelor. Any other questions? Thank you for that. No, and I don't need any additional information. Thank you. Okay, thank you. And yes, those ward maps are always very helpful. Great for town halls. Um, looking for first-time speakers before we do a second round. Okay, not seeing any online. Councelor Stevenson, you wanted to go again? I did. Yeah, I just wanted to circle back on 2.2 because, you know, I hear us saying, well, the trucks are going past anyway. If the province would only let us pick up the other stuff, that would be great. But for whatever reason, they've made it clear they're not going to do that. And they could very easily come back to us and say, "We saved you 3.4 million a year by taking over the blue box. Why don't you just take care of your businesses for a million dollars a year? You could even expand it from what I understand from the 500 businesses to all 2100 or 2,200 for just over a million. So when we look at the issues that are facing our city and our small businesses are really struggling and they're struggling for all kinds of reasons, some within our control, some without. And there's not we don't have many avenues to help them. But this could potentially be a way to relieve uh some costs uh or some uh you know service delivery issues that they're having by addressing this bluebox need. it meets so many of the things we say are important in this city. And so I I I struggle with going back to businesses and saying the province saved us 3 to 4 million a year on blue box, but we already put our money to uh our mill rate and so sorry, we're just going to have to let you suffer with this. So I when people say we're all on the same page, I mean it's hard to say no to what's before us, but it's really like a little more than nothing. Like I don't know how many businesses are going to be excited about driving out there to drop off, not charging them. I absolutely support, but I I really feel like this falls short of what we could would should do um as a council to support businesses. We have an unemployment rate highest in the country. Our small businesses are big uh employers here. We're straying a bit far from Well, it's my rationale for saying I think that we could do uh a lot better for our businesses here and maybe that's something that could come through uh our e economic development or maybe when we're talking about that strategy, but I don't think that we should leave it here. Like this is fine for now, but I hope we're not going to leave it here. I hope we're going to come up with something really great. Okay. Thank you. And you're at time. Okay. Um I don't think staff need to respond to that if you've put forward your proposal. Um looking for other counselors for speaking. Uh councelor Traso, go ahead. I I just want to say um I think we are getting very close to being on the same page. And I do think that this is to say that this is almost meaningless. I think really undermines a lot of the good work that staff has done and uh the the fact that we're trying to reach a um compromise here when this was sort of divided at uh at council and to say that it's meaningless or almost meaningless I think is really unfair. What I will say is that passing this does not preclude us from making an additional um determination that we want to spend more money. I don't think that would be considered um something that needs reconsideration. I think that would be additive to what we're passing here and I would certainly be very happy uh to to look at that. But it is going to require some additional um budgetary commitment that we perhaps we we we couldn't have made today. What's so elegant about this proposal that's in front of us is that it's already been budgeted for and we're not asking for any additional expenditures. And I think that's what makes the staff recommendation doable right now. But again, to address your concern, yes, we could be doing more. And I think we're going to have to see how uh this plays out with the province because I think it's an absolutely arbitrary and unreasonable regulation for them to I mean, what what gets mixed in with with with recyclables. The worst thing I've ever heard is cheese on pizza boxes, and that's not really uh at at at play here. We're talking about shoe boxes, and uh I know the optometrists have boxes for uh for vision materials, but uh this is a really good place for us to be. So, let's just stay together on this and then we'll take the next step and figure out if we need to do a multi-year budget um business case to expand on this, which I'd be all for. Thank you. Okay. Uh thank you, Councelor Trusso. Uh councelor Fer, go ahead. Thanks. I just wanted to I guess touch on that too like with when we talk about like the economies of scale like the first conversation we had was we would have to have a whole collection system with trucks uh with operators picking them up at these specific individual locations within the city and the money with that alone would be astronomical from the conversations I've had with staff on it. On top of that we would have to have it on the back end actually go to the sites to be collected there as well. So um when we talk about economies of scale like the the cost that we have that we see that we see that we've been talking about here it's much higher than that if we were to actually implement that entire system and that system would be overlapping with the system that we have right now. It would be much wiser and more prudent to advocate to the province and have the province see if they would be able to pick up those non-eligible sources in residential areas when they're already there with the trucks because that would be much more costefficient in moving forward. This is giving us a bridge to get there. Obviously, I would like to see pickups from the locations either to Enviros or either to our our collection sites. Um, but at the same time, it would be how much does that cost if we were to implement that on top of the system that we have right now. So, I think this is a good path forward. It does give us a bridge. It does give us some time. It does provide an opportunity. Um but at the same time like I know staff have have looked into uh the cost when it comes to the actual operators collection trucks coming in and picking all that up and that would be a huge huge amount. So this is why uh this report and I would say this is a way moving forward like obviously this is not the best of it all and I would like to see it be better but we do need some time to figure that out and I think the first approach would be point of order Mr. Chair. Okay, point of order. Go ahead. I believe the council already made these comments in their first round of speaking. I think we're just getting a little bit redundant as we're close to a vote. Yeah. Um, he has 5 seconds left. So, if you want to pen, go ahead. I'm just saying I think this bridges us to that point and speaking with the province is the first right move to do. Okay. Thank you, counselor. I'm not seeing any others. Uh, I do myself just have two quick questions with regards to uh 210 and 212. Um, just in terms of obviously we were waiting on some amendments. um part of this motion for for 210 anyways is to give staff that authority to uh continue uh those discussions. But even with 212, I'm just wondering are there any cost implications in terms of the province not having these things ready for us? Obviously, we have to wait until they send us things and we'll be given an update. But regard to 210 if we have any cost that we incur because of that and with 212 um I mean we're still waiting for information, but do we have any indication as to when we get more uh details about that? I don't know who on staff wants to take a crack at that, but looking for someone. Go ahead, Mr. Murray. Uh, thank you and uh through you, Mr. Chair. I'll speak to 2.10 being the court security and prisoner transportation program. So, that is a program that uh is uh the responsibility of London police. It is included in the police budget. Uh and this funding uh is simply flowthrough funding that the city then turns around and provides uh to the London Police Service uh as an offset to the costs that they have already budgeted in their budget for this program. Okay. And we are in terms of the other parts of this motion, this is just giving the authorization for staff to uh to conclude those agreements um when we get those amendments. Correct. Uh that is correct. the uh the uh approval here is the authorization to execute the agreement uh and then to execute any required financial reporting uh under that. Okay. Thank you. And with regards to 212 just in terms of uh do we have any indication when we get more information about the buy Ontario act and how that will impact municipalities? Uh go ahead Miss Barbone. Is that you? I don't know. You looked at me so I wasn't sure if that was you or who who do we have? Okay. Go ahead. through the chair. I'll pass that over to uh Miss Aurora. Thank you through the chair. Yes, we will wait for the uh we will leverage the trainings which are available right now. Uh will be available starting from May 4th till May 13th from the province and then we'll be reporting back to council on any additional resources or changes amendments or the controls we'll have to put it um in our procurement process. even the designs um changes and how it'll impact the complete uh procurement life cycle. Thank you. Okay. And uh sorry just to my earlier question in terms of there any cost implications for that uh do we envision any of those yet or has the province get any indication as to us having to absorb those? Thank you chair. Uh yes uh there will be cost implications uh in terms of resources as well as um um designing and evaluating the major goods uh reporting requirements from the province uh and total procurement life cycle costing uh change orders. So yes, there will be some cost implications. Uh and thank you. And any indication as to um whether they will be providing any funding or is that something we just absorb? Uh thank you through the chair. Uh there is no indication there will be any resources to um go along other than some of the guidance that might come through by Ontario. Um it's still early days. It's a little hard for us to estimate what the excuse me, the total cost could be, but uh certainly as we get any information, we'll provide reports back to uh council and committee as we hopefully get some more details then very shortly. Uh thank you and appreciate the responses from staff. Um I know we don't have all the details, but I still thought it was important that we mention that just cuz uh down the road we we'll have more uh coming back to us. So, thank you for that. Um again, looking for any other comments. This is on items 2.1 to 2.7 210 to 212. Okay, I'm not seeing any other hands. Um, we'll open that for voting. Closing the vote. Motion carries six to zero. Okay. Uh, thank you. Uh we do not have uh scheduled items items for direction terms of uh deferred matters. There were the two that were pulled. Um we have 2.8 2.9. Um we'll just deal with those separately. So I'll um put 2.8 on the floor. Uh looking for a mover and a seconder. Councelor Frank. Thank you. I'll second it. So 2.8 is on the floor. U go ahead for questions. Councelor Stevenson, you had this bullet. Go ahead. Yes. Thank you. Uh so I did have a couple of questions on this one. the um the contributions to the reserve fund that the social services reserve fund and the affordable housing renewal reserve fund in BNC. Has this been done before or is this something new? Uh go ahead, Miss Murray. Uh thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So, these are uh new. This is the first uh time that you're seeing uh these uh and I would characterize these as uh a function of uh not having the plumbing in place if you will to be able to uh actually uh do these uh going forward at this point. Um so the uh the London regional employment uh services is a fairly new service that the city uh provides and uh this is the first year that we have uh achieved the targets for uh the uh realization of incentive funding. So that's the uh funding here in question in recommendation B. So uh this is the first year that we're dealing with it. Uh the intention is to uh set that money aside to reinvest in the employment uh system uh and and to utilize the social services reserve fund uh in order to do it. Uh however, we do not have uh administrative authority uh to contribute to that uh reserve fund uh for this purpose as it currently stands. So that's why it is included uh as a separate recommendation for council's approval. Uh similarly uh the uh the properties uh the affordable housing properties uh specifically uh Silvin in question here in in part C uh these are fairly new properties. This is uh you know uh very early on in their life cycle and this is uh the first opportunity that we've had to contribute a net surplus uh from this property uh to ultimately reinvest it in the future life cycle renewal needs uh of of our affordable housing builds. So uh once again not something that we have the administrative uh delegated authority to do that contribution to that reserve fund currently. Uh so that's why it is for uh council's approval as part of recommendation C. Okay. Uh followup councelor. Yeah. Thank you. So are we looking at changing the policies going forward? Go ahead. Murray. Uh thank you. Thank you Mr. Chair. Yes. The intention would be to then uh as part of our reserve fund housekeeping annual report to bring forward the necessary changes uh to facilitate this process going forward should council approve. Okay. Thank you. Uh go ahead councelor. Thank you. The the reason I really struggle with this is a couple of years ago when we had property tax increases of 8 and 7% and we had 50 $60 million surpluses. when we as a committee or council tried to say, "Hey, could we use some of this money for other things similar similarly to what's being done here? 11.5 million for social or for shelters and now a half a million here and quarter of a million there. We were strongly cautioned against that for reasons that are still true today as far as I understand. So, I'm just wondering, like I said, if I go back and watch those meetings from a couple of years ago, we tried really, really hard to keep some of that money to address needs that taxpayers have. And now in 2026, we are doing just that. And we're expanding it even more beyond the shelter uh things that the mayor did. Now, we're talking about other surpluses going into reserve funds. And the question would be, why this? Why not garbage? Why couldn't the3 or four million dollars in in surplus have gone to a garbage reserve fund that we could have then used for things related to that? So, can you just help me understand why there's this change that's happened in the last couple of years and how expanded is this going to be or could council and the public weigh in on other things that they would like to see? Um, Miss Barbone, Miss Murray, go ahead. Yeah. No, thank you and and for you, Mr. Chair. So what I would say is uh there there has been no change. This is this does not represent a change. We still uh in general terms have a surplus deficit policy that guides uh the allocation of any or the disposition of any year end surplus or deficit. Um these are very uh specific things. So as it relates specifically to recommendation B uh I'll emphasize that this is a regional service. Uh this is not specifically a London taxpayer uh specific service. This is a service that uh supports not only London and Middle Sex but also Elgen and Oxford as well as an entire catchment area. Uh and the intention here is to reinvest these uh these funds in the overall catchment area. So this is not uh funds that are being sent aside to benefit London taxpayers specifically. It is to reinvest in the regional system. Uh recommendation C is in keeping with the strategy uh that was articulated by our municipal housing development team. I believe it was back in December uh with respect to uh the future plans uh to re reinvest any net surplus as it pertains to the baseline Thompson and Silvin uh properties. uh that report I believe specifically focused on on baseline primarily, but the the intention is the same for uh Thompson and Silvin as well. Uh so that we have the funds set aside to down the road uh rehabilitate and renew those uh specific properties uh when they require renewal. Followup, councelor. Yeah, I have a lot, but I'll take them offline. Uh on page 81 it talks about the total forecasted expenditures continue to exceed funding allocations beyond 2027 and that's with regards to social services and I just wondered if we could know more about that or will there be a report coming uh as March 2027 is you know only a year away. Go ahead Miss Murray. Uh through you Mr. Chair. So I will uh refer you to uh the same page in fact uh right before uh that um or a little a little bit up uh from that paragraph that you're referring to. Um our intention is to as part of our midyear budget monitoring report uh that will be coming later this year uh to uh provide some further detail and quantification where we can uh of some of those pressures and uh kind of give you a or attempt to give you a more wholesome picture of what those uh pressures look like uh over the months and years ahead. followup, councelor. Yeah, thank you. And that's great. I know we talked about that and I'm looking forward to it, but we've got um requests coming to council next week in terms of 20,000 a month and 85,000 a month for outreach and daytime services when we don't know if we're going to have shortfalls in shelter beds or, you know, that kind of thing. So, I feel like it's a little bit more urgent when I read something like this in a report and we're going to make funding decisions next week. Um, the other question is on the financial summary on page 82, we get very highlevel amounts like financial management has a $23 million a year budget. Corporate uh social and community services is $344 million. Corporate services 80 million. And I don't recall ever seeing a line by line for any of those areas like I can see for police or library or any of the other ones that have statements. So when was the last time the public and council got to see a line by line for any of these? Um I don't know who wants to take that one, Mr. Murray. Okay. Uh three, Mr. Chair. So uh the results uh as it relates to the monitoring uh positions have consistently been reported at the service grouping level which is what you see here. Um the next level down the service uh the service level. Uh that budget information is uh reported uh and available online through our our uh budget documents and our open data portal. Uh however uh the monitoring has been consistently kept at the service grouping level. followup councelor. Yeah, thank you. So the budgets that are available, does it all also have the actuals? Do we get to see the variances line by line? Go ahead, Mr. Uh you Mr. Chair. No, it is uh strictly the budgets. It does not include actuals. Okay. Followup. Yeah. And so I guess my question was when was when was the last time the public or council got to see a line by line variance for any of these big departments? Uh Miss Baro, want to take one? Go ahead. Uh, thank you through the chair. So, um, I'm going back many, many years here. Um, the size of the budget binders once upon a time did have that information. Um, as the city of London has continued to grow, the size of the line by lines has also grown. So, the number of lines are beyond the thousands and thousands of information. And that's why it's summarized because the actual line by line and the level of detail is so sufficiently low in our financial statement. It would be very challenging to reproduce and be very challenging to provide any um summary information to the public that would be useful because it would be too low a detail and and have titles that would not provide any information. So certainly um at least since well before 2015 um the information has been at a consolidated level to be able to make it useful for the public and for the council to uh have detailed information about Okay, thank you. Uh follow-up counselor. Yeah, I I I hear you. And at the same time, we've consolidated to one line, right? So we don't even know I I'll criticize other things and say how much is wages? how much is overhead, how, you know, what are the variances? And we don't even have that for our own departments. And I've I've seen I've looked at other councils and they're receiving like very very like actual GL accounts every single account. I I question whether the bigger the city gets, the more line numbers there really are um versus the smaller ones. And maybe that's true, but usually the numbers just get bigger in in business in the business world anyway. And so I I think there's going to be an opportunity going forward. There's a request for more transparency from the public. And I think um you know it starts here at home for us to say do we even know what the variances are within the departments that we we uh provide oversight here for. So council you have 30 seconds. Yeah. It's u it's an issue I believe and I think that there's I'm going to look into how we can request more information. The same thing happened with the reserve funds. We used to see the ins and outs and that hasn't been provided in a long time either. So our tax rates are going up up up and what the public gets to see is going down down down. Okay, thank you. You're at time looking for other speakers for committee members. Okay, I'm not seeing any, but I'll do councelor Charles then councelor Pville just um really briefly and this is this this is hard but I I have to I'm looking at I'm looking at the municipal act section 224 that talks about the role of counselors and while I I am not directing this as any criticism towards anything that's on today's agenda and I'm not directing this to criticisms of any program or any member of civic administration, but I think councelor Stevenson is raising a good point. Um, it's a broader point that I think if not this council, perhaps the next council is going to have to look at in a little bit more detail because when we're told that the complexity of the problem is too great to share because it would be thousands and thousands of lines, um, I I don't think that's right. I I think we have to be given the opportunity to see that that level of detail. I'm going to leave it that there right now. I'm certainly not going to raise this at council or make any kind of a any kind of amendment, but we always have to go back to that section of the municipal act to understand what our special responsibilities are as a council. Uh and again, I mean no I mean no criticism, no disrespect of anything that the staff has put forward. This is just a very conceptual item for the future. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, councelor. Uh councelor Ple go ahead. Thank you. I would like to start by making a comment and congratulations the entire RBC plays for a great financial year last year. Uh we do have a request in front of us the how to deal with their uh operating surplus. But I just want to say that even though we are going through the very challenging times this organization actually recorded the highest revenue during the history of this uh uh of this convention center. So congratulations for that. Uh I do have a question and when I when I look at the surpluses last year and this year last year financial management was the highest $28.8 million uh not this year or the amounts are not there and my question was when I look at this last year financial management you know due to delay in property reassessment resulting in lower appeals uh of course u uh taxation personal contingency savings. My question is this in this list and there are a few other ones. There's no doubt that there have been changes. We know interest rate has come down etc. But if you look at these items, aren't these items still some of them valid? And I understand they are not $28.8 million, but would they be in this list as well with some solid amount? Uh Mr. Murray. Uh thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So I think uh what we saw last year and what we had noted in fact as part of uh last year's results were a number of um one-time uh kind of unusual uh amounts that drove up last year's surplus. Uh you uh you spoke uh specifically uh to the uh provision for uncollectible taxes and tax appeals. That was uh an example of you know a fairly uh significant contributor uh last year to the surplus in this area. uh that was uh more so one time in nature. Uh it's not something that uh we would uh expect to see and certainly not in that magnitude uh you know every year and that certainly has played out uh this year as well. So you know some of those factors still can play in uh but I think last year there were some unusually uh large uh one-time surpluses uh that contributed to last year's overall surplus. Followup councelor. Okay. Thank you for that. Uh I will end uh the 2.8 by making a comment. Uh you know the council approved surplus deficit policy. It was actually done even before our council. This the one uh I never agreed with. I honestly believe that we should have it open. Every year is totally different and I totally believe that we would still take very seriously the staff's recommendation. I I believe we are all very responsible and therefore we wouldn't want to jeopardize the Moody's rating either. But again, every year is different and I think the council should have the uh ability based on the needs which every year they are different. We know how fast the world is changing and we can anticipate even what's next week that there should be a flexibility for the counselors. Thank you. No more questions or comments. Okay. Thank you, councelor. Uh looking for any questions or comments on 2.8. Okay. Uh not seeing any online. We'll open this for voting. Closing the vote. Motion carries 5 to1. Okay, we are on 2.9. Uh this is the 2025 year end capital budget monitoring report. Uh looking for a mover and seconder. Okay, councelor Frank. I'll second it. Okay, that's on the floor. Questions for 2.9. Go ahead, councelor Stevens. Yeah, thank you. on. So on page 27, it talks about the 2025 debt level level in table 8 and it says the total tax supported debt in as of the end of 2024 was 118 million and at the end of 2025 it was 137 million with authorized debt of 747 million with a total potential of 884 million. I just wondered if staff could talk more about that and the impacts that that's going to have on debt servicing levels and when those impacts will start. Uh Mr. Murray, go ahead. Uh thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. So yes, the uh the table here in question shows uh the debt levels as of last year uh what has been issued and retired in 2025 uh leaving a a balance uh outstanding as of 2025. It also shows uh the authorized debt as of 2025 as well. Uh authorized debt being debt that has been approved uh through the budget uh for capital projects that has not yet been issued but has been approved and needs to be factored in into our projections uh in terms of debt levels and debt servicing costs. Uh so that uh when you add that to what has actually been issued uh reflects the what we call the total potential debt uh that is outstanding. Uh this is uh consistent and in line with what we uh reported as part of the uh 2026 budget update uh back in the fall. Also in that uh debt section of that uh budget, we provided uh some forecasts in terms of uh when we expect uh that debt to be issued uh as well as the resulting impact on debt servicing costs out over the next 10-year period. Uh certainly based on the approvals uh the approved investments that uh council uh has made at uh at this point through the multi-year budget and uh since then uh we do expect debt to ramp up uh over the years ahead and and we uh you know have incorporated that in our projections and uh we do update those projections every year to kind of reflect uh where we are with projects and and how we uh anticipate them trending and when we might get around to issuing them. um that uh I will also mention that we uh you know through our various financial policies whether it be the surplus deficit policy uh or the assessment growth policy for example we have the policy mechanisms in place that allow us to uh do debt substitution which is effectively allowing us to chip away at that authorized but unissued debt figure. basically avoiding uh that authorized uh debt, avoiding having to issue it and actually have it come to reality. Uh so that is the strategy we use to uh avoid having to uh see this uh debt, this authorized debt materialized and avoid those uh debt servicing costs uh into the future. So, uh this is why we continue to advocate for the importance of those debt substitution uh policies that we have in place uh that have uh successfully allowed us to uh avoid I believe it's uh a little bit north of $100 million uh going back now to uh to 2016. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Followup, council. Yeah. No, thank you. That that's helpful. Well, I I guess I just see that ability to reduce the debt going forward decreasing as we change our policies as we have and start using the surplus for other things because we only have 5 million left this year. Um the other thing I wondered is on page uh 101 which is appendix A the capital budget activity when it says budget adjustments in the last column are those positive numbers increases to the budget. Go ahead Mr. Murray. Uh thank you three you Mr. Chair. Yes those would be uh budget increases uh where uh budget either has not existed uh before. So, you know, for example, uh I would refer you to source of financing number uh 25136, which is the first one on the second uh page of that table. That's the replacement of steam services. That's an example uh of of one where there was no budget at that point in time for that initiative. So, uh a budget has been created uh to uh to facilitate that uh that procurement in question. Uh some of these others are uh examples where the budget in place has been insufficient and additional uh budget has been added to that capital project through that associated source of financing. Followup counc. Yeah, thank you very much. Yeah. And I noticed like one of the first ones on here, 25002, I think it was the East Link phase 4, uh, $29 million budget with a a budget increase of 2 million. Um, I don't see any budget decreases. So, would those show here or are we only reporting increases? Go ahead, Mr. Murray. Uh, thank you through you, Mr. Chair. So typically uh this is uh what you see here are are the uh sources of financing that have been awarded that facilitate the actual award of tenders. Um typically what uh what happens is we we're either uh within budget for to award the tender and there's no additional funding required or there is an additional funding requirement that uh that is required in order to proceed as it pertains to uh budget reductions or releases. uh this very report is in fact the mechanism to reduce or release capital budgets as there is surplus in those capital budgets they get uh released through the semiannual capital budget monitoring report followup councelor no thank you that's great that's all for now okay uh looking to other committee members okay not seeing any online go ahead council approval thank you chair to the staff last year we had this column graph uh which was forecasted tax supported depth levels. It was this one and uh I know this year I did not find it and I thought I found it really very useful last year and my question is if it's uh if it was omitted because it's identical even though I don't believe it is identical but uh if it's not will we be able to still receive it before the council? Thank you. Uh go ahead Mr. W. Thank you three Mr. Chair. I'll refer you to the 2026 uh budget update document which includes that graph. It's the most recent uh iteration. So if you go to the budget document that's available on our website, you'll find those very graphs with the latest projections that we have. Thank you. Followup counselor. So thank you. The latest and therefore more most current ones. Correct. That's correct. Okay. Thank you for that. And the second and the second one's through the chair to the staff. uh the capital source of financing seni diagram by classification when I compared it it's identical last two years is it still valid that really any changes it still would be very valid identical to last year thank you go ahead mr uh thank you three mr chair uh I would say that uh this doesn't tend to fluctuate uh very significantly uh this is kind of based on a longer term uh kind of view and this is uh this is in fact based on the uh life-to-date capital budget. So this is uh the 4.4 billion of existing capital projects. So I would not expect it to uh to change or to deviate very quickly. It tends to be fairly static uh only changing as each year more and more uh capital projects are added to it. But uh it would take a really significant uh kind of deviation in a particular new capital project to radically change this diagram. Followup councelor. Thank you. Thank you for that answer. And actually, I'm just going to go to the previous ones because I'm quite sure it's going to be faster for you than for me. If you could please send me the link to the column graph. Thank you very much. No more questions. No more comments. Great. Thank you. Uh looking for any other comments, questions. Okay. Not seeing any online. We'll open this for voting. Closing the vote. Motion carries six to zero. Okay, thank you everyone. We are now on to confidential items. Looking for a motion to go into close session. Councelor Frank, councelor Mirburg again. Great. Thank you. And opening for voting. Closing the vote. Motion carries six to zero. Okay, we're back in public session. I look to councelor Frank to report out. Thank you. I'm pleased to report that we made progress for the items for which we went camera for. Thank you. Looking for a motion to adjurnn. Councelor Frank, I'll second. All those in favor of adjournment? Any opposed? Motion carries. Okay, thank you.

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