Transcript: Council Compensation Review Debated - 2026-04-20 - Finance and Corporate Services Committee | Summary 674

Council Compensation Review Debated - 2026-04-20 - Finance and Corporate Services Committee

Okay, good afternoon everyone. Welcome uh to this meeting of finance and corporate services committee. Uh I will begin uh as usual asking if there are any disclosures of kunary interest. Not seeing any. Uh we will move on to the consent items. Um councelor Chapman on the consent items. Sir, you queued out here. One second. Can you queue back in? Okay, go ahead. Yeah, I'd like to pull 3.1 and 3.2. 3.1.2. Okay. And actually, I had uh comment on 3.1 as well. So, I'll take that motion of taking those two items out of consent. Those in favor? And that carries. Councelor Chapman, do you want to begin with uh your question? Okay. So, I'll start with 3.1. Um the five Charles Street. Um so my first question has to do with um so that the idea is 400 units 80 will be affordable. What is meant by affordable here? It would be CHC's definition of affordable housing as they're applying for an affordable housing loan through CHC. Okay. Um and I had a question about um a holding provision. Will there be a holding provision on this because of the water scarcity? That would be something that uh planning would have to determine. So, we're not at that stage yet or No, we're not at that stage yet. Okay. They haven't even come in for presubmission at this point. Okay. Um my other question has to do with the um commercial businesses that are at 91 Queen Street. Um because the parking the proposal will take away the parking away from that those businesses, right? Um and I just wondered if they've been notified and um what the response was. They have not been notified yet, but yes, that is a public parking lot that's owned by the city of Kitchener, and they will be notified at least six months in advance of the lot closing, which probably won't happen for the next year and a half to two years. But if we were to pass this now, then um it's pretty well a given that that parking will be taken away. Is that correct? That's correct. Okay. Um and in the report, it says that the current costs in the lot. Um, it's an annual operating cost of $13,000. I just wondered what the revenue is that the city takes in in that lot. So, that that is the net figure. I don't have Sorry. That is the net figure. So, the revenue less the expenses results in a in a deficit of $11,000. Oh, okay. Um those are all my questions. Thank you. Okay. On on this actually just uh by way of comment. Uh fellow members of council want to take a moment to acknowledge a long serving uh city employee who'll be retiring in coming weeks. Uh and then as I understand this is uh likely the last time we'll see Mr. Mr. Bennett uh in in the council chamber. Uh he joined the city of Kitchener over 13 years ago. Uh Brian came to the city following 27 years with TD Bank as a VP of commercial banking, having completed a term also as the chair at the KW Chamber of Commerce. It is rare to find someone of Brian's business background and local connections. During his time with the city, Brian built critical relationships with key business leaders and CEOs across Kitchener. He has always been seen as a trusted go-to at city hall for any business that was experiencing challenges. At the same time, Brian was equally respected by his colleagues at city hall. A natural problem solver, Brian built bridges, helping staff and developers find ways to move projects forward. But Brian's true passion is city building. More specifically, partnership building that led to new community assets. Most notably, Brian played a critical role working with Andrew Holmes to see the full city center development completed right here next to city hall. Other key projects Brian helped bring include the recent reimagination of the boat house, the redevelopment of the Legion and construction of 345 King, the final phase of the Heron Business Park, and the full build of the innovation arena. So, it's only fitting on his final time in front of city council, Brian is here on behalf of a partnership with St. Matthew Matthews Church that he's helped to nurture for over eight years. Mr. Mr. Bennett, on behalf of City Hall, thank you for your many years of dedication to our community and for the leadership role you've played with our business community. Thank you. Thank you. Not to put you on the spot, but I didn't know you turn your microphone off. And that's first of all, thank you for your kind words and it's been a real privilege to work with council and team Kitchener to move our economic development agenda forward and um I'm going to miss everybody. So, thank you very much. Okay. Well, we hope we we see you around. Uh Council Chapman, you had questions on another item as well. Oh, sorry. Mayor Banner, go ahead. again. No, I just wanted to add my thanks to uh to Mr. Bennett as as well. Um for uh for his many years at at the city. Um you know, as in my role obviously since uh since 2014 as mayor, had an opportunity to work with uh economic development on uh on various projects, some of which you mentioned. um and but also with uh Water Region Economic Development Corporation and and Brian in terms of um our efforts to uh get uh new investment into the community. And so we've had the opportunity uh to travel with other mayors um in in various jurisdictions and uh tell them about all the great things uh that that Kitchener and Water Region has to uh has to offer. and um you know some of those came to fruition and the relationships that Brian was able to build in that time uh I know were highly regarded and and respected by uh by by those folks. Uh he certainly has has worked well with a number of people to help them in their uh in their growth uh trajectories as as well. uh with that being one of the the key focuses of uh of our local economic development department and and so uh I know he's got a a a big rolodex and I I hear that uh he's uh figuring out how to transfer some of that over to uh to our staff to uh to help support them as uh as they uh as they carry on. Uh but whoever his successor will be will have big shoes to fill. So, thank you very much, Brian. Thank you, Mayor Benovich. Um, sorry. And councelor Chapman, do you have questions on the other item? Yeah, for 3.2. Um, I don't know. Is it the same people? It has to do with the cameras, the body cameras. Okay. So, yeah, I had a couple questions. Um, will these cameras be used by all bylaw officer calls? Mr. Flected through the chair. Um, our downtown safety ambassadors and our temporary staff will not have cameras. Our property standards and compliance officers will. So, are there particular calls that they would have them turned on or would they always be turned on or would it only be if it was a noise violation or like are there specific categories that would merit the Yeah, so any any call that our officers are at will have the camera turned on. Uh if they're in their line of duty, whether it's issuing parking tickets or interacting with people or part of an investigation, the camera will be turned on. Okay. Um the other I mean this is a more general question. It said in the report that their um CCTV cameras have been um used in the city for the past 20 years. Um and I I guess I would ask how are they currently used and will anything changed change other than these body cameras? Yeah, go ahead. Oh, sorry. You Oh, go ahead. You're good. So, through the chair, um, the body cam uh, program wouldn't change the way that we've always used our CCTV cameras through corporate security. And I think in the report it referred to authorized personnel. So who's authorized? So for our CCTV policy that is authorized personnel is restricted just to security right now. Um the cameras can be seen at a facility but not reviewed other than from the security department. So but there's recordings of what they're it's not just a a live image, right? Is it recording? Correct. Yes, it's recorded on a hard drive at the facility. Uh security is the only one who's able to review those recordings. Anyone from your department? Yes, correct. Okay. And um how many CCTV cameras do we currently have? Don't have an exact number. I'd say close to 300. Okay. I just have a bit of a problem with um you knowbody anybody in the department having access to them and what information is stored and how it's being used. So the reason for the policy, we've always had an operating procedure in place for security uh that outlines the use of the cameras and the recordings. Um all recordings are I guess deleted after 30 days if they're not being used in an official investigation. And there's we've only turned that footage over to our insurance department or uh water regional police with a request form. Uh all review and I guess downloading of that information is also documented by security and incident reports. Okay. Thank you. Um going back to the cameras for a moment. Is that a live feed or is it also recorded and it will be on available for 30 days or how's that managed and that might have been in the report through the chair. Uh the body warn camera footage is a little bit different where it's unique licenses. So each officer will have their own license and can only view their own footage other than the super users which is the director and the manager management team in by law enforcement. Uh there's three different categories of retention for the footage. So there's the rout routine recordings which don't have any sort of interaction that automatically get deleted after 90 days and then there's investigative ones that are about 30 months plus a day. And then there's ones that are categorized as critical incidents which is seven years. Okay. Thank you councelor Deno on this. Thank you chair Davey. Uh have the policies have there been any policy changes for the CCTV in the last number of years? Go ahead. So through the chair, um the policy, the internal security policy was created about 2016. Um there's only been minor changes based on the documentation of how security is documenting the footage. Um this is the first time that we've gone to a corporate official policy just to put that in place. Okay. And as far as uh in terms of who who can view it, that hasn't changed, right? Correct. That has changed. Okay. Thank you. and Mayor Benovich. Thank you very much. Um just in terms of um the cameras and so on. So essentially these operate in a similar manner to ones that folks have at at home um except except we have a a fixed um destruction uh point of view to them through the chair. Uh that's correct. We have um all of our hard drives are set to a 30-day uh I guess it's basically a re taping over um schedule. Uh the only way that any footage is saved beyond that point is if it's downloaded specifically for an investigation. Okay. and the the footage and so on that's that's captured is uh you know based on how you've described it's it's not sort of run or used against any other databases or or anything like like that. It's simply footage that is captured and and if there's a a criminal offense that that happens then you have it for investigative purposes. Correct. Yes. We don't have the capacity at this time to even live view all of those cameras at one time. So, it's strictly for after the fact use. So, if for example, we have, you know, I know from time to time we trespass people on some of our properties and so on, these cameras don't have any ability to to check against our trespass list or or video or anything like that. Not the not a function that we use. They do have the ability, but it's not something we use for facial recognition or anything like that. Okay. Thank you. Okay. I'm not seeing anyone else in the queue. So, I did I get a mover for the consent items? I don't recall. I did. Yeah. Okay. If I didn't, councelor Dell. Uh, asking any requests or comments? So, I would ask those in favor and opposed. I believe that carries unanimously. Okay. Thank you. We'll move on to the discussion items. The first is uh 5.1 uh Savic Homes 15 Delray Avenue. I don't believe staff is speaking to this. At least in my notes, I don't see that. Okay. So, I would take any questions on this at this point. Not seeing any questions. Can I get a mover? Moved by councelor Ionitis. Any discussion? Not seeing any. Those in favor and that carries unanimously as well. And we'll move on to the next item which is the council compensation review. Mr. Watkins, when you're ready. Thank you, Chair Davyy, and good afternoon, everyone. Um, I'll just uh take a brief moment here to offer some introductory comments on the report before you today before turning it over to our consultant. So, as you will recall, on February 2nd, council directed staff to proceed with an independent review of council compensation with the intent of ensuring both transparency and alignment with market practice ahead of the next term of council. This review was primarily recommended based on results of recently conducted reviews undertaken by other municipalities including all but two in Waterl region. Following that direction, staff retained Maryanne Love Consulting Services, a firm with more than 30 years of experience conducting public sector compensation reviews across Ontario. The consultant's mandate was intentionally focused to give limit uh given the limited time to undertake the review and the fact that a comprehensive review is already scheduled for the next term of council. The review focused solely on base pay used comparator group of cities within regional municipalities and assessed council compensation against established benchmarks. The consultant is joining us virtually today from her office in Ottawa to present her findings on the work and respond to any questions she may have. U recommendations from committee will be brought forward to special counsel later this afternoon to ensure that any decision on council compensation is finalized in advance of the opening of nominations on May 1st for the 2026 mis election. Uh with that context I'll turn it over to the consultant for her presentation. Thanks very much uh Justin. And uh you can see um chair that the presentation's on screen and um I believe going to move the slides and happy to answer any questions you have chair um through the presentation. We can hold those to the end. I just follow your lead. Okay. Thank you and welcome. Okay. Thank you. Okay. So um as as as has been set out in the introduction, we were retained to conduct a compensation review for the elected officials commissioner. Um there's a policy that outlines compensation for elected officials that was approved in 2002 and that resulted in changes to base pay rates that were effective Jan 2003. There have been subsequent amendments to this policy. were made to reflect the elimination of the tax-free exemption and also enrollment in homes. Uh I was asked to review municipal comparely collected by city of Kitchener staff, we had a few data points that we needed to add on our end. And really as as has been set out in the introduction to focus on base remeration and we did that by using percentile target analysis and These recommendations are really prepared for council's consideration. Thanks. This slide sets out your your remuneration and the base pay as it's relating to base pay. So the the 2026 annual base pay rates that were effective April 1 of this year are set out here where the mayor is at $121,262 and counselor positions at 235. There is no def defined percentile target for base pay at present and the annual base pay increases I'm advised are tied to the annual salary adjustment or cola for the non-union and management staff. We have 11 members of council and this is including the mayor. There is no deputy mayor uh at Kitchener. Counselors are considered part-time and they serve on city council. The mayor serves on city council and also at regional council. Just by way of overall summary, the 2026 base payer for mayor and council positions is low when we compare it to the defined pay market. And that's when zeroing in or reflecting the 60th percentile. And I'll get I'll drill down on that in a few slides. The 2026 market summary annual pay rates at the 60th percentile for the defined pay market are for the mayor $156,762 and for counselor $68,83. All of our comparators adjust council salary annually. A strong majority of the comparators provide adjustments based on aligned with exempt staff and they also conduct the market review at the end of each term of council. This uh slide sets out the methodology and the source data that was used. Uh we identified nine comparators to use for this review and the comparator group was selected and is reflective of the following selection criteria. scope. So we're looking at local area municipalities certainly geographic location some regard to historic comparators and some general alignment with comparators used for the non union. Um a custom survey was prepared using the comparator municipal organizations you see on slide and I'll just read them out. We have Markham, Oakill, Richmond Hill, Burlington, Ashawa, Cambridge, Milton, and Water. And only the city portion of the base pay was used in the market analysis. We did not use any regional pay pay received by a position for regional work or regional participation. So you'll see um on the next slide um a bit more I'll just to slide the things there's a bit more um descriptor on this slide with regards to some of the selection criteria. So you see the comparator down on the left hand side in the region. So there's geographic location. The population is noted and that's from 2021 Stats Canada. There is a 2026 Stats Canada exercise that's underway um in May of this year. That data obviously then is not available but it does give us a sense of relative size by population. It does not pick up growth but it gives us a consistent numeric to compare through the comparator group. The size of council is also shown as well as the statement of operation uh statement of expenses coming from the um the operation expenses sorry coming from the u municipal fs that were that have been filed. Of course you see again at the bottom of slide we're using 2020 for Ontario financial information return data just to give us a sense of those expenses. Um the data isn't is to to be filed you know was to be filed in March and that isn't a fully complete data set um for for 25 as yet. So again we're seeing a consistent data set being reflected for 24. So these are just general indicators around size and scope and you put this in for council's uh information. This slide sets out the um sort of the outputs of the analysis and I'll start a top slide here. Base pay comparative statistics are shown in this market summary and we use various percentiles the 50th 55th and the 60th percentile targets. You can see in each one they're they're colored just for ease of of the eye. Um and you can see a column that's called that's referenced as percentage differential. And that just gives us a sense of the gap between the KER elected official uh position and that base pay rate for that official and then the what the market statistic is showing. And where we have pluses that means we need to increase current base pay to achieve that that that target that that's reflected. Yeah. Sorry, Marian, can I ask you to hold pause for just one sec? Uh, madam chair, is it possible to move the video because it's covering some of the information? No, it's not. Okay. Okay. No problem. Sorry, please continue. It is actually in the report though too if you want to reference that as well. Sorry, Marian, please continue. Yes, I'm it's blocked on mine too, but I think I I I know. So, I'm okay there. But thank you very much, chair. Um, I just wanted to step back from the slide for just a little bit and talk about percentiles and they may the use of percentiles may well be known to council because I expect you know we use percentiles uh for for other metrics in in our government and our administration but really it's a better reflection of ranking and positioning than an average. So when we have are using percentile comparisons we're really trying to determine how we rank and compare amongst the the data set that's been selected. What you You'll see on the slide is the number of observations. We just took that out because we knew we had nine comparators. So for the mayor and council, we have nine observations for each for each of those percentile targets. You don't see any any differential besides deputy mayor. That's because we don't have one. And also just just for information, there were three of the comparative mayor. So certainly not the majority. It was the minority that did, but we reflected that. Excuse me. Percentile targets as I said give us a sense of how we rank and compare. And you will see as you move your eye across screen. So from the market median which is the 50th percentile ranking to the 60th the numbers are growing. And that's because we're looking at a higher ranking amongst pool of comparators. Um the u the 60th percentile is the dollar rate that you see here on screen. 40% of the observations are above that amount 60% and I'll take the next slide. So this slide gives us a bit more detail with regards to the numbers that you saw in the slide previous. Our compensation philosophy in Kitchener seeks to position elected officials competitively within the municipal sector. Market benchmarking as I said earlier allows our compensation allows council comparisons across similar municipalities. Now to support decision making council compensation reviewed against different percentile points. So you see the 50th percentile target I won't go through the numbers you see on the screen the 55th percentile target and the 60th. So again these targets are increasing that just means an increase a higher ranking amongst amongst that group. I'll take the next slide. The um this slide um again just additional reflections on base pay comparisons. Council's current compensation is positioned below the 60th percentile. The base pay for mayor is below all percentile benchmark targets. The base pay for counselors is is competitive 50th percentile but below the 55th and 60th. This review is recommending ing council compensation of the 60th percentile and that's based on a number of considerations. Uh first off it's Ker's population size and scale of municipal operations and not to ask the to go back to the previous slide but you'll see in terms of size and scope um u indicators there's a number of smaller municipalities in terms of financial u in terms of say the operating financial operating data that provided and also population. So to come up a little higher within that ranking of the nine seems reasonable yet conservative. So our population is above the 60th percentile based on the 2020 21 census data and it's also um above the municipal operating budget. Okay municipal operating budget indicator that was reflected and you see the numbers here in the in the I just won't reference them. But just general, as I said, general reflection is we're above the 60th percentile. So, in terms of size scope, so it makes sense not to bring ourselves in at the middle of the pack, if you will, but a little higher in the 60th percentile is is more reflective, I think, of relative positioning. Certainly, the other thing that I wanted to underscore was the additional responsibilities of this council that is associated with governing of the two municipally owned natural gas utilities in the province for which I'm advised there is no separate compensation. We have additional duties for Kitchener in relation to the peer organizations again supporting a bit of a higher percentile target ensuring um another consideration of course is ensuring broad consistency with the corporations or the organization's overall compensation philosophy and wanting to maintain competitiveness with municipalities to to support governance. So the base pay rates that are being recommended effective next term council are for the mayor 156,762 and council 68,8 so um in terms of pay practice as it relates to base pay all of our comparators are reporting annual salary adjustments for councils for for their Seven are report that they apply a cola adjustment to align with exempt employee groups and two comparators report that they use CPI increases or related um economic indicators to to determine their increases. Reviews are typically completed during the last term of council of council and prior to the municipal election. Six of our comparators report that they conduct their reviews at the end of council's term. One comparator conducts a review every two to three years and two comparators are conducting group reviews on a national basis. And by way of conclusion um the comparator group in our view is representative based on select criteria. It is prevailing practice to generally generally align the comparator group group. based pay with the comparator group for the non union management staff and we took that into consideration here. The 60th percentile pay target in our view is reasonable based on the size scope and pay practice of the comparator group and factors that are unique to specifically the accountability for governing this natural gas utility. The base pay rates for mayor and counselor both require an increase to meet the 60th percentile pay target. It is best practice to increase annual base pay for elected official positions by the amount used to adjust the non staff salary grid and this is allowing for a year increase to align with cost of living increases also supported by our survey results. It is also best practice to review compensation once during the term of using compared to municipalities. And again, it it allows that sort of periodic systematic review to avoid large increases in any one term. In terms of recommendations, we're recommending that council give consideration to implementing um the base pay adjustments you see on screen effective next term of council and that effective date is November 15th of this year. 56,762 counselor 68,83 based on the considerations that settled in this report. It's further recommended that can council continue the practice of adjusting base pay for the elected official positions annually by using the economic percentage economic adjustment provided for the non-UN management staff compensation grid. And further, it's recommend recommended that council adopt the pay practice of compensation once during each term of council in consultation with third party consultant and a comparison of comparative organizations and this again aligns with best practice in sector and amongst your comparative take any questions. Thank you for your presentation. There are a couple questions beginning with councelor Singh. Thank you Mr. Chair. I think um my focus on the conversation. Um, I'm gonna move my camera so it's a little bit easier. Sorry, my apologies. Uh, is not necessarily on the recommendation and the report towards the compensation, but ensuring that the report effectively and adequately outlines the responsibilities and and you know the efforts that this council uh is undertaking as it responsib Glad Miss Love that you outlined the gas utility because that does make city quite unique compared to it all it peer municipalities being the only other one but uh there was no mention of u as a comparator of severance package where some municipalities do outline severances uh if someone is not successful in retention of their uh uh you know remaining in office how does that compare city where does not have that. That's one. That's one. And the second question and your report did outline this uh in reference to a deputy mayor position where other cities do have a deputy mayor role and that compensation accordingly is higher than a member of council in the city of Kitchener. Although we don't have deputy mayors, we do uh follow the practice of outlining responsibilities shared amongst all of us as acting mayors and I think all of us in various different formats have attended uh different functions events or responsibilities related to as an acting mayor uh and we share that responsibility but that does come with effectively additional workload that's shared amongst us so although we don't have a deputy mayor we are undertaking that extra duties as well can you outline that also thank you Mr. Those are my questions. Thank you through the chair. Thank you very much for the question. First question related to pay. I understand that there's going to be more comprehensive revieweration um in the next term of council and typically when we review on a comprehensive basis um the other elements remuneration they would include key components of ancillary pay could be retire which would include retirement benefits for example health and dental benefits uh pension participate pension plan participation. So there'll be a list of additional pieces of facility pay that I would expect will be included in that review. This review was really intended, as was referenced in the introduction at the beginning of this presentation, really to focus on base pay to get to with the view to having that set reset in a a more competitive u more competitive way to move this council into the next term. Understanding more work done with regards to the second uh question. Um and granted we is a a note there on screen and you see it in your package for deputy mayor but there are only three of the nine that have a deputy mayor so I really don't think from from our perspective that the data is necessarily skewed because because it's two of the comparators don't have a deputy mayor so I think the data is pretty representative of a nonuty mayor mayor scenario if If it were that the majority had a depor, I think that would be taken into account with regards to the base pay, but because it's a minority and it's a small minority, onethird of the data set, we really didn't think that that entered into it considerably. So, we we didn't take into that into account, but we did want to show what at least the the three observations like. Thank you. Next is councelorus. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you, Chair Davey. Thank you, Miss Love, for your uh your presentation. Um just out of curiosity, based on your experience, uh when when we when we look at the report, the last time a really comprehensive review was done was basically 2002. Is is that unusual compared to other municipalities in that length of time to see a comprehensive review? through the chair. Frankly, it is unusual. The norm is to have compensation reviewed once a term and you know for reasons set out because then it's just sort of a it's a it's a touch point versus oh we really need to do a deep dive here and perhaps you know bring in adjustments that are sometimes you know folks folks may may kind of pause and wonder but clearly in an evolving pay market in the municipal sector is one both staffwise and governance wise It's something to keep our minds on. So I think the most there's two prevailing recommendations in this report. One is the adjustment itself and the other is the practice of going out and testing the pay reviewing the pay market once a term of council that really has evolved best practice the last 10 years. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Just myself left the question uh Maryanne if I could. I just want to make sure it's clear on how the percentile system works uh when we're only looking at pay. So if I could just illustrate an example, let's say the cohort was only our two most local municipalities being um Waterlue and Cambridge each of which has approximately half of our population, a bit less in some cases. Um but their their pay is approximately at least the the recent changes their pay is similar to us. How does that how would that paint Kitchener if that was if the wage percentile was the only factor being considered? Well, first of all just statistically it's very hard to get a rank order and a and a and a percentile comparison when there's only two observations. we pretty much need three or more observations to to really understand what the rank order is amongst the group. Um I I think it's important to understand just by way of reflection here. It's important to understand what your closest municipalities are doing both in terms of what they're paying and how often they're going out to the pay market. That's practice that we probably want. Um and and it it that observation in terms of how we actually see the data does that inform us does that give us a better understanding or feel that amongst the broader group we should be positioned a little higher than the middle of the pack which is the 50th percentile the answer is yes it does so I think there's a a number of considerations and council and yourself chair or committee I should say and yourself have sort of hit on a number um you know there's the responsibility for utility which is quite unique in the province. There's the fact that you know we've got I would say a relatively conservative pool. We've got some small municipalities in there. So we haven't stacked it with large municipalities. So and if we did you probably wouldn't hear at 60% probably a lower percentile but that's not the way we do it on the staff compensation across the province. We try to pretty good set, some larger, some smaller, and how do we see ourselves within that grouping based on the unique characteristics to the organization we're doing the work for? And there are a number of unique characteristics for there certainly are one is the geographic placement clearly and then the responsibility for utility. Okay, thank you. I know the other question on like referencing the gas utility as part of the rationale for moving away from moving up from the 50th percentile. If it were workable with staff, would it make logical sense to you? Or if you don't have an opinion, that's fine. Um but to have some instead of muddling it with um current base remuneration, having some of that difference come directly um via the gas utility um division. Well, chair, I can answer that from my perspective in terms of the feasibility of that happening. Maybe that's something, you know, CIO can address, but certainly if there were to be remiteration um directly from that utility, then I obviously wouldn't say that, you know, it would be considered in the percentile. There's maybe still other factors that would impact the percentile, right? It would also depend on how much the remuneration is. But the fact is it's not there in the future. Might it be? And could that be taken into account with regards to a future review? Yes, most likely. Right. But I it's hard to put a premium on that value like is that worth 5% points? Is that worth 10% points? It's very difficult to assess that right now. Okay. Thank you for that. Since we've had our conversation, a couple more people have jumped into the queue here. So, you do have some more questions coming. Uh, next up is councelor stretch. Yes, thank you. I was just wondering if you could put the slide back up where it it did put it within context of other municipalities. Specifically, I I want to look at Waterlue and Cambridge um some of the bigger cities that sit on the region with us and just have a clear understanding for myself was where we sit within that peer group. You see them running across just to get our eyes all climatized 257,000 11 members of council approximately 473 million operating and then we move down to Cambridge Cambridge smaller population 138 and then there's ners a lot smaller on the operating expenses and likewise with water. So we we know we know that is larger in size and we know that to be the case. So it would sort of stand to reason against amongst the group. We're not just comparing to those two but they are key considerations within the comparator pool. We want to you know there there should be a reflection amongst the comparative pool that we're also comparing to larger because we are larger and you see on that slide that there are municipalities that are larger and they're larger than data points that from my perspective is a good data set that helps us understand without just looking at two looking at it more wholesome. It helps us understand and support the the target values and the ultimate recommendation. Thank you. Um and my last question is again I guess the percentile difference between a mayor and a counselor and how we can ensure that that gap doesn't in increase but also stays consistent. Do you have any insight or advice on how that through the chair. I think that's a very interesting question that really wasn't the subject of this review, but it's an interesting thing to pro I think as we work through or as I should say as the organization works through a more indepth review of remuneration in the next term and you know there's sort of a I wouldn't even say there's a rule of thumb what the appropriate differential is but there's ways to take a look at what the differentials are amongst the group that's something can into account, but in the end, it's the base pay that really sort of drives that piece. And as as the other member of committee referenced earlier, some of those three of the six that we used for this review have a deputy mayor. So that that's a bit of a buffer between the counselor and and the mayor, but two don't. So a deeper dive on some of those um components, I think, would be interesting in the next in addition with other elements. Great. Thank you. Under adisement. Okay. Thank you. Next is Mayor Benovich. Thank you very much and thanks Miss Love for your report. Um a few quick uh questions. One of the things that happened in the recent um provincial review was which was long overdue quite frankly. um they um they actually set theirs going forward I believe to 70% of the federal rate going forward. Um and the federal rate one I think is somehow connected to the judiciary if I remember correctly. Um is that a a a normal sort of practice kind of thing to is that something that in the future we should look at as part of that more comprehensive review next next term? chair percentage and I understand why it's perhaps done in province but amongst municipalities the norm and the practice is more so what are your organizations we have a lot of that data there's not it's a smaller data pool when you're doing the provinces and the feds so there's there needs to be I think a different way of approaching the metric and those considerations here we have 4 municipalities we have no issue in terms of rolling coming in with a comparative group. So it's quite easy and I think we have a better reflection of in that regard. Okay. Thank you. And in in your um recommendations you refer to the review period and you've suggested um that uh you know we do something every every term that would be a best practice. um you know, I'm guessing it would make sense to do that in the first part of the um the first part of the term, maybe the midway point or something like that. But sort of recognizing what you've looked at now and recognizing the fact that we haven't done this since 2002, which um it actually surprised me that it's been that long. I'm wondering um if there are if there are specific things you think we should look at as part of that next review through the chair. Yeah, I I think some of that has been touched on. I think in the next review uh which I understand is is sort of a deeper dive over this next the next term of council. I think some of the other elements of pay and pay practice specifically in silver pay benefits um car allowance um retirement allowance um entitlement to pension things of that nature and I think there's quite a laundry list that's that's typically done you know when we're doing a broader review than just based pay and I think that's something that should be that list should be considered and then pull in the data from the peer organizations and do a comparative analysis. I think the benefit of this review that council's undertaken it's at least we've got a reset on the base pay which is the largest component of remuneration the largest component. So um that will I think b the next term of council pretty well in terms of moving into the next review. Okay. Thank you. Thank you councelor Chapman. Oh yeah. Um can you tell us what um so every year we get a an increase is compensation like an increase in our in our wages. Can you tell me um when the last one was and what that increase was as a percentage of the previous compensation package? Jar, I'm going to ask um the CIO um to comment on that because I can't recall what the the last annual adjustment was or what the adjustment was for 26, but I'm not sure councelor Chapman if we'd have that information available immediately. Maybe staff could follow up email. Yeah. Yeah, we'll follow up with that on email. That was the only question. Okay, Councelor Schneider. Thank you, chair, and thank you, Marian. Um, when it comes to the increase, is this something that comes all at once and for the full term or it can be something that gets phased in year by year? Uh, chair, that's an interesting question and it's one that number of councils have asked and it really depends on many times the size of the increase, right? And so, if it's a large increase, council choose to direct that, you know, half of the increase be put in the first year and then the next half the second year. Um, bear in mind that each time the full adjustments still have to take effect because we need to do that or else we lose lock step. But it's really up to council to make that determination. Clearly, when it's done and we can all see sort of just conceptually the benefit of doing once a term, we don't have to really think about that so much. But here it is. We haven't had the benefit of a relatively recent review and this is this is how position today. Okay, so that's a council council decision. Okay, thank you. Thank you. And second round counceloritis. Yeah, thank you chair Davey. And uh this came up this question of mine came up as discussions went when uh with regards to when you see a a big difference in pay equity uh perspective for like let's say the mayor as an example that's in your report is is underpaid. Um, how does that affect individuals who may look at the position and want to want to look at putting their name in the in in the hat and trying to run? Do you do do you see that as a detriment when it's uh to having individuals who want to put forth their name seen that the pay is rather insignificant? Well, to the chair. Yes. I do. Well, personally and professionally, yes, I do. It can can be seen as a detriment. I think in municipal government compensation, what we want is a fair remuneration, and that's a very difficult thing to determine what is fair. Um, we have, you know, a lot of folks that serve on councils that put an awful lot of time. So, this is not a time and effort metric at all. This is just saying what is out there amongst other pure organizations. We want to be relatively competitive. So that's um to me it's council as a principle embraces the principle of fair fair pay then periodic increases all right regular adjustments and periodically testing the pay market is a responsible thing to do right and I think in most municipalities that lands positive constructively we want to have qualified and willing participants at the govern table. Okay. And again, I guess my question, my second question would be with regards to locally. Um if you when you see a huge pay disparity in among local local councils comp comp in comparison would that not dis want to discourage folks who want to try to run when they see well why would I run my city when all the other cities are are uh they're paying way more than what the city I live in like why is that why is that why why Why are they so low through the chair? I think they might ask that question. Yeah, that sounds that's not sure that's really a question for the consultant who comparing weight is more rhetorical. They may ask the question, but they don't live on those other municipalities. So if they're wanting to live and run, this is it. Okay. Thank you. Miss levels appear to be all the questions. Thank you so much for taking the time today and for the work. I appreciate it. Okay. Thank you very much, Chair. appreciate the the time and I'll sign off. Okay. Thank you. Take care. Now, uh any questions of staff about our staff on this? I do have one. I have a um an amendment um that was sent to the clerk. I just wanted to I actually did not really get a chance to thoroughly bet this through staff ahead of time. So wanted to clarify and it was leading from the um uh the question earlier on whether the gas utility should be separately broken out and what I'm proposing here is all the absolute dollar figures would remain the same. So from the staff's recommendation which hasn't been moved yet by the way need a mover. Can I get a mover for this item by the way? Moved by councilor it. Thank you. um the absolute remuneration would stay the same except instead of pushing the percentile um up from 50 to 60 in base pay to have the difference really acknowledge the mically owned gas utility and have that difference covered um by the municipally owned gas utility instead. That sets a framework and I know the consultant said that there should be some analysis in the future but this sets a framework for that um for that to occur without changing the absolute recommendation um of the consultant and I can't move that and I understand councelor Andis you move that mic. Thank you. Um so again, my question to staff would be, is this something that could be um implemented in time for um the next um council? It's the first question. And second question, do you have any um greater problems or concerns with this approach, Mr. Chapman? Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I do appreciate the heads up that you gave me before the meeting in terms of of this item. Um, taking a look at the council budget right now, the only enterprise that makes a contribution to the mayor and council budget is the building enterprise. Uh, I think historically maybe it was considered that that council was a general government service funded through property taxation. But as you've noted through this review, a part of your governance role does extend to municipal enterprises including the gas utility. And so it would not be inappropriate to recover a portion of the cost of council from those enterprises. And I like the way that you've worded the motion that basically much like the building enterprise, there would be an allocation for the percentile difference from those enterprises to the mayor and council budget to to help offset the cost of compensation. So staff have no concern. Okay. Thank you. Uh any questions, Mayor Vanovich? Um no, I I just in terms of your amendment, I think it makes a lot of sense and I can um I can support that. Um, and I apologize uh because I didn't have a chance to uh really reflect on a couple amendments that I well one one I I think I've mentioned to some of you. Um, but on the review period and the um the reference from Ms. Love um I'm wondering Mr. Chapen, would it make sense that um as part of that recommendation that that happen uh next term that we we actually um reference that it specifically happen in the first half of next term? Um and that include the the items that Miss Love mentioned um this afternoon as part of that uh as part of that review. Uh obviously the next council would still have the opportunity to uh change that direction if they were so inclined but um the motion would then automatic would otherwise if they don't automatically kick in that process. Mr. Chapman uh through the chair that would be entirely council's prerogative to give that direction. The only comment I would make about timing is that it can be done early in the term. Uh but as we've seen in this council term, most of our counterparts completed the reviews late in the council term. And so the reality is that you would be setting rates based on older information and wouldn't have the benefit of their compensation reviews. And so certainly on the issue of what's in scope, I have no no concern with everything that was discussed today. Um I would just caution council that you may be setting rates. They're not reflective of market if you do it before the comparative group moves forward. Okay. So on that uh Mr. Mr. Chair, I think then what I would uh suggest based on Mr. Chapman's comments is um is an amendment that would see us um direct staff to do that work prior to the 2030 um election period kicking off. So that that gives lots of room in terms of when to when to do it. um but to include the items that uh that Miss Love mentioned and and that way it it uh specifically kicks that uh in into motion. um the the second amendment that um that I' I'd like to make um at the uh at the appropriate time. And I I get that this is very much a a numbers exercise um and you know, we're trying to to keep things um in line with um the comparables. Uh having said that the I I I recognize what those numbers realities may be in terms of the mayor's role, but I also recognize the the curtain the certain the current time period that uh that we're in. And so I'd like to actually uh limit the proposed mayor's increase to the same percentage um that uh is recommended for the counselor. So I think it's 10 point something 10.3. Okay, I will take those two amendments. Did anyone wish to comment um on this in general? There we go. We're lighting up. Uh beginning with counceloritis. Yeah, thank you chair Davey. I'm just not understanding the first amendment. W based on this report, wouldn't wouldn't that be con wouldn't that review be conducted near the end of the term as best practices? Mayor Ben. So, it the the recommendation right now is that council adopt the practice of just trying to read the whole thing. Hang on, I got to make it a little smaller. of reviewing compensation once during each council term in consultation with the third party consultant and a comparison with comparator municipalities. And so what uh the amendment is is saying it specifically should happen before the start of the 2030 electoral period much like we're endeavoring to complete it right now before the 2026 one opens. And secondly, um, Miss Love indicated a number of things that we should look at, um, based on her professional experience, and so I've suggested that that would be part of that review. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Councelor Schneider. Thank you, Chair Davia. Uh, and I just want to speak in support of of your amendment. Um I I think uh it sends a a clear message that yes, we do have extra responsibilities as a city of Kitchener counselor. Uh and that that the the difference in the pay, the percentile comes from that utility. Um the work we do is challenging. It's meaningful. It's sometimes difficult. It does take a lot of time. Um and while these increases uh have been well researched and they are reasonable uh it is a a very difficult time for many people right now and optically it's it's very difficult to say hey we have to make up for lost time and you have to pay for it. I think um recognizing the uh contributions we make and the extra responsibility for the gas utility and that pay coming from the gas utility makes really good sense. Thank you, councelor Chapman. Yeah, thank you. Um so I have great difficulty with all of this. Um I've never worked a job and I've worked many different jobs where I actually sit down and decide what my raise is going to be. So I I sorry but I can't support any of this. Um I don't know how things these things have to come about but um I feel I've got a huge conflict of interest in in this. Um, as was mentioned, people are struggling, you know, to pay for the gas in their cars, food on their table, rents, which are off the charts. And, um, to think that we would be giving ourselves a 10.3% wage increase, which again, for me, I've never seen a wage increase of that magnitude in a in any job that I've ever worked in. Um, so I I'm sorry, but I can't support this. And I I realize that um you know we get our annual increase and I I wish I somebody could tell me what that is, what how much when it was and how much we got and maybe over the past four or five years um what that looked like because it's not like we're not getting increases. Some people get no increases yeartoear. So um I'm sorry but I'm I'm not going to be able to support this. Thank you councelor stretch. Yes. Thank you. Um I just want to um confirm one question. So if with the proposed amendment from um Rebanovic, would that mean that each review following would come at the end of term for that council? No, I think you just you just said before definitely before the following term. So it could still happen um at any point and that's probably be to be determined by the next council. But Mr. Chapman indicated that for the best analysis it should be near the end of the term. Um Mayor Benovich's initial suggestion was earlier in the term probably because it hasn't been done since 2002 but my my sense would be that it should be a decision of the next council. Mr. Chapman through Mr. Chair uh what understood the mayor's motion to meet and perhaps you can clarify if I have it correctly is that that direction was for the purposes of the next review. What's in scope for the subsequent subsequent reviews and the timing of those will be decided by future councils. This is all with respect to the next term of council. Okay. Thank you. Um I guess I wanted to add um as a new counselor, this is definitely the most full-time part-time job that that I have ever had. Um and though although there are many people who you know really struggle to get pay increases, um I don't think that's the right thing to do. And I think building in uh consistent structure um so that there is less decision making and more preemptive uh decisions being made is is a wise move. And um you know as far as where we sit within the region within that context I think that that is an important piece as those are our peers and our colleagues that that we're working with. And so I think that is an important context in what we're dealing with and I think honestly especially as a mayor um that's important based on the level of responsibility and decision-making power that um that there is potential for. So those are things I'm taking into consideration. And I am looking into supporting um supporting the um staff report. Um councelor Davey, your um your amendment looks good and and Mayor Burbanic, I'm still considering what you're proposing. It's fair. Councelor Micho, thank you. Um I'm falling quite in line with councelor Chapman on this. I really um struggle with uh giving myself a raise to councelor Chapman's uh you know comments. I've worked a num number of jobs over my lifetime and and I've never sat around a table and decided what I was going to or what I des what I deserve to get. Um I wish there was another body that could decide this. I know that was a recommendation, but here we are um considering giving ourselves a 10.3 7.7 uh uh raise when when to councelor Chapman's comments and and to to councelor Davy's comments in past of we are in really tough times right now. We've been very careful on how we're going to spend money because of the tough times that we're heading into and the and the conditions of the economy and and and the direction that that the that the interest rates are going to go and and and everything else is going to tie in line with people having a hard time to pay the bills, to buy groceries, the gas prices. It just goes on and on. I I cannot um in good conscience uh uh support this and give myself a 10% raise. Councelor Deno. Thank you, Chair Davyy. Um, the reality is we're not giving ourselves a 10% raise. We're giving the future council a 10% raise. Whoever is that fortunate enough to sit around this horseshoe. Um, yeah. And it's it's an awful awkward position to give yourself a raise. Um but like all the other decisions that we have to make council when recommendations um come to us uh and there's a budget issue or there's a capital budget issue it ultimately lies with us to make that decision and uh I remember getting 10% raises over three years back in the early 2000s um in in healthcare but that was a long time ago and you're right those days are done um or long gone. done. Maybe they'll come back one day. But, you know, with respect to people out there struggling, I I I agree. But, um I would also think that some of us are struggling as well. um whether you're a public official, elected official, um you know, everybody's feeling the pinch around the gas pump, around food prices, around registration for for children's activities. And so, um it's not inevitable position that we we're put in, but ultimately it does fall to us to make this decision. Um, again, it's not we're not giving ourselves a a pay increase. We're giving future counselors um and councils the opportunity to have their wages um increased, you know, and and as counselor stretch said, you know, it's it's a part it's considered a part-time job, but it's it's more than a part-time job. you know, we spend some days half a day, whole day in a community um center or, you know, a a few hours away from your own family at a at a function. Um, and I'm not I'm not complaining at all. I I've loved almost every minute of of my time here. But it comes with a price though at the same time. And so, um, I I will support the recommendation. Uh thank you to councelor Davey for his amendment and also um Mayor Burbanovich uh for his um amendment as well. I don't know if I'm going to support uh his fully but uh I appreciate um where your where your thought is. Councelor Micho you wanted to follow up? Sure. Yeah. I just wanted I just wanted to add to my my uh comments. Um, I support the mayor's increase because I will tell you Barry Barry Verbanovic works um like double full-time that he is never he never stops. So, I'm I'm just gonna put that there. But I also want to say personally that when I decided to run as a counselor, I didn't even know what how much money that we were getting. It didn't matter because it was a call to duty to serve the citizens in our community. And that's why I look at being a counselor. And yes, it is sometimes feels like a full-time job. I have another full-time job that I do as well, but I do this because of the love of community and and I just you're right, councelor Jano, this isn't an increase for us, it's an increase for the next counselors on term. I still don't sit well with 10% increase. Uh, councelor stretch, before I go to you, I'm just going to I'm going to comment briefly if I could as well. Like I'm not going to setting your own pay is a ridiculous position to be in. Um this is absolutely in my mind something the province should have some kind of metric that looks at population workload and tells us how much we should get paid like but the reality is we don't have that. Um so I'm torn in this. I mean, I I looked at the numbers very closely over the last week, and like the one thing I can tell you looking at our comparator group, and again, this isn't the only thing that should figure in the equation, but when I looked at the cost um per capita for counselors of our entire comparator group, we're dead last. Like, we are dead last. Um if if our residents are looking for value, um Water and Cambridge, for example, they make approximately the same as we do right now, and they have half the population Water has less than half population and while we're looking at the next term of council and you know it's difficult to separate us from the next term of council for those of us that are residing to run again we also have to consider people that do want to run in this role where they have to try and make ends meet right like how many you know single parents are you going to get running for council um if we're not if we're not competitive and those views are important around this horseshoe so there is no you know equity based pay or anything like that in this role and I think we are doing future councils a disservice by not making sure um and I'm not even saying competitive even if with this what we're looking at here and again if you want to look at the numbers com on in terms of population size and that sort of thing we are still like very very low in terms of absolute compensation. So, this is something that we have to look at. You know, yes, we're in this role now, but we also have to look at what kind of council we want. Um what kind of people we want running. And that is the same reason we'll be able to support the mayor's um second amendment on his pay because it is this isn't I was going to say a Mickey Mouse job, but that's probably the wrong term to use. This is this is this is a big role and and it deserves uh the right people running for it. So, I'm going to go through again. If if you already spoken once, please try and keep your your comments more brief. Councelor Stretch. Yes. Thank you. Um, can we see uh Mayor Verbanovic's amendment in written form? That would be helpful. Whi- which uh mayor for his pay. He has two, but the I guess I'd like to see both of them. Both. I'm not sure if he has them written. That's okay. My my my last comment is um you know if you if you are able to apply and campaign for a job that you haven't considered the pay for that is an absolute privilege to be able to come at it from that point of view. And I think that it's important that we look out for who's coming next and after us. And I think that's something that we really need to um really need to consider seriously. Councelor Zing. Thank you, Mr. Chair. My apologies. I I missed uh a bit of the discussion and uh to to my understanding uh one of the recommendations is the uh the additional recommendation and the increase in council pay be coming from the gas utility. Can you correct me on that one on the amendment that's on the floor? That that's correct. So it would see our base pay um our tax supported base pay staying at that 50 percentile and the increase suggested by the consultant coming from the gas utility effectively is what it means. Okay. Um if you would allow me to make my comments, you know, I think that is the right course to take. Um, one of the uh, the biggest differentiator between the city of Kiter and many of our peers is the fact that we do have that extra layer of responsibility with the Ker utility and that responsibility comes with uh, decision- making process as well as um, additional oversight which adds on to the complexities of the job as well as the increase in in that uh, work format as well. So ensuring that that that differential come from the gas is the right course to take and it keeps us more responsible in differentiating our responsibility between what we do for towards our tax base as elected members and effectively uh being almost like a board of uh governors or you know a board of directors for a gas utility where responsibilities and the compensation or some of that compensation comes uh from uh the revenues from you know collected through those users um from my peers the comments that you know I was able to listen I was on the fence on this one. I I I share some of the concern and apprehension and some members who are outlining that it's not fair for us to decide our own pay. Um I wish there was a you know we could completely delegate our authority to uh a citizen committee who would have the final say and not coming back to us to ratify. It doesn't really because this does the same thing. If you give this responsibility to the citizen committee and they come back with a recommendation or you hire a professional that has a broader uh lens of being able to compare across the board of other municipalities and come with a recommendation that's before us essentially the same. it's us who will have to decide and that's where you know the reluctance was on my part but I would agree with some of the comments made already in saying we need to ensure that we allow a pathway for um you know you know good candidates who want to step forward and serve our residents and um it would be great for many of us to be able to do this uh you know as a volunteer but that's uh that's not the reality of life. This is a even though we we are very humble addressing our role as parttime. It's very far from part-time duties in the various capacities we have to serve our community in attending at WS and representing our residents which is for many of us 30,000 residents each uh along with you know huge learning curve and constantly evolving landscape uh for decision- making. This is a full-time job and then some. It's a job that I cherish. It's a job that I'm honored to do. Compensation is not my driving force. But as others have said, this compensation decision is not necessarily outlining what we want to be paid those that are, you know, in office right now, but what is fair compensation for anyone new that might be coming into this office and ensuring that we are, you know, we are attracting, you know, the right pool of talent. We talk about talent attraction, but guess what? ensuring that there are the right people who are representing our citizens with the skill sets uh that uh you know that can provide that oversight as a governance body as well as the right type of representation in uh in community building. Uh we you know those those people would need to to be able to make a living as well. Uh that's the reality of life. Um, so it, you know, it's a it, you know, on paper it looks like a a raise that's 10%, but again, it's a pay raise that has not been addressed or looked at or compared since 2002, uh, since my time on council for 15 years. We haven't addressed this. And I think that's that that that almost um I think comp it compounds a problem where we are avoidant on addressing uh you know something that we're reluctant to to talk about and it compounds and we we're undercompensating our members of council and then we compound the issue of having to do a pay raise that seems out of line what you know average citizen might be looked at. Um but again when comparing from 2002 to now that what's being recommended on paper seems a only slight increase and especially if this extra increase is coming uh from the gas utility it's a uh a limited impact to our t our taxpayers um ideally I would have preferred this decision to have been as part of the new term of council but I don't want to you know negate my responsibility either I think uh anyone coming into office should know exactly what their compensation is going to look like and effectively make that decision if they want to run for office or not. Uh so it's not a decision I'm making lightly, but uh I agree with the comments made by my peers and something that we need to uh make a decision on now. Okay, councelor Chapman for a second time and then we're going to take the vote on this. Yeah, this is um just I'm a bit puzzled by the some of the wording here. Um people are referring to the need for this um increased compensation because it will attract good candidates and we need the right people. I I guess I just would ask what do we mean by that? What are good candidates and who are the right people? Are all of us the right people? Are we good candidates? I mean it seems like a a rather um weak argument to um justify this increase. council briefly, please. Yeah, I think I think what was meant by the right candidates is to be equitable. So, as as councelor uh stretch mentioned, like there's individuals out there that may not have the privilege of being able to uh uh to to to leave their job to try to want to have this. So, I think that's what to want to do a public service that I think that's the core of of the rationale. Okay, thank you. With that, uh we will vote. There are one, two, one, two recorded vote on everything. Sure. So, we'll do the first recorded vote on the uh the gas utility motion is put forward if it could be good by um counceloritis and recorded votes requested for that. And I'm click remembering to click counselor sing this time. Okay. And that carries. And now we'll do Mayor Verbanovic's I I would like to take them separately. I'm going to do Mayor Verbanovic's first amendment on um the review for next council period. And that carries unanimously. And we'll take Mayor Verbanovic's second amendment, which is to uh reduce the re the consultant's recommended amount um to the same as council. And that carries I believe mad clerk by one. Yeah. Okay. And now we will vote on the main motion. and that carries. Okay, we will move on to our next item which is the W regional police services closed circuit television and automatic license plate readers and I believe our friends from WP WRPS will be making five minute presentation Okay, good afternoon. When you're ready. Thank you. Uh, thank you, Chair Davey, uh, to Mayor, um, and to the rest of council. Thank you very much for having us here. Uh, again, just to speak to you about the closed circuit television and automated license plate recognition partnership that we are seeking with the city of Kitchener. As a bit of background, it was in 2020 when the Ministry of the Solicitor General launched the CCTV grant for the first time as part of the Ontario Guns, Gangs, and Violence Reduction Strategy. The goal is to strengthen community safety and give law enforcement agencies access to the tools they needed to keep Ontarians safe. In 2025, Waterl Regional Police uh applied for this grant and was awarded funding uh to launch our CCTV program. What you see on this slide is a number of other partnerships that exist between municipalities that currently have policeled CCTV programs already in place in Ontario. One of the main things that uh we prioritized as we uh built out our strategy was on how do we maintain and ensure confidence and trust uh in this um program with the water the regional police. We committed to being completely transparent with information about the program and we will continue to do so by highlighting camera locations, ensuring clear and visible signage and providing regular public reporting through our board. Over the past months, we have met with municipal and regional partners, businesses, other police agencies, the information and privacy commission, uh the business associations, etc. We also conducted community consultation as part of our strategy and provided an avenue for community to learn and ask questions about the program. Once the program's purpose, safeguards, and transparency measures were explained, feedback has been generally positive and supportive with many asking why we did not already have this program in place in Waterl region. We have spoken before about uh why CCTV and ALPR are such um important tools for the Waterl Regional Police and for our community. They support our crime suppression strategy. They help to decrease violent crime. They help to decrease social disorder occurrences, sometimes just by their overt presence. They support frontline policing by helping to identify suspects, timelines, persons of interest, providing best evidence for court, and supporting positive convictions in court. They help to improve investigative outcomes as they lead to more timely investigations and access to objective evidence. They help to increase public safety as another tool used by police. And they have been seen to support measurable reductions in crime and allow for better coordination of resources for major incidents occurring in real time. We've been very clear that camera locations are not chosen arbitrarily. They are determined using an evidence-based data-driven approach. We have conducted a three-year historical analysis based on our uniform crime reporting statistics, citizen generated calls for service, areas of increased crime and disorder incidents, concerns identified by community, and service specific considerations to identify locations for cameras to be installed. They are not arbitrarily placed. They're proportionate to achieve safety measures and they have many procedural safeguards in place including governance, access, auditability and compliance. The cameras that we hope to introduce are a combination of panil pan tilt zoom cameras, bullet and multi-ensor cameras each providing a different function. They work off existing infrastructure which is just power from our existing street lights. No construction is required. They draw less electricity than a standard household light bulb. So, a bullet camera, which provides clear footage at a distance as well as license plate recognition, uses about 20 watts of electricity and costs about $23 a year. A quad camera approximately $31 a year. And our pan, tilt, zoom camera is approximately $45 a year. We've talked a little bit about the benefits of CCTV, but to be clear, CCTV is not speed enforcement. It is not live monitored. Again, it is not arbitrarily placed and it is not something that is accessible by all members of the police service. What you see on the slide is example of what public notification would look like uh to show visibility where cameras would be placed. Throughout our research, uh we worked uh in partnership with the information and privacy commission to ensure we were in compliance. All information gathered by WRPS is also in compliance with the Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act. We will be using a 30-day retention period which automatically deletes from the device at that time. Data is stored using encrypted cloud-based solutions that are located here in Canada and even encryption keys are used which means even the vendor cannot access data that is stored. Our program is seen as upholding security as of persons of interest under the charter which speaks to the use of tools aimed to reduce risks to personal safety. This applies to all individuals even those or especially those that are disproportionately face risks to their safety as well. Thank you. Thank you for your presentation. Questions? Councelor Schneider. Thank you, Chair Davyy, and thank you uh for coming in. Uh just to for clarity sake, maybe for the public, I know the sound of maybe having a camera can be a little scary, but can you go through the policies and procedures of access to it? So, this camera uh not just anybody can go in for any reason. This is supervised. uh there is a a request form that has to be filled out as I understand it. Could you explain that whole process if and and for what reasons and maybe give us a hypothetical situation for that? Absolutely. Um thank you through you chair. Um we have uh the actually the police service board let's start there actually will have a policy on on the fact that we need to have a procedure in place as well around CCTV. The service has already drafted and completed a procedure on access and use of CCTV. who can access it. Um the process by which we can access it, the training that um those who have access to it must undergo first to be approved to access it. Um what the audit functions are, how we actually track um when a person maybe accesses it and for what purpose. So everything on the back end is auditable and something that we can report on much like how we access every other um database that we have. So CPIC information, our body warn video information, um incar camera information. So it'll follow the exact same processes that we have in place already um which are wellestablished processes. Um on top of that, we have trained members working in our real-time operation center. So, it's a small group of individuals um that are the only ones that are approved to receive a request from an officer um to access video because a an incident has happened, a criminal act has happened, an act of violence has happened, and they are seeking um access to the video for evidence evidentary purposes. So, an officer, if they're conducting an investigation and they have a timeline or they have a suspect description, they can send in a request that must be approved by a member of the real-time operations center who can then access that video um and would then upload that section of video to our data evidence management system. So, again, also in another secure um area and that is where the member would be able to access it at that point for their investigation. So they can't access all of CCTV. They can only access the clip that has been provided to them and is placed in data uh data evidence our digital evidence management system. Okay. And for transparency purposes would would we receive or could we receive a report at the end of the year or or periodically that that states uh when the camera was accessed and for what reasons and the result. So we have committed to providing uh quarterly updates to our police services board. Uh those would be through open board reports much like we report on our use of force um uh etc. So anything where we have an agreement to provide that information. So those would be available and accessible. Um and we also have built this in that it would fall into um our audit uh cycle as well. So um it would be up to the the auditor to determine is that at a one year, two year, threeyear cycle much like we audit everything else. But for sure quarterly reporting that would be publicly accessible and that would actually be on use of the cameras and then also um on successes that we've had as a result of those cameras. We as I mentioned we we want public confidence um that that these are actually used to help ensure public safety. Okay. And is there uh any examples maybe from other municipalities that you could share where this camera was a camera of this type was helpful in solving a crime? Um two that come to mind uh recently in the last number of months you may have read or heard publicly uh the city of G was very successful in using their CCTV cameras to um follow and track uh an individual who had committed a significant assault on someone in their downtown core. So it was very useful in identifying the subject for that. Um we also know that Chadam Kent um had a very successful case where uh they were actually monitoring and able to see a suspect throw away evidence which was a firearm. Uh so they were able to then go back to that area and actually locate the firearm. So those are just two that come to the top of mind. Um but two pretty significant. Okay. Thank you. Thank you councelor Chapman. Yeah. Thank you. Um so um have you consulted with the community legal services? With who? The community legal services or the regional community legal services? Um no I we communicate and consulted with our legal team. Our legal team has been part of all all consultations with the information and privacy commission and our legal team has been in consultation with all municipal and regional legal teams as well. Um I would I would think um consult I don't know that one agency one legal agency would speak on behalf of all residents but where I think there would be agreement is the fact that everything we've done and built into this program aligns with protecting uh section 7 charter rights of individuals and again it comes down to not arbitrarily placed um done in a fair and equitable manner manner and then all of our governance strategies. Okay. Um in the report you focus on the the license plate recognition. Yes. But you don't me mention face recognition. Is that left out purposely or We don't use uh artificial intelligence for facial recognition through this program at all. It's not enabled. So there's not nothing in the images that are collected that show somebody's face and identify it could be that could be identified. how AI is used on the back end where we when we do our query to search hours or days of video um relate trying to find evidence we can um input information we're looking for and it will take that information to do its search of the of the video. So it may then provide um multiple different images and then it's up to the investigator. This is where we refer back to that human in the loop maintaining that consistency piece is the investigator still is required to conduct the investigation based on the evidence that's provided. So it's AI is used on the back end for doing those queries. Okay. Um so downtown we've got the downtown ambassador program. Um we've got more city security downtown. We've got more police presence. Um why do we need cameras? So, I think two pieces to that. Um, you have a community that is asking for it and a business community that is asking for it. And I believe you all received a letter today from the Kitchener uh BIA. Um, we also know there is a second letter um from some of the specific store owners that have signed uh in support of the program um as well as um Fairview Park Mall. So, also because of incidents that have been happening uh in that area of of the city. So it is it's not a um one or the other. I think it's a combination of all of these approaches that are actually helping to ensure and provide me tools um for public safety. Um everything that we do under our crime suppression model is to have an offender-based strategy. It's to have a location-based strategy and it's to have a community based strategy. And that's exactly what this is doing. Uh so it's it's it's actually as a result of all of those things working together where we're actually going to see success. And what would the difference of the cameras versus more feet on the ground be? Again, I don't think it's one or the other. Uh this does not replace officers on the ground. We still require that. Um hopefully uh well, what this is intended to do is actually help those officers be more efficient. Um right now when we are trying to do a video canvas, it is going doortodoor. If someone's not home, it means we're going back again to do a to do doortodoor searches. This would actually provide us with quicker access to objective evidence for investigative purposes. Okay. Um maybe this will be my last question. Um so in the in the report you say that um they would decrease violent crime, decrease social disorder occurrences um and other things. But in particular those two items you say that the cameras will be monitored passively that they won't be monitored actively. So, I don't quite understand how if there's not somebody there watching the camera about to act, how that is going to de decrease a violent crime. And I'll get to some in my comments. I'll I'll talk about some other um data, but um I can you explain how you um are arguing or how you can justify that argument that it will decrease violent crime and social disorder occurrences when it's being done, the cameras are monitored passively. So what I can say to you is that in the UK where this has been this type of technology has been used for many years they have actually attributed it to a statistically significant decrease in crime happening where CCTV camera is available. Um locally cities such as York they actually attributed a 6.9% decrease in crime where CCTV cameras were um put up. Um, anecdotally, what we know from from reading is the fact that uh the crimes or the cameras often act as a deterrent for people when they know that they're being watched as well, which also leads to then a decrease in number of incidents that are happening. Um, and just trying to think of what the second part of your question was. Um, I forget to Oh, um, the other thing being is where even where we have seen um decreases in violent crime that have been occurring. We are still looking at about a 50% um unsolvability rate uh around violent crime and oftentimes that is because of a lack of a available evidence to continue with an investigation. So that's another really important thing to note as that it's it is another investigative tool that can um provide evidence to continue these investigations further. Okay. Thank you. Thank you councelor Deno. Thank you, Chair Davey, and uh thank you for coming in today. Um I'll focus on War 3 in Fair View Park Mall. You mentioned that uh the mall themselves, the owners of the mall have have indicated that they are um very in favor of this this type of a program. And so when we're seeing, you know, Fair View or even Konos Stoga um these crimes that are happening, who's committing the crimes and where are they coming from? Obviously, you don't know everybody, but there's a high where's the high propensity of people coming from? We have we have locally have definitely seen an increase in crime that is coming from the GTA area. Uh and that is why another one of our partners in this program has been the Ministry of Transportation and we are working with them as well because we would like to ensure that we have cameras in locations that are like our our ingress and egress routes for the region. um because vehicles are traveling into our region, committing crimes and then leaving our region. Um these are sometimes individuals we don't know or it takes extensive investigation working with our community or policing partners and other jurisdictions to actually make connections and identify persons of interest. So um we can say that we we are seeing an increase in the number of persons coming from outside of our region committing crime here. Excuse me. I agree with you. Um, but I'm not a police officer, but I I think it's I think there's proof in the pudding. And so, how will the license plate recognition um assist police in uh in a deterring or b um you know, capturing some of these uh these individuals. So, um a really significant way is that we can actually add a license plate that is connected to a crime vehicle. So, say it's been used in a robbery in uh Burlington or Toronto or or you know a prior robbery here for instance, we can add those license plates to what's called a hot hot list. Uh so when that vehicle actually passes by one of the cameras, it would create an alert and then we know that vehicle is back in our region. Then it allows us to actually start to deploy resources to the areas where we think that vehicle could be going. Um, so if that were the case and we know it's a vehicle that's been previously involved in a robbery, that might mean that we're ensuring we have resources that are heading to our different malls or to some plazas that have been targeted or um ensuring that uh we're following up on on that and also then looking for that vehicle. So it also would assist in with the ALPR that's already in our vehicles. So it's a bit I guess it's a bit more proactive rather than being reactive like we we see now. 100%. Um, from a reactive standpoint, if we're conducting an investigation and we're trying to find a vehicle and what what route that vehicle may have gone and we have a license plate, we can also then write a production order to access um all of the license plates that that ALPR has captured um as part of an investigation as well so that we know where it's traveled and at what time it's traveled by. But again, that wouldn't happen unless we had judicial authorization also built into our procedure. Okay. Thank you. Uh, thank you. Before I go for a second round, if I could, the you provided a lot of examples of good policies and procedures asked by councelor Schneider, but my question is if if the if any of these policies or procedures were to be amended or changed, who makes that decision? So, if there's any changes, sorry through you, chair, if there are any changes to, let's say, legislation um or different recommendations that might come out from the information and privacy commissioner, we would then go back to our procedures to ensure compliance or look at if we need to update those procedures. Um, even if there isn't one specific thing that causes us to do that, we put all of our procedures on um a review cycle anyway. So, it would be something that we review every couple of years to ensure it's still still in compliance. But then then it wouldn't necessarily come into the public realm. Like let's say the procedure changed from instead of erasing the videos after 30 days, it was you know six months. That's something that could conceivably happen without government involvement or sorry um council's involvement. No, if it's any change that is in our um in ourou with the city, uh we would bring that back to you as well because that would require an amendment to the memorandum of understanding as well. And the memorandum is is quite detailed. So, it has all of this information in it, including um our processes and procedures outlined. So, any change to any of those procedures would have to come back to staff and into council for any any changes existing. If it's a significant change or any change that would change the body of the memorandum of understanding, then yes, it would come back to council. Okay. Thank you. That's helpful. Uh councelor Singh, you're muted. Councelor Singh. Can you hear me better now? No. Thank you, uh, Mr. Chair. I think, uh, that helped to answer part of my question as to the overall oversight and control that this council would continue to retain in our uh, operation with the water regional police and this pilot. And uh, I'm referencing it back as a pilot because I think that's uh, important consideration where residents that may have some concern or members of council that may have some apprehension uh with this program where they may see overreach uh by ensuring that there is a sense of control with this council and the fact that we have the capacity to look at this program in a year's time and assess the overall uh I guess community benefit and exactly the the cooperation that we we've been able to you know incorporate with the water region police is that control and the retention of the control will remain with the city council. That's a question. So that uh my understanding is already currently being discussed between the city's legal council and our legal council uh to be put into theou as such. Would it be unfair to consider it as a pilot where we can reassess uh the terms of the memorandum of understanding and we can tweak that a year's time or choose to not want with the program uh from a year from now. Yes. So that that is exactly what is being placed into the amendment of of understanding after after um being being brought forward. So that's there's no issue with that whatsoever. I think that helps to hopefully uh ease concerns in the community as well as you know members around the horseshoe. Um you touched on an important point of using the cameras in your um investigation methods where you can have faster conviction or also acting as a deterrence right now. Um when you're investigating, you know, how much on the ground u work is involved amongst the officers and how much limit how much of a reduction could this uh allow Puerto Rico police where you can potentially reallocate those and other aspects of community safety. So, um because this will be a phased in implementation, uh it may it may take some years to see the true benefits in in the reduction. Um because obviously it's in just certain um uh areas to start with. Uh but if I could give you an example of a a significant incident where where we let's say there's a shooting uh incident or a a violent incident that's happening, we're pulling together a team right now, whether it's from our general investigative unit, whether it's a combination of patrol, whether it's a combination of major crime, and as I said, they're going doortodoor uh currently doing these video canvases looking for businesses or residents or people who might have doorbell cameras or might have cameras in their cars. etc. And then we're collecting that information. So, as you can imagine, it's taking hours, days, sometimes weeks to gather that information. Uh, and then it takes us actually going through that information as well. So, um, on a major investigation, it could have significant impact on reducing time, but or or um allowing us to actually get to useful evidence much earlier through that process. And these are active duty officers that are doing the patrol or going door to door? Yes. And some of these officers are sometimes for uh uh speed uh enforcement and and you know other other active enforcement in our communities. Yes. Taking away time from That's correct. Um I understand that obviously this is going to be uh you know there's a lot of data collection from this to understand the overall net benefit to the community. Um, and you know, we'll have to, you know, tweak it as as we go along. But anecdotally, other communities that have had u a longer uh uh program such as this, what kind of benefits are they able to point? So, as I as I mentioned um earlier, just some of the uh small examples that we that we have seen or heard of in in our consultation with others is um just positive feedback that community has given. Um I think one of the key things um is ensuring that we are sharing the incidents where these cameras are being used uh and the and the positive outcomes that that are resulting from access to evidence that they're providing. So when we know that it's helping to um take a violent offender off the road or we know it's actually being used to identify someone who's committed a stranger on stranger sexual assault which we've also experienced or where we know that it's been used to actually find um weapons. That's the impact um where community is actually recognizing the value to um to their to ensuring their public safety. I know you're repeating yourself, but I think rehearing it only helps to make help make the argument. So, thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Councelor Micho. With regards to data from other municipalities, do you have anything and and maybe you said this already and I apologize if you have. um where another municipality is there a decrease in in crime like robberies and whatnot when where they have cameras. Is there any data to to um identify that? Yes. So I did mention to you um York Region for instance, they're expanding their program, but when they first piloted theirs in areas within a kilometer of where their camera locations were, they saw a 6.9% reduction in crime attributed to that. Um over over a period of I would have to go back and look at the period um that they measured that um but then also we have the information as I mentioned that came from the UK where they were able to also show that there was a stat statistically significant reduction in crime associated to areas where they had cameras located. So those are just two examples. Um I believe we did share information um a document that had some other examples as well. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Councelor Chapman question. Sorry I should have asked this earlier. Um what um what would happen if we didn't approve this? What would the um police services do at that moment? Um we'll continue to work with the other municipalities that are moving forward with this right now. Um we have Waterlue has already approved it there. So um we're just currently working on our MOU with the region as obviously a lot of the infrastructure is regional infrastructure as well. So getting uh regional support for that too. Um and um we are close with signing some otherus with uh some of our other municipalities uh with Cambridge. Uh and we're continuing to meet uh with the townships. Again, our whole thing is to move forward with the municipalities and townships at the pace that they're ready to move forward. Um and and that will be our plan. So if it's not Kitchener, we will add more to Waterlue or Cambridge or wherever it is. But we we have um we have what uh what we've purchased through the grant and we also have a a 10-year rollout strategy expansion strategy. So um the plan would be to actually expand and roll out 2026 uh cameras as well uh later this year too. So to more locations and did one of the townships not vote against this? One of the townships has decided to stand down and wait to see how it rolls out in other areas. And can you share with us why they chose to to wait? Um I I my my understanding is there I think there was some misunderstanding um when after we presented and then when it actually went to vote uh around what the cameras would be used for. There was conversation or questions raised on whether it could be used for dealing with jaywalking situations and it is not something to be used for that. Um so I think there was a bit of trepidation around that. So they wanted to see how it would roll out. Um, so I have to respect their decision at that time, but um, we hope to approach them again as we roll this out uh, and and see cameras installed there as well. Okay. Um, can I um, call for a deferral until the council meeting given that we have several members at the table that aren't at the table today? You you certainly could. Okay. Do I do that now or should I do um, actually there's no one else in the queue. Did anyone else have any before we take the for more channels have any comments or concerns you want to share? comment. Okay, if you would mind holding it till the after comments folks want to make comments. Councelor Deno, thank you Sher Davey. I'm going to read a little excerpt from this email I received uh at some point last year. I'm reaching out to you today regarding the on ongoing issues facing Fairview Park Mall. I'd like to ask you if there's anything being done to keep Fair View Park Mall safe for families such as mine. It's gotten to the point now we are deeply concerned to visit due due to the seemingly endless number of armed robberies occurring there. Personally, I've been at the mall with my family. We've had to redirect ourselves due due to violent altercations within the mall, overdoses within the mall, and even during one robbery. And and and why I'm reading that is people are not feeling safe um at our mall uh in our mall going to the mall. And you know, we we talk about making people feel comfortable at all of our city venues and making sure they're accessible and welcoming. This that that goes the same to to our malls and to our our private um facilities. And so being that I represent Ward 3 and being that Fair View Park Mall is in my is in my my ward um I have great I I think this would really um you know obviously not immediately but over the course of time um alleviate people's concerns if if they know that there's there's opportunities to catch some of these really bad people um and not from our community. They're not most of them are not from our area as Miss Davis said a lot of them are coming from the GTA, Bmpton, Missaga, Toronto. Um, and so having something to deter them not uh from do doing these smash and grabs I think is a way to make our community feel safe. I have another part of my ward that's uh they deal with car thefts on a on an ongoing basis. While this is not necessarily in their vicinity, my hope that it would actually um if we can continue this program, it would move to that area and uh you know, again, not have police have to deal with their time knocking on doors where they could, you know, use this as an investigative tool and hopefully solve a crime a heck of a lot quicker than than sometimes they are now. And you know, we're a lot of the community is is always complaining that well, you know, the police are spending too much money and and but but at the same time, there are a population who wants more police so they can feel as safe. And so we can't have it both ways. We can't not want to spend money on the police services, but at the same time say, well, we can't have that many hires. And so if we can have a way to keep some people um safe and feel safe, I think this is a a a good alternative um to start or a good place to start. And I'm hoping that uh council when it if the deferral does go through at some point in time, council, we do uh we do recognize that we want people to feel safe in our city and obviously by this email they're not feeling safe and so I will support this whenever it comes back to uh council. Thank you, Councelor Chapman. Yeah, thank you. Um, I just wanted to well, I want to I wanted the the deferral. Um, but I would also like to just comment on the fact that in the United States, they have a homicide rate of 5.9% per 100,000 um people in the population. And they have 70 million CCTV cameras. 20 million of those are monitored by the police. So, like I said, they have the highest homicide rate of all G7 countries. Canada has a a homicide rate of 1.91% per 100,000, which is substantially lower. And we have we already have 12 million CCTV cameras. And the number that are actually operated by the police are, they said like 20 here and 20 there. Like, it's um really not reportable. Um, so I just want to say what I'm trying to get at with this these numbers is yeah, you can have millions and millions of cameras if we want to turn this into a into a surveillance state, but it doesn't mean that our homicide rate is going to um necessarily go down. And so I think we have to think um very carefully about what we're wishing for here because once we have two cameras, tomorrow we'll have more. And um I really think we need to reach out to organizations like the the community legal services to get their take on this because they deal with um many people who are um falling through the cracks and and might be faced with um issues with the law. But um you know I'd love to hear what their opinion about surveillance cameras is. And I also think, you know, let's put more. We've been asking for more um foot patrols in the downtown core for a long time um through the BIA and um certainly through city councilors. And and it doesn't happen. It used to be that you had two designated officers walking the beat day in and day out. And you know, suddenly that becomes more difficult to do. And um I I just think um cameras are not going to cap are not going to they can be a deterrent until they're not they're not going to solve the the the problems that that we're being told they're going to solve here. They're not not going to stop that crime from happening. It might they might deter it from happening, but they're they're not going to stop it from happening. Um, so I would like a deferral, like I said, because I think it's important that all of us be at the table for this for this vote and this discussion given the importance that it it it has for the community and beyond. Thank you, Council Michelle. Thank you. I'm not sure I'll support a deferral here. We're all here except for two, so we do have a pretty good solid council here because Mr. Singh is on online. Um, so anyways, uh, yeah, I don't think I'll support the deferral at this point. Um, I do support cameras and I do appreciate you coming in and presenting this to us again. Um, I think that this city has grown exponentially. I think the and and along with that, the problems have grown exponentially. I hear this out in Ward 4 in Dune South all the time. Um, I I realize that it's not going to stop the cars from being stolen and all the breakins from happening, but it's going to deter some at some point. Um I mean we had a a robbery in the liquor store at Pioneer Park Plaza what last year and it was a brazen middle of the afternoon robbery. These things could turn go sideways very very fast and um I think that uh having cameras where needed where where the police force thinks that they are the the think that they are the um uh at the most appropriate places to deter this. Um yeah, you're right counselor uh Chapman. It may not solve the problem, but it's just another tool in the toolbox to to help correct it. So, I I do support cameras and again, I thank you for coming out. Thank you, Councelor Initis. Thank you, Chair Davey. First of all, I just want to thank the police force for for coming in today and and uh you know, giving us uh your presentation. That's really appreciative. And by no means I you do a tremendous job in service to our community. One of the things that for this particular issue is where I I I have a bit of a concern is I would have and and it's no fault to for to WRPS, but the way the speed camera was rolled out and the way that the public was not involved with it to begin with is my first concern with this. Uh, I feel like we should have a this should be a little bit more uh have a little bit more public input with regards to how this this is rolled out because I myself I'm not an expert and I know the police are an expert, but I'm not sure whether this is something that's going to be accepted in the community or not. And I'm not prepared to at this time to to uh make that decision without having that that more of a more of an honest discussion with with with residents whether they want this or not. Um and I guess the other the other uh issue that I kind of have too is with regards to um where where does this go from the start of this? Uh um I I I do have a con serious concern with uh with the way that where this may go and again I I totally understand the parameters and where this where this may lie but I think fundamentally I think what I think is the issue here and we're still this is sort of addressing try not really addressing the issue but it's a it's an it's a symptom of why we're addressing this is I feel like um our judicial system allow uh basically allows repeat offenders to be let go on a consistent basis and I think that's where the real issue is this and I don't think it's the um I think that's something that needs to be addressed. So those are the two reasons why I'm not supportive. Not that I'm not supportive of the staff. I think you guys are amazing and I do support you 99.9% of the time but on this one I I just just don't feel good about it. Thank you, Councelor Stretch. Um, yes, I'm happy to support Councelor Chapman's uh motion to defer. Um, you know, I'm leaning towards supporting this, but um, Councelor Ryan Nitus made a great point about uh, community input, and I am curious um, about community input, and perhaps after this meeting and, um, some news cycles, I'll be able to hear more from my constituents and community members to to help inform moving forward. Thank you, Councelor Schneider. Thank you, Chair Davyy. I I believe that we do have the ability uh after a year that we'll get a report back to council uh following launch of the program reporting on qualitative and quantitative to both measure success and approval slashacceptance in the city of Kitchener. So I think if there are issues we could deal with those in a year. So am I correct on that staff? It is listed as a one-year pilot. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Thank you, Councelor Singh. Yeah. Thank you, Mr. Chair. The others have already said it, but what's before us today is not an open-ended commitment. It's uh a one-year pilot uh as recommended through staff that would allow the city to enter into that agreement with a regional police service. um and this extension can be considered uh and that's a um a measured and responsible approach. We can consider this year uh you know how this program might get expanded. Uh it's not being expanded tomorrow. Uh this is a slow approach towards adding a extra layer of tool towards public safety. We outline our concerns about privacy or infringement of our personal rights without any immediate evidence of that. It's more consideration through fear. What is uh before us is actual hard data that we do have uh worrying trend towards uh you know um I think safety amongst our residents where residents are contacting us um you know and and they're worried with uh you know the way we see the smash and grab in our various different malls uh residents are not safe to go to go to the mall because they don't know what's going to happen. uh and that's uh exasperated with you know social media where we see not just the problems in the city of Kitchener uh but what's happening across the province and that's a worrying trend. This is a extra tool that's going to allow um uh you know water regional police to be able to properly allocate resources to address those those issues across the city uh where we can have uh we can't prevent the crime but we can definitely have conviction or investigation far faster with lesser resource and we talk about having more patrol in our downtown. Well, guess what? That's going to happen in two ways. either we significantly uh increase our a lot of regional police service force with extra officers and that's going to come with a significant cost to our community or look at various different tools that we can manage within our existing resource uh and allow a broader spreading across community to give that that facetime to see those patrol cars uh in our various different neighborhoods to give that sense of security. Um, if if this was a blanket u blanket uh agreement that gave full authority to roll this program out, I would have all the concerns that other members have laid out. But that's not the case. Uh it's a measure approach that will allow us to see over a year's period of time uh anecdotal evidence uh and at the same time when we we have concerns about public feedback. This is the opportunity for that public feedback because it's a small measured uh allowance that is going to allow residents in the interimm correspond with us. We're going to hear at the door during election time and then we can take that full comprehensive data as well as the feedback from a public and deciding do we really want to broaden this program out in the city of Pitcher. I think this is the right step. This is the right time especially before the election. Um I I think we should uh we should be uh supporting this unanimously and uh I'm not sure that a deferral is really necessary and and I will not be supporting the the deferral. Uh one of the counselors I'm not going to pinpoint by name but outlined data from the US. The society and community we are not the same. Uh our uh our approach to public safety and police uh is not the same. uh our perspective of um police enforcement in the communities in Canada, the US is not the same. Our gun rights is not the same. So we can't compare those two those two data sets. I think we are unique and uh we uh I think we are safe as a community in the city of Kitchen, but that's not to say that we can't add additional tools that can give us additional assurances of greater safety. That's how I see it. Thank you. Okay. Thank you, Council Chapman. Have you queued in? you already commented once. I'm not I'm not going around a a quick Yeah. So, you can ask a quick question. Please go ahead. Yeah. Um, so I'm I'm just I'm trying to reflect a bit on why we're even discussing this here because the police don't come to us to say, should we have more police officers downtown? Should we have more cars? Should we have more this or that or whatever? Um, and we have no say in the police budget. We have no say in what police do. It's a regional responsibility. And yet we're here. We're we're politicians. We're not police. We're not part of the police force. We don't oversee what you do. And yet we're being asked to put in sur to to approve surveillance cameras in our city. Why are you not making that decision? Um and I I just don't understand why is this is something even is it is it about is it about the is it about the light posts or is it or what is actually going on here? Would a member from the police like to respond as to why this is proper for us? Go ahead, Mr. Davis. Um, we really see this as a partnership with the city. This is not something we want to do independently of the city. Um, and yes, there is an infrastructure piece to this in the in the fact that we do require access to existing infrastructure, which is those street lights. So um some street lights may be municipally owned street lights um and some are regionally owned street lights which is which is why we are making our rounds with all of the different municipalities townships in the region because uh it is a partnership um amongst all of us um and with respect to the cameras um it's it's in addition to supporting you know even the 300 plus cameras that the city of Kitchener already has um that police don't have access to and that when we're required to try and see if there's evidence. It's about a a manual process of us reaching out um to try and see if there's evidence. So again, it comes back to that timely evidence and information for uh solving crime and um ensuring public safety. Okay. Thank you. Everyone spoke. I just like to make a few comments. First, I want to actually just dubtail on that. I agree. I think the reason this is before us um is out of is frankly out of respect and the mutual respect we have with the water regional police because my understanding is they could have gone ahead with it certainly on regional roads um whether we weighed in or not. So they're ask you're asking us and I appreciate that. Um yeah, this this is a tough one for me. I'm not going to lie because the police have done a fantastic job covering off every one of my concerns or fears. and my concerns and fears have nothing to do with uh whether it will reduce crime or not because I'm willing to concede that uh programs like this certainly will reduce crime uh going forward. For me, it's a broader question of um is a broader question of the surveillance piece and and again I don't want to um rely on the police force at all because they've done everything they can to to honor that um that privacy and only try to only use it um when there's a really dire need to use it. So my concern So what's my concern? My concern is the step this is a very it is a positive step but down a potentially very negative road uh in the future of surveillance. And I guess my biggest concern is yes we're covered off today but I'm not sure who's going to be covering us off tomorrow because I can see cases in the future where they can say well if we only kept the video in perpetuity we could have solved this crime or if we only monitored real time we could have captured this criminal earlier before they did something. And for me, it's the peacemail approach that's going to happen in the future. And with the frankly chilling advancements in artificial intelligence that we're we're seeing where they can they can monitor and analyze and um pick out, you know, people are wearing the demographics, facial recognition, thousands of hours of video in in moments. It frankly, it's it's frightening. And again, risk repeating myself, this is not at all what the police are proposing, but I do fear that this is a step down down that road. So, um, for now, I I'm still grappling with this. Uh, I will support, uh, the deferral at this time. Um, but this is I don't know this is a really and I know there's a million cameras out there, but there's a from in my mind there's a very serious difference between a million cameras out there from private citizens and corporations from a government entity um for the sole purpose of frankly prosecution. Right. So anyway, I will support the deferral. If the deferral fails, then I guess we'll see where that goes. But I will take that that motion now. Sorry, madam clerk. Do I have to have a mover before the deferral or can someone just defer right off the hop? I can't remember. Just the deferral. Okay, perfect. So, and recorded votes been called in deferral. So, this is deferral to council. If you want the deferral to council, you would push the plus button uh through the chair. Councelor Singh just entered the meeting. He's been having some technical difficulties. So, if you wouldn't mind just summarizing what he's voting on for for this moment, just to make sure it's clear. Uh, certainly And councelor Singh, are you in favor against the deferral or has he voted? Oh, okay. Report is open. Is Has everyone voted? The deferral fails. So, could I get a mover for the motion? moved by councelor Deno and I'm assuming record a vote as well in this as well and the motion I believe that does most okay motion carries very good okay that concludes this item thank you Thank you RPS for coming in. Appreciate it. Uh the next item is the emergency management plan. And Mr. Berle, you have a fiveminute presentation for us. Welcome. I'm here today to bring forward some recommendations for our annual update to our emergency management program bylaw and our emergency management plan. Now, as I go through the recommendations in the next couple of minutes, the overarching goal here is to improve both our bylaw and our plan, make them more clear, make them more flexible in their implementation, and by doing that, we will strengthen our response capabilities here in the city and improve our overall readiness. So, that being said, I'll go right into our Sorry about that. Okay. Every year, as part of our annual mandate and our compliance with the Emergency Management Civil Protection Act, we implement a comprehensive emergency management program that consists of the eight items on the slide in front of you. Now, within these eight requirements, we have the emergency management plan is foundational. It is schedule A to our bylaw and it is our operational guideline for what we do when we activate in response to either an emergency or a business disruption. Now on the list in front of you, item nine is highlighted because even though business continuity is not a requirement of our provincial mandate, we here at the city have a very comprehensive business continuity program. So that we are in preparing for both situations or incidents in our community that provide um a threat to our um public safety. But business continuity also allows us to focus inwardly on potential business disruptions and how we as a municipality ensure delivery of time critical services to our community members. So within the um requirements of the emergency management civil protection act we have the program bylaw which empowers all of the things on the slide in front of you. We have the plan as our guideline and by identifying business continuity we are bringing that into our emergency management plan with the recommendations I will bring forward. Okay. First we'll start with our bylaw. Now the changes we're looking at making here are fairly subtle. We're clarifying a number of things and removing a couple elements from the bylaw um that are no longer required. So, under um our bylaw section three, we're changing um the titling for our community emergency management coordinator to be um in alignment with the position that I'm currently in. The CMC is one of the um requirements of our bylaw and every municipality in Ontario must have someone who's designated to maintain the emergency management program. We're also looking at um recommending the removal of the alternate CMC appointments within the B because they're not actually required in the bylaw. We can make those changes administratively um through our provincial partners and it gives us greater flexibility if we want to change our alternates throughout the year without having to come back to council for amendment to the bylaw. Section six, we're looking at increasing our clarity by designating that all members of the corporate leadership team collectively form the components of our municipal emergency control group. So those individuals, whether we're dealing with a business disruption or an emergency event, they're the ones who come together as our leadership structure and um serve as either an incident management team or an EOC management team. And lastly, for the bylaw component of the recommendations, we're recommending that the previous bylaw be repealed and replaced with the update. So moving from the plan um from the bylaw to the plan itself, we're focusing in two key areas. Overall, we've made we're looking at making recommendations to the plan that improve its readability, um provide greater consistency in the language, and clarify some of the pieces by making the language more concise. The key recommendations we're bringing forward today really focus on our concept of operations and complementing the concept of operations within how we designate roles and responsibilities within the incident management system. So in a little bit more detail, section three of the emergency plan really sets the structure that we use to implement and assigns key leadership responsibilities to groups of people. So the re recommendations coming forward today is we're amending the policy group which is the um position filled by the mayor and the CEO and we're expanding that policy group definition so that we can include members of council and members of the corporate leadership team um depending upon the emergency situation. We're also making a very conscious decision to separate incident response for business disruptions and emergency response for public safety events. So within the plan, we now have two streams that allow us to focus inside and as well as support um our response direct to the community. We're also identifying a recommendation that in the event of a large scale event that impacts both our businesses, our um service delivery and has a public safety impact that we can default to our EOCC management team structure. So we go to an emergency posture and this also addresses the implementation of the incident management system itself and our recommendations to section seven. It really reinforces what we've done in section three under our concept of operations. Again, making sure that we're differentiating between um a business disruption and an emergency event. Further reinforcing and strengthening some of the key roles and responsibilities such as policy group and further expanding some of the responsibilities under other key um responsibilities as contained within our incident management system. And that is an overview of what we're looking recommend what we're bringing forth as a recommendation to our bylaw and our plan. Happy to take any questions. Thank you for your presentation. Are there any questions? Not seeing any questions. It's usually a sign that everything gone smoothly. Thank you so much for the work. We appreciate it. Could I get a mover for the recommendation move by councelor Anitis? Any comments? For sure. Councelor Deno. Uh thank you, Chair Davian, and thank you for bringing this forward. You know, these are situations that we hope we never have to use. Um, okay, calm down over there. I'm in support of it. Um, but you know, years years ago, um, sitting around conferences at my workplace and and we would ask families if there ever was a pandemic, you know, would you keep your resident here or would you send them home? And the joke was like, oh yeah, pandemic, pandemic. It was never going to happen. Well, we saw what happened. And I think in in a lot of instances we weren't prepared uh what was what we had to do um because we never thought it was going to happen. So it's good to to have these policies updated and reviewed every once in a while to ensure that we are ready if something bad does happen. So thank you very much. Thank you council. Thank you for that councelor Deno. Well said. Uh so the motion has been moved. Those in favor that carries unanimously. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. And the final item for finance and corporate service committee is the digital kitchener 2026 priorities. Good afternoon, Chair Davey and members of committee. Uh we're here to review the prioritized focus areas for digital initiatives in 2026 that are supported by the refresh digital kitchener strategy and outlined in the staff report. These priority areas were identified by committee feedback in March and also aligned with both our planned and underway work. Um these projects provide a corporatewide view of the initiatives that align with digital Kitchener goals and are expected to contribute to the city's broader digital transformation efforts in 2026. Responsibility for the delivery scope and timing varies by initiative. Uh they will remain with the relevant division supported by technology innovation and services. So the first priority area that we're going to focus on is exploring and implementing workflow automation and AI solutions that reduce staff time on manual and repetitive tasks allowing staff to focus their time on highv value work. Some examples of these are one that we're currently working on which is the Chris Kindle vendor market workflow. Um, we were just about finished the first part of that and that actually saved staff 34 hours of work and now we have a process that takes 40 minutes and is automated. So, looking for more opportunities to do things like that. Um, another example of one coming up is the the sanitary storm water staff scheduling. Again, if anybody's ever had to do a schedule in your part-time work, it is a lot of work. So, we're going to look for opportunities to help them out with that. The second priority area, next slide, um is to p evolve the pitchkiter program um into the city's front door for civic innovation, providing clear pathways for innovators to engage with city challenges. So we really want to um help innovators move forward from idea to impact by offering test sites, staff expertise, data access, building vendor readiness and safely piloting solutions in real environments. We will partner with our local post-secondary schools to support research and co-design sector organizations to convene in the ecosystem and startups as a solution partners and local experts to help us explore emerging technologies. We will bring a report back to council outlining what this evolved program could look like. The next priority is to strengthen partnerships with technology companies, education institutions, and city departments to support co-creation and pilot projects. One example is project 519 where it's citycale mapping of Kitchener uh buildings. And so this is an oid OAN funded collaborative project with a local startup now um full company called Mapped In where we're going to be using computer visualization to digitize over 18,000 building floor plans so we can create interactive maps for city use by our fire department um on scene and in training. We'll be continue to look at smart infrastructure and AI asset management. We have a project right now with UW and the Conrad School of Business where we're looking at facility data um so that we can explore strategies to uh work towards proactive maintenance. Next priority is around exploring and implement AI based solutions to improve customer service, streamline cumbersome application processes and accelerate decision- making. Um couple examples of areas for this. Uh there's um project underway to use AI analysis, data dashboards, and hardware to help support proactive maintenance and process efficiencies at our aquatics facilities. Um look at expanding use of sensors, data, and AI uh to improve real-time visibility and operational decision making at areas such as Kitchener Golf following on the work that was done uh this past year. uh and also looking for other opportunities to expand AI enabled visualization for infrastructure inspections of bridges and roads. next priority. Um following on uh councelor Singh's interest and there was interest from many of the other U counselors as well with this is examine the feasibility expanding the technology loan programs through our city facilities leveraging retired technology assets and also considering the role other community service providers could play. So we'll look to uh work with internal staff and determine the capability and capacity and then also uh groups like KPL and other partners that could play in this uh to really look at how we could get these loan programs uh an easier access across the city to the residents. Uh again on this item uh report will come back to uh committee uh outlining our recommendations and options and any potential costs that could come with that. And the last priority we've identified is to partner with local organizations and support them to deliver digital and AI literacy workshops. So this is an expansion and continuation of what we've done in the uh first round of digital Kitchener and then also continue to expand public uh Wi-Fi into underserved areas of the city. Uh so one of the things we've been looking at is trying to use the marginaliz marginalization index to identify areas of the city that could benefit from increased public Wi-Fi as well as also uh loan programs. Uh and then we'll look to partner with local organizations to deliver uh digital and AI literacy workshops as well. That's the priorities we've identified here. We're happy to take any questions. Thank you Connie for your presentation. There are a couple questions uh beginning with councelor Singh. Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you to uh Mr. as well for being openminded enough to uh to consider the the idea about using a retired devices uh where we're partnering with with working center and making those devices for sale for community members but maybe re allocating some of them in our community uh centers or potentially even partnering with the uh with our library uh programs as well. Um beyond that one of the things for AI is also ensuring that we have a broad lens on the changing landscape. Uh Mr. Mary, are we keeping in tune to all the uh the changing landscape as well as I would say any incubators that are focusing towards AI technology that currently exist uh within the water region or through community tech. Mr. Sorry. Uh through the chair. Certainly AI is the topic of the day when it comes to technology and there's not one session or conference that isn't completely loaded with uh topics on AI. Um it's one of those things that I think is going to continue to move very quickly and we're seeing all sorts of different applications and and people imagining new ways of using AI. So it is certainly something that uh uh we're staying on top of. Um the discussion among uh all our regional um uh counterparts is ongoing with how they're using AI, what they're doing with it. It's also discussions at all the associations that were part of uh free municipal information uh um our counterparts within the uh the province as well as across the country. So absolutely it is uh we're doing our best I'll say to keep up with it and make sure that we're on top of all the AI developments. It u it is a very fastmoving field. Uh I can let Miss Amaral speak to the community tech. I'm sure it's very much a topic of uh discussion there as well through the chair. Um we definitely before you do Nicole before you do so maybe you can add on to the question a little bit so we don't have to go back and forth. So I'm I'm I'm pretty uh confident that you guys are staying in touch with community tech or you know other uh organizations that focus on AI or the advocacy or even as incubation. So that's where where I wanted to touch on is do we have an opportunity to support AI incubation within the community work along with other uh cities as well or even consider a pilot uh where we're uh supporting you know AI incubation that focused on civic engagement or civic uh governance different tools that could be available to us uh through the chair. Yes, we actually have a meeting coming up with community techch, a brainstorming meeting at the end of this month. Uh we are going to talk about um the evolution of Pitchkitchener for example. And so how can we make sure that we are working closely with our local tech community um and those abroad sorry abroad across Canada uh to focus on civic tech. How can we um instead of you know figuring out the solution when we're procuring a new solution instead we put out challenges. here's what we would like to do, how can we get there instead of saying we would like to buy X system. Um there are are also opportunities for example with the University of Wateroo and so I sent out an email last week with a very long update of everything that we're working on and so they're doing um some work with the city of Edmonton for example through the future cities institute. So your question about working with other municipalities around civic engagement and so we're we're looking to see if we can get involved with that around creating AI solutions but having them in an open-source format so that we can share them across the country like many European cities do. I'll discuss with this uh further with you guys maybe offline but one thing that I do see is uh even allocating presence of space within our city hall. I know we have the 10th floor that to sit kind of idle if there's opportunities within space that we can support like a growing early nurturing AI incubation. Um and again then we're close to home for new emerging tech and at the same time we can kind of nudge and encourage them to seek out potential solutions within uh a local government or governance in general and service delivery. So maybe we can talk more about that, but I think there's opportunities where city of Kitchener similar to what community tech was three decades or four decades ago uh being an early found you know supporter and funer and I think we can maybe play that dynamic role there as well but we can talk more off the line and thanks again for keeping a broad mind on the the local program. Thank you councelor Chapman. Yeah, thank you. Um I just want to say that um I was able to attend the the Geomate um presentation you did with um Geomate and the Ovine project and it was very impressive to see um how that partnership was working. So thank you for that. Um my question has to do more though with um customer service and if we talk about it being inclusive inequitable um how do we accommodate for those people who don't own a computer um maybe computer illiterate or that are uncomfortable doing online transactions or interaction even for that matter with the city like how do we ensure that they're not left behind? Mr. May through you Mr. chair. I would say that um this is actually a a way in which the city of Kitchener is a municipal leader and so our uh fundamental approach to customer service and the strategy that was endorsed a number of years ago by city council says that we will not simply provide services in one channel. So we will not move everything online whereas some other municipalities have taken that approach. So, we are at the same time as we're building services online, we're creating things like this the uh city hall service center so that people can walk in and uh and get their the services that they need and we're we're strengthening our corporate contact center for those that would prefer a phone call. Great. Thank you. Thank you. That actually concludes all of the questions. I actually do not have any questions myself after meeting with you guys a few times now and asking all the questions of previous committees. Uh, I did want to comment that I do I do think you absolutely nailed the priority list, right? I mean, it's it's a list that isn't in order, you know, of what's easiest. It's in order of what's most impactful and what's going to help our corporation the most and our residents the most. Um, I do find interesting too, just the question from councelor Chapman as well in terms of how folks um that perhaps aren't tech literate um will figure into this. And just it's it's kind of funny. Just the other day, it's the first time it's happened to me. Maybe it's happened to some of you, but I answered the phone and there was a lady at the end. She was soliciting a survey. She wanted to get some survey results. And I'm talking to her for like it wasn't that long, maybe 30, 45 seconds. And I clicked. I'm like, are you are you an AI? And there's a pause end of the line and very professionally. Yes, I am an AI, but if you'd like, I can connect you to a real person blah blah blah. And I'm like, you know what? This is great. Let's just continue. So anyway, my my point in that is that, you know, that is someone that that's technology interacting with someone who just can speak on on a traditional landline telephone. And I think the the future is bright in in this sense, especially in terms of customer service. Uh, Councelor Johnson's queued in in the meantime. Go ahead. Thank you, uh, Chair Davey. I just I just want to make a quick um comment as well that I think that this is terrific and I think I always think that you're on the right path if you're asking students about AI because they're uh they're right on the cutting edge. Um and I really appreciate that you're using what we have here in this community. So thank you and councelor. Yeah, thank you uh Chair Davey. Yeah, I I I think councelor uh chair Davey nailed it on the priorities are bang on and again I just want to comment and say that I see the progress that the digital strategy has been moving forward of late in the last year or so. So it's I'm very happy because I felt like we were stagnant there for a while. Thank you and Mayor Renovich. Well, thank you very much. And uh I do want to uh again thank staff for all of their work on this. We did have an opportunity to um for for council to to see the the preliminary draft of uh of this document uh some weeks ago. Um and I think you know at that time was it was an opportunity to recognize the progress that we've made as a city but also the the vision that's being created here going forward. I think as I pointed out at the time um in 2019 we had the opportunity to actually have our digital kitchener strategy showcased by the federal government as part of uh Canada's voluntary national uh review at the uh at the UN um particularly the work that we were doing around digital equity and uh having uh you know having the ability to continue building on that and speak to the kinds of things that councelor Chapman uh spoke of uh but more importantly how you know we're going to continue to see technology um really work to keep Kitchener at the forefront more importantly continue to deliver uh strong levels of service to our our residents is uh is important. I also uh just seeing this this final draft now, I like how we've also linked it to the Strat plan and the uh and the STGS as part of this work going forward. We're just in the midst of u of working on our own voluntary local review um which I believe will be done later this year uh for the first time and uh hopefully that you know some of this work will be included as part of that. Thank you. Excellent. No more comments. Can I get a mover for this item? Moved by councelor Anitis. Those in favor and that carries unanimously. Good work. Oh, councelor Singh, I have you in you. Oh, sorry. Are you here to vote? I forgot to get your vote. And you're muted. I'm need help with this one. Thank you. Just wanted to make sure my is okay. Thank you very much. Uh, that concludes finance and corporate services committee. Uh, Mr. Mayor, how long till you want to start special counsel? 10 minutes. It's 5:00. Okay.

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