[0:20] so we're here today because as a municipality
[0:23] we want it to reflect in our offer of culture,
community, life and leisure
[0:28] to allow us to guide our strategic decisions
over the next ten years.
[0:33] So at the end of summer 2023, we gave a mandate
to
[0:37] Raymond Chabot Grant Thornton to conduct a
study of our cultural
[0:41] and leisure needs of the Beaconsfield  residents.
[0:44] And we're very excited to show you the results
tonight.
[2:14] So my name is Maude Giard.
[2:16] I'm a manager in the tourism laser and culture
at Raymond Chabot
[2:19] and we've been working with the city since
the past summer
[2:23] to help them with this analysis.
[2:51] So tonight I'm not going to go through in.
[2:54] I'm not going to go in in details of the entire
work that we've done because
[2:58] it's a report that's over 100 pages long, and
that will be quite a long evening.
[3:02] So I'm just going to go through the the key
findings and the orientations,
[3:06] the directions that we're going to that we
are proposing to the city
[3:09] based on our findings.
[3:10] So I will start
[3:15] I will
[3:16] do English and French both for the presentation,
but I'm going to do
[3:21] like one page only in English and the next
page only in French.
[3:24] But when I'm speaking English, it's going to
be written in French.
[3:27] So just it doesn't go over too long.
[4:02] the work for Nicole the work we were doing
[4:05] is an analysis of the needs of the population
in regards to culture,
[4:08] sports, leisure, community, life, neighborhood
life.
[4:12] So all that makes the quality of life of a
city.
[4:15] So the main assignment, the main objective
that we have were to draw up a detailed
[4:19] portrait of the population to understand its
features, its leisure habits.
[4:25] What do people enjoy doing?
[4:26] What are they doing? All this?
[4:29] And we also we also wanted to examine, examine
the current situations
[4:33] in terms of leisure, offering
[6:01] But obviously as we wanted
[6:02] to ered the population needs, we also talk
with the population.
[6:06] So we had an online surveys that we did a bit
earlier in 2023.
[6:10] You might have taken part in it.
[6:13] We have the on the online survey that reached
[6:15] about 1250 resident of Beaconsfield.
[6:19] There was also a part that was specific as
a survey
[6:22] to was specific for the teenagers because they're
a bit harder to reach.
[6:25] So we had a specific survey for them as well.
[6:28] And we've conducted as also a focus group for
different focus group
[6:32] where I see that many familiar faces that were
there maybe
[6:36] and we talked to about 45 people in those focus
group.
[6:41] So from all this work
[6:43] we're going to present you the seven main the
seven key
[6:46] findings that we add in regards to that
[6:49] the population needs for sports, leisure, culture
and community life.
[6:56] So the first one
[6:57] is the recognition that sports, leisure, culture
[7:01] and community are important fields of action
for the quality of life.
[7:06] The city when we came to to to find out is
that the city
[7:09] is well aware of the importance of this feel
of those fields.
[7:13] They recognize that they are important, they
are essential
[7:17] to the citizens quality of life.
[7:18] So that's a good start
[7:19] to recognize that and to be aware of that,
that's a good start.
[7:23] And they also have significant, significant
resources
[7:26] and infrastructures to develop those areas.
[7:29] So we can in terms of resources, we can think
about the staff.
[7:33] There's 116 people that works in those different
fields,
[7:37] about 114 serving employees and 16 that are
full time.
[7:41] So this includes people
[7:42] working at the library, at the pool arena recreation
center at the day camp.
[7:47] So all of those different activities.
[7:51] There is also an annual
[7:53] budget because when we talk resources, we often
talk about money.
[7:56] Obviously, there's an annual budget of about
$9 million.
[8:00] This includes everything that's related to
sports culture
[8:04] and also the parks.
[8:07] There's also several infrastructures that are
owned by the city.
[8:11] The building that we're in right now, Library,
the rec center Centennial
[8:16] and all the parks as well, and the equipments
that we find in those parks.
[8:21] And finally, there's also many
[8:23] plans and policies that are either directly
linked
[8:26] to culture, sports, leisure, or that have some
actions related to it.
[8:30] We can think about that age friendly municipality
policy.
[8:35] There's the Park and Greenspaces
[8:38] master plan that is also a with that
[8:41] the association recognition policy, the universal
accessibility plans
[8:45] that has some specific action related to leisure
as well.
[10:28] So the first field of activity
[10:30] is the culture cultural activities.
[10:34] Globally the satisfactions rates are quite
high, especially library
[10:38] you with 94% of the people that answer that
say they were satisfied.
[10:42] So that's a very good rating.
[10:44] People enjoyed their library.
[10:45] They enjoyed going there
[10:47] and it was also the cultural center so that
the building in the centennial area
[10:52] and that that had an 84% satisfaction rate,
which is also good.
[10:58] But in the comments
[10:59] we understood that it was mostly the outdoor
experience, the concert,
[11:02] the shows, the events that takes place more
than what happens inside the building
[11:11] at the sports and leisure
[11:13] was at a bit of a lower satisfaction rate globally.
[11:16] There was the lowest from all the different
fields you can see.
[11:22] There is no well, it's not it's not really
bad.
[11:26] It's mostly it's like 74, 75% for the indoor
indoor pool,
[11:30] 64% for the arena, which is not that I
[11:34] but there's some issues with the state of the
building itself.
[11:38] The lowest was really for the indoor recreation
center activities.
[11:41] So apart from the pool in the arena.
[11:44] So everything that might happen, sports classes,
fitness classes, the open gym
[11:49] for a pickleball or basketball or whatever.
[11:53] So they had a bit of a lower satisfaction rape.
[11:55] And the last one was the outdoor pools.
[11:58] They are the big people that go to those pool
seem to really, really enjoy those.
[12:03] When we ask the citizen to compare the Beaconsfield
offering
[12:09] with the other cities around,
[12:10] that was the sports
[12:11] and leisure was the one that they say we had
in something that an offering
[12:14] that was inferior, that the other city had
a superior offering to what we had.
[12:18] There was really where it was the most, the
most
[12:23] jealous,
[12:24] and more likely a mishap decided the one that
was the most often mentioned
[12:29] as in Superior, outside of Beaconsfield.
[12:35] And the last category was specifically for
the parks.
[12:39] There was a good satisfaction.
[12:40] People enjoyed their greenspaces, they enjoyed
their parks.
[12:43] I think you're currently working in the green
spaces in Park Master Plan,
[12:47] so this is something that's also probably going
to come out from this plan.
[12:52] But globally, people enjoyed their their parks.
[12:54] And where are you at?
[12:55] A bit of a lower satisfaction rate
[12:57] was mostly for the facilities or equipments
in the park.
[13:00] So like the outdoor sports fields might have
had a little bit
[13:05] of a lower satisfaction
[14:09] I'm the next one
[14:11] is a programing for everyone so we have many
activities
[14:15] that our offer and they do attract a large
number of participants.
[14:18] We have some example here for the library and
we have about 90,000 visits a year,
[14:24] which is a lot of people and a lot of people
coming to
[14:27] the recreation center, all activities combined.
[14:30] So arena pool classes, summer camp,
[14:34] all of those add over 133,000 visit.
[14:37] So people do take part in the activities that
are offered
[14:40] and we have a large number of participant.
[14:44] But there today
[14:46] one of the common
[14:47] that came into the survey and in the focus
group as well was that
[14:51] those activities were mostly geared towards
either young families or retirees
[14:56] or people that were available Monday to Friday,
9 to 5.
[15:00] So people that were not available during this
time, they had a bit of a less
[15:04] diverse offering for them.
[15:06] You can see in this survey we also asked for
a specific clientele
[15:10] or population profile, and you can see that
for the senior
[15:13] people felt they had many activities and it
suited their needs well.
[15:18] But at the opposite range you have the teenagers,
[15:20] which most people felt they didn't have enough
offering for them
[17:18] Another important element for the cultural
sports
[17:21] and leisure offering is in regards to the the
collaboration.
[17:25] So we said that collaboration and partnerships
needs to be strengthened.
[17:31] This city cannot offer everything herself itself.
[17:36] It needs to work with partners, it needs to
work
[17:38] with different collaborators that can help
them.
[17:43] Because when we do have this collaborative
[17:45] work, it can optimize what it's offered to
our citizens.
[17:49] We cannot offer everything ourselves, but when
we work with other,
[17:51] we're going to have a larger offering for people.
[17:55] And there's several potential partnering partnerships.
[17:58] Some of them are already in place, some can
be improved,
[18:01] some can be strengthened.
[18:02] So we can think about neighboring municipalities,
their schools.
[18:06] And there's also Oliver Associations.
[18:08] There is about 60 associations that currently
[18:12] I work for offer activities in beacon spheres.
[18:15] So this is and those are important partners
that we need to to work with.
[18:20] However, we found that their offering was not
well known by the population.
[18:26] There's a lot of activities offered, but people
don't necessarily know
[18:29] that they exist.
[18:30] And there's also you need to to find a
[18:34] balance between the
[18:34] fact that they also they're not they don't
only work with the Beacon
[18:38] Steel population, but also with all the other
cities around.
[20:24] so we're going to start with the Ford guidelines.
[20:27] So guidelines are general guidelines. Yes.
[20:32] So their general guidelines that will that
[20:34] we have to keep in mind for every action that
we're going to work on.
[20:38] So there are not specific things to do.
[20:40] They're not things oops, sorry, They're not
things to check on the list.
[20:44] But whenever did that did
[20:47] the city of Beaconsfield team is going to be
working on project.
[20:50] They're going to have those four guidelines
in their head.
[22:01] the second guideline is an offering that connects
its citizens.
[22:04] So by that we mean that the city focuses
[22:08] on facilities, activities and events that bring
citizens together.
[22:12] So we're trying to see how can we connect people
better.
[22:15] It also wishes to facilitate opportunities
[22:19] for citizens to explore and interact with their
neighbors.
[22:22] So this might mean offering activities that
are closer to a
[22:26] a small community neighborhood so people can
connect and talk and meet.
[22:31] And it also wishes to strengthen the sense
of belonging to the city as a whole,
[22:36] but also for two small communities within the
city.
[23:49] and the fourth
[23:51] guideline which is an offering based on collaboration.
[23:54] As I mentioned a bit earlier, this city relies
[23:58] on partnerships to effectively serve the needs
of its population.
[24:01] It cannot offer everything on its own.
[24:04] It needs to work with partners
[24:06] and it also needs to support its partners by
facilitating their process.
[24:11] I'm sorry I tried repeating that word professionalization
[24:15] and I can't seem to see it's right, but it
works to make sure its partners
[24:19] can offer a quality offering and they can work,
[24:23] and then that they can also respect the city's
guideline.
[24:28] And so those guidelines are really general
[24:32] guidelines over everything.
[24:34] And now from that, we have to directions that
will be at the base of that,
[24:39] the work of the city for the next ten years.
[25:07] And so the first direction as I mentioned,
[25:10] was develop and maintain a network of infrastructures
and facility
[25:14] that effectively meets the needs of our citizens.
[25:17] It has three different strategy.
[25:19] The first one being to complete the major the
major infrastructure renewal project
[25:23] that are already underway.
[25:25] So you do have the to carry out the Centennial
Park project,
[25:29] but it's already ongoing.
[25:30] So it was just keep going.
[25:34] See the end of the project.
[25:35] And you have also the renovation and modernization
of the recreation center.
[25:39] There's also a couple of plans
[25:41] that are already in place for the arena, for
the pool.
[25:44] And so this is also there there's the redevelopment
of the Windermere Park,
[25:49] which is the next part that's going to have
a makeover.
[25:52] And overall and there's the Beacon Chalet.
[25:55] That was I'm I'm assuming it's almost finished
or it's getting near Diane.
[25:59] I'm not quite sure, but almost there.
[27:18] the third
[27:19] strategy is to introduce a rig bill to avoid
regular maintenance program
[27:25] for existing infrastructures,
[27:27] which is mostly to make sure that they don't
deteriorate over time
[27:31] and that we need to do a major renovation project
later.
[27:34] So just to keep in mind, always to keep our
infrastructures, facilities,
[27:38] equipment up to date,
[28:41] I'm in the same strategy
[28:43] we also had to relocate or take outside
[28:48] some activities outside of their traditional
infrastructures.
[28:52] So maybe there's an activity that could be
offered in the park
[28:54] or in the in a park chalet instead of at the
library or somewhere else.
[28:59] It doesn't necessarily apply to every activities
where we can.
[29:02] Thing is, are there are some activities that
we could
[29:05] tinker outside the box and see where else we
could offer them to,
[29:10] to whoever
[29:11] ensuring that activities are offered all in
all districts.
[29:14] And the last innovation part or renewing our
approach part
[29:19] is to take an innovative approach to management.
[29:23] So does it have to be the city that offered
this activities?
[29:28] Could it be offered with partners?
[29:30] Are there any other tools that could enable
partners
[29:34] to contribute to this programing? Do we have
to do it ourselves?
[29:36] So these are things that needs to be taking
into consideration
[30:28] and the third strategy is to strengthen collaboration
with associations.
[30:35] So as we mentioned earlier, our associations
are important partners
[30:39] and we need to work an end in hand with them.
[30:42] We need to see how we can facilitate a quality
offering on the parts of this.
[30:46] The associations, So make sure that this offerings
[30:50] is adapted to the needs of the population and
it complements
[30:53] what is already offered.
[30:54] We don't want to offer something that the city
and an association are offering.
[30:58] If only the association could offer it to more
people.
[31:01] Maybe so. This needs to see.
[31:03] We need to see how we can work better for this
[31:05] and how we can optimize communication as well.
[31:08] Because we saw that many people, many of the
population
[31:11] didn't know what was offered by the association.
[31:14] So how can we let them know what is going on?
[32:15] So this is all the strategies,
[32:17] direction, strategies and guidelines that came
out of the report.
[32:21] Obviously, if we want to put those forward
[32:24] in the next ten years, there are some conditions
for success.
[32:27] One of them is to ensure that everyone respects
those guidelines.
[32:31] So obviously the city itself, its elected officials,
[32:34] when we're deciding new project, we need to
keep the guidelines in mind
[32:37] because otherwise they're not gaming really.
[32:42] There is also the definition by the the team
of an annual monitoring tool.
[32:47] If we want to make sure that we are
[32:49] and we're innovative, that we respond to the
population need what we need to know
[32:54] how many people are attending our activities
is it is the satisfaction
[32:57] good or so we need to have a bit of a monitoring
tool for that
[33:52] so thank you very much for your time
[34:10] I'll sit I would like to thank you the residents
who participated
[34:14] by a being here tonight
[34:15] who participated also in the surveys and in
the focus groups.
[34:19] It was nice to see such a great participation
rate and and show
[34:22] that you're interested in developing your community