have a department here which is, uh, 25% of its total budget
is cost to the levy. Could it be better? Maybe so. But again,
I just wanted to reiterate that we are making headway in some
areas. And secondly,
I kind of agree with Councilor Buro. It's tough to
keep robbing from reserves. That's why we had low budgets. I was
part of the budget process back when COVID was on,
and to keep the budget low,
we robbed from reserves. We kept it low,
and then by eliminating a lot out of the budget,
as soon as COVID was over, we had to put that all back in the
budget. So if we had maintained a 3% or 2%
levy increase through those years, we may not be looking at what we're looking
at today. But those were decisions of the past. But decisions
of the future will come when we have infill. You know,
we've got a new development team. So we're looking at development.
Every time there's infill into our community,
which sometimes is, uh, answered by
nimbyism where they don't want it, but the public has to realize that every
time we add a development which doesn't create more roads,
uh, which doesn't need new sewer mains, which doesn't need new water
mains, that becomes a, a definite bonus
to the community as far as tax revenue. So if we add 100 units
and we don't have to add any serious infrastructure, so 100
units at averaged 3 or 4,000, you were talking $300,000 or $400,000.
So I just wanted to bring those points forward, even though we are using reserves
now. Hopefully in future with the development and infills that we
can bring those reserves back up. Thank you.
Okay. Just, just so we're moving forward,
I appreciate the statements, Councillor Darling, but we are looking for questions of the presenter
at this time. Councillor Maton, go ahead. Thank you for your report, and I look
forward to community engagement and perhaps presentation to
council, as alluded to earlier. My question to you is,
I just— a point of clarity.
If you are retained as a consultant
Could you please explain the disclaimer at the end of your report?
I wish I brought the report with me. Okay, so I, I'll read. It says,
um, uh, David Dexter Consultant and the Town of Cobourg
are not responsible for any loss or damage which might occur as a reliance
or use of the contents in this report.
I'm not used to seeing a consultant put that kind of disclaimer,
so I'm just wondering if you could— perhaps it's just my unfamiliarity.
I'll start this off, Mr. Dexter, and then I'll let you answer afterwards.
Um, then I stand, and I appreciate that. I'm going to partially
answer that and then let Mr. Dexter answer the rest of that, because remember,
I'm the one who retained Mr. Dexter, so perhaps I should
start and then Mr. Dexter can finish. Um, when Mr. Dexter was
retained, he was not retained as a professional accountant. He was retained as a member
of the public in Cobourg who to in the past have
a professional accounting background. He was not retained as a chartered accountant,
and there, for that reason, I'm just letting you know that may
take part of that, because when Mr. Dexter and I were beginning the conversations about
this, we very clearly— I wanted someone who is a
member of the public of Cobourg, who's a ratepayer of Cobourg, to lead that,
and I wanted someone who had a professional background of
more than 15 years. But that said, Mr.
Dexter's retired, so I can let him explain why he put that there. But I
just wanted to be very clear that when I hired Mr. Dexter, I wasn't hiring
a chartered accountant. I was hiring a member of the public in
Cobourg who happened to also have professional experience.
Thank you.
By all means, sir. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I mean,
what the mayor describes is correct, right? I'm not a consultant by trade.
I'm a resident with 30 years experience in the industry on
the municipal finance side, so I realized there needed to be
some disclaimer at the end. I looked at some of the examples of some of
the reports, the financial reports that the town had done, be it KPMG
or Watson Associates, and I realized I needed to identify the
fact that I wrote the report and that people that are on the task force
are not accountable, and that it's town report and that
you don't know. I mean, indemnification is you don't know the situation
of risk or something that could be claimed
back at the town or something like that, right? And you need to make statements
like that, like in a contract or something that you may not know, a situation
where something could be used and someone said, well, I read this and
I did this in my life, and because that you don't
know these things, so you have to make a disclaimer of some sort.
Right. Well, Miss Councillor Barber. Yeah, just very briefly, I wanted
to, um, come back to something you said and, and backed up
basically, uh, through, uh, what, uh, Councillor Darling also mentioned.
Um, some of the things that this
council has done in the last 2 or 3 years are against—
and I think it was recognized by your group
they are starting to show positive effects and things towards some of the finances,
specifically our
front desk idea, et cetera, et cetera. And I just wonder
if you might just enlarge on that just a little bit. Some of the things
that we've decided on over the last couple of years now are beginning to actually
start to show positive effects on the
budget. Budget. Thank you. Okay,
Mr. Dexter, I'm going to ask a very brief question, if I may. Or do
you want to take that one? By all means.
I mean, we, we stuck pretty much to the financial framework
and the financial concerns, so we never got into some of the deeper elements of
the service. I, you know, the front desk and the, and the,
and the people at the front of the building, I think that's excellent.
Right? And we know— I've heard no complaints about that. I mean, for one
thing, on a pure financial basis,
funding for long-term capital sustainability is a
multi-financial thing, right? Long-term,
long-term assets, that's a wise thing to use.
And now there's a debt policy in place that the treasurer brought forward.
One thing that the town also brought approved is an
infrastructure levy. I know it's a tax, and I complain mentioned
earlier that it was one of the burdens that they put on the taxpayer,
but it's on top of everything else. On its own, with normal
tax rate increases, it's a good thing to do because the tax burden—
the taxpayer has to be a part of the long-term sustainability of the assets
that— and the services they provide. So that was new, and it
was done in what, 2024, I believe? I believe that was the budget year.
So that was smart as well, right? A stormwater rate's wise too,
right? Because it provides for the replacement of assets.
How it went about and some of the complications in between would've been nice
to avoid, but the end outcome and the rationale
of having a stormwater charge makes sense, right?
Well, certainly redundant to say, but the
tax levy pays for reserves. I mean, reserves are built
out of the tax levy and a lot of people don't think that through,
I think. Thank you.
Simple question, Mr. Dexter, if I may. Has anyone on council approached
you to do a presentation for them?
Uh, to you, Mr. Mayor, this would be the first. Okay. Um, has anyone
on council reached out directly to you to have a one-on-one count or meeting about
the report? Uh, to you,
Mr. Mayor, no. Okay. Um, thank you, Mr. Dexter. I appreciate it.
No further questions. Um, just to the council, No further
questions. Thank you, Mr. Dexter. Appreciate it. We're going to move on to Mr.
Bussan. The reason I asked those questions, Council, is, uh, as you're all aware,
a meeting could have been called at any time by 4 members of this Council
to go over the budget task force. Similarly, any one member of
Council could have easily reached out to Mr. Dexter and gone over that task force
one-on-one with him. I say that because both the Deputy Mayor and Councillor Buro
have suggested that they would have liked to have a meeting before this
meeting, and I just want to make sure the public knows that every member of
this Council is free to conduct themselves as an independent island as
they see fit, and that as an independent island, they are
responsible for their sort of retention,
knowledge, and building a basis. So again, just like
this meeting was called by 4 members of council, anytime 4
members of council could have gotten together and had a meeting called to review the
Strong Mayor Task Force. Councilor Matan, I see your hand. Yes,
I would actually have to comment that we rely on your leadership, Mr. Mayor.
So I think we rely— council, and I'm speaking for myself,
is that your leadership in ensuring that council has the
appropriate information. And I would like everybody to know that I had asked if
I could be an observer at these budget task force meetings.
And I was at first, it was agreed to, and then I was denied.
There was no public access to the task force meetings,
including by members of council. So I just wanted that to be
out there. That's great to cover. And it was a first-time process, But definitely,
Mr. Mayor, we look to your leadership with regards to all of council
also. That's my, my, my view. Well, I hope so, because here we are discussing
the mayor's budget. So let's hope we follow that leadership. But Councilor Mouton, on that
point, let's— I think it's great you brought forward. You're right, I did agree to
that, right, initially, because I was like, oh, of course, why wouldn't you? That was
out of place for me because it wasn't actually my task force
to run, to select, to choose, or to out line. So I agreed
to you being a participatory, uh, mistakenly, because I didn't actually
check with the people on the task force first. When I brought
that idea to the members of the task force and leadership, it was them that
asked for, uh, the privacy to have a conversation away from both myself and
all political and staff members so that they could build that trust
and relationship amongst themselves. Because from the,
the luncheon I had at the end of that task force with the individuals
to say thank you for all the hours and hours of work. I was,
uh, incredibly impressed with the
congeniality of some of these members who in the past I have seen not
be very friendly to one another because of their very diverse political and
financial views. And I think it served us well to
leave them to their own in a sense, because, uh, what I think they
needed was an ability to find a trust, just like this council has had to
work over the last 3 years to find a way to trust work together.
This was 10 unique individuals who had to come together and come up with
some recommendations. So I just— I'm glad you brought the point up. That was my
mistake. I said, of course you can participate. And it was actually at that point
that I was corrected and said, well, Mayor, actually, this is a group that
will decide. And that was the decision of the group. So thank you for that.
And I appreciate that you do follow this leadership. But again, this council has
a record of calling— I think we're up to like 9 or 10 special meetings.
Anytime I make a strong— Mayor, you This council seems to call a special
meeting. So while I do appreciate the point that you follow my leadership,
I would suggest that you only seem to want to do that when meetings aren't
called. But, you know, we'll leave it at that. Deputy Mayor. Thank you. Just a
comment on that. And I definitely don't want to open the Pandora's box on that.
Respect the fact that we're in an era of strong mayor legislation. I just
think it's important to remind everyone that council can only have a conversation on a
strong mayor directive by calling a meeting and in an open
forum. And with respect to the task force, yes,
absolutely. I, um, as the mayor,
because this was funded by taxpayers' money and it was put out into
the community with a lot of recommendations that have— could have
significant impact, uh, to the taxpayer service
level. Some of the task force recommendations I think are really strong. I think a
lot of them require additional feasibility, and a lot of them require
additional unpacking. Um, so if
we talk about isolated islands, we put a document out into the
community of Cobourg and it creates a desert because it's sitting
isolating. And to Councilor Mouton's point, I believe if I could say
also the leadership, Mr. Mayor, at any time you could have created a special
meeting of your entire team, which you talk about being a proud team leader
and you could have presented the task force to us and
the community as a whole with context from the strong leadership
of Dexter and the community, Mr. Dexter and the community,
rather than finding out about the task force information in
a Facebook post followed up by an email. So it
goes both ways. Council has to mobilize
and petition a meeting where strong mayor's ethics especially,
and I will stand by the fact that that the tax
levy budget is a budget of the community. Uh, it's the Coburgs' budget.
And so I get a little frustrated about hearing it's
creating islands of isolation when in fact,
um, this is why I brought forward the motion back in September when
the strong mayor's timelines were published,
had a more thorough timeline and release of information,
and then follow-up and presentation of said material. I think could
have brought the engagement and the education of council and community
along, along with that. Perfect. Can I understand what
would have been more thorough so that we can make changes moving forward?
Well, a communication of the budget timeline,
um, the presentation of the task force. Again, it could have been— I guess
the question back to you, you asked Mr. Dexter, why didn't a member of council
ask for a presentation? Why, Mr. Mayor, did you not present the
task force information as a whole to council.
Also too, on community and Engage Cobourg, it talks about there
was a direction through the strong mayor to include a community engagement
project timeline with the budget. So we put
a budget out on Engage Cobourg, but there's been no engagement
plan to put with that. So I guess I'm just, I'm just as confused as
everybody and trying to follow along all the release of information. Short period
of time, but I just want to make sure to make it very, very clear.
It was your directive, it was your output. A presentation
of the task force to all of Council and the community, I think, would have
been a strong stewardship of the investment, but also too,
really strong opportunity to highlight and recognize and appreciate
the work of, of the task force. Okay, perfect. So I'm gonna
go address those because I think it's really important. So the communication budget
that would have fallen to staff. So I guess what sort of criticisms or what
could staff have done better in terms of communicating the timelines?
Question to myself. Yeah, but you said that the communication timelines weren't
there. Well, the timelines were published several months ago. They've never
needed to be updated. The only update was that the timeline was pushed back by
a week to allow for the CPS presentation. But other than that, the timelines are
as they were written. Several months ago. So I'm just wondering, what would you like
to see the comms department do better to sort of make it more easily understood
by everyone? Fair. I'm not criticizing staff.
Um, I guess, why release a budget without a communication engagement plan?
So why release a budget document but then it also
says to release an engagement? So that's great. I'm going to answer that question.
We'll just go one by one just to make sure we keep it sort of
straight. Um, that's the way it's always been done. So the draft gets presented and
then the engagement happens. So today the draft was presented and
now the engagement happens. So that's the exact way it always happens.
Draft comes forward, then engagement occurs. The difference is
that I'm presenting the budget instead of staff, but the process is
always the same: draft, engagement, council makes final decision.
So again, I'm just trying to understand when you say we could have
been more thorough and that the comms department— it was confusing. I don't understand
that. So I'd just like to know specific part that was confusing.
Um, I think the question— I think I'm confused in the question,
but if I can go back, then why the task force document,
which was published 2 or 3 weeks ago? Perfect. Again, Mr. Mayor, at any time
you could have called a special meeting of your team, which you so proudly
state in leading. Um, so again, the task force information
could have been presented to council. I'm just saying, last week
the the mayor's budget was published,
and in that same documentation
it said a special meeting would be scheduled in the future.
Council had to petition to create that special meeting. So I guess I'm just saying,
if I were the one packaging this all up and releasing it,
I would have made sure that when the budget came forward that it
also came forward with a comprehensive and communication
plan. So if you— if staff needed more time to present that plan, then why
didn't you wait on the release of the budget, knowing that the 30 days kicks
off. Um, let's stop there. Just— I'm happy to hear more. I just want to
answer that question. See, Yvonne, um, when the budget was presented, did I
give direction within the minute to make sure the communication piece was put out?
Engagement piece. Because what we've heard is that it wasn't done comprehensively,
and I'm just wanting to know if you could perhaps counteract that narrative.
Because the reality is, is we talked the weekend before— the Friday and the
Thursday before I released the budget out the engagement piece, and I believe my
direction was whatever council wants, this is their time to engage.
So make sure that the council has the engagement that they
look forward to. I know that was my direction to Kara Uwali as well as
Jenny. I'm wondering, is that a fair assessment,
or did I just sort of not tell staff what to do for the engagement?
Thank you, Your Worship. Um, my understanding,
um, would be yes, that you had spoken to communications staff and
asked them to begin to release information
and engagement. I believe Ms. Ewale and Ms.
Nuttall are on the line. I don't want to speak on their behalf because I
wasn't present for the conversation, so I don't really want to put words in their
mouth. No problem, we'll go to Ms. Ewale. Thank you. As she's the director I
dealt with as you were off that week. So Ms. Ewale, are you with us
today? I am. I'm not sure you can hear me. Can you hear me?
I can, yes, we can hear you loud and clear. So, Uh,
what we're just sort of making sure we're all on the same page here with
sort of the timelines. We've heard that some of the timelines were really confusing and
were not delivered appropriately.
We're looking at the specifics, and what I've heard recently is that the direction
to staff wasn't necessarily clear or direct in terms of the engagement.
I was wondering if you'd like to perhaps summarize and recant the conversation you,
me, and the Communications Director had prior to
the actual budget release being put Yes,
for sure. Through you, Mayor, to the rest of council.
So we had communicated several months
ago the processes of the new budget process
and the introduction of the community engagement
through the task force. So Mayor Cleveland had
expressed to us that he would be going door to door as well as the
introduction of the community task force would be a new opportunity Committee
for Ground Level Community Engagement.
Following the completion of the report,
Mayor Cleveland did direct staff to post all information
regarding the budget on Engage Cobourg. So it would be a one-stop
shop for members of the public to receive
information on the mayor's proposed budget, but also the
documents that informed the budget, which is in part the community-led
task force as well as the staff budget. So all documents
are housed on Engage Cobourg for any residents
to take a look. We are also advising
members of the public that they can come and request delegations
if they have comments on the budget itself. And further,
If council would like to set up, as we have done
in the past, Mayor Cleveland and I did speak with this as well as the
Manager of Communications, Jenny Nuttall, that it is within council's
right if they'd like us to set up in-person sessions with
members of the public about the budget
itself. The only direction we would need from council is
when and how this would come back back through a report
at another future session. So that's why, as of right now,
we've requested that people review all of the budget documentation and come
with questions as delegations or speakers to, uh, special council
meetings. Thank you, Miss Ueli. I do appreciate that fulsome answer.
Um, and I've just finalized the last sort of point, Deputy Mayor,
was that I could have come forward and presented the task force to
council. I at the exact same time I did to all of the public.
I believe that a public document like the task force budget needs to go to
everyone on an equal level. It's been public to council and
to the general public since the day— basically the Monday I received it.
I received, I believe, on the Friday before I had the chance to
read it. I felt that the budget task force did a very good
job at breaking it down to a comprehensible level
for the average citizen. I felt that they deduced major,
major tax issues and
theory to an approachable level,
and I didn't think a detailed presentation was needed. I felt that all 42 present—
all 42 recommendations were pretty self-explanatory, and a lot
of them needed more development from a municipal standpoint anyways. These were sort of good
ideas that needed to be then developed, which I would expect that they would— Council's
decision. So just to sort of address some of the concerns and/or suggestions
that it was a mismatch. I, I just— I'm going
to oppose that. This has been very well communicated
by staff, by the staff team. We've had multiple training sessions
on this. We've publicly had this. There's been special meetings
called about this. So I just want to push back, uh, in the sort
of implication and suggestion that this is chaotic in any
shape, way, or form, even when we needed to move the budget process back
by a week, uh, just to make sure that we could hear from the Cobourg
Police Service and have that thorough presentation, uh,
that was easily achieved and everything moved back a week. So I would suggest that
this is like every other budget process. Yes, the only difference is it's titled as
the mayor's draft budget, but again, this wasn't just a symbolic move.
This is the reality, is that it— if council wants to change
everything, if council wants to readjust, if they want to start from the drawing board,
that's council's prerogative, and I, I won't be getting in the that.
By all means, Deputy Mayor. Thank you, Mayor Cleveland. Just, uh, my,
my wrap-up on this, because, uh, first of all, no criticism on staff.
I just want to make that very, very clear. I did not use the
word chaotic. I said confusing. And really what, uh,
stemmed all of this is, first of all, in, in all this,
it was a response to council creating an island of
isolation. Um, I think this whole process
has created that. Um, but really where my comment about the staff engagement or clarification
came around, um, was on Engage Cobourg
under what happens next. The first bullet point clearly
stated— so when the budget was first published, the first
2 bullet points said, as per the mayor's directive,
he has directed staff to engage the community. Then there was a second bullet
point that a future special meeting of council would be called. Called. Council called
this meeting. That's been updated to state December 15th.
All the documents are there. That's really great. But really, Mr. Mayor, what I'm
getting at is the foundation of what initiated
my comments was asking for clarity around that first bullet
point. As per the mayor's directive, he has directed staff to
engage the community other than your door knocking, where we don't
have any summaries of those findings. I mean, we all do our own
door knocking and engagement in town calls and indirect informal conversations
as members at large. Um, when I read this
and when I've had members of the public ask me, how have you directed staff
to engage the community? When I go to engage Coburg, I have no opportunity to
engage. This is— anyways, I'm not going to hash
this out anymore. I just wanted to come full circle with, um, to explain what
initiated that original, um, series of
my comments. Thank you. Noted. Thank you so much. Are there any questions moving forward
of that? Seeing none, I think we should move on to our next speaker.
Thank you for being so patient. Mr. Bisson, would you care to join us up
front for your 10 minutes? We've done this before, so you know I'll put the
two fingers up when we're close to 2 minutes. Mr. Bisson, we look forward to
hearing your, uh, presentation.
Yes, there we go. Okay, well, good morning
or afternoon everyone. Uh, this was, uh, a bit of a surprise
I showed up here this morning. I wasn't intending to, so I don't have prepared
statements or anything like that, but I've been, um, extremely busy doing
my own thing and watching you guys from afar, and I can honestly tell you
that 10 months from an election, uh, seems to be the gloves are off
and everybody's starting to position themselves. And we just had a a perfect example,
ladies and gentlemen of the public, as to what happens in an election year
when politicians start to jockey for positions on a move-forward basis.
This process is a new process for COBRA. We've never had a
mayor's budget before, and under strong mayor powers, it is his prerogative
to be able to do that, and which he has done, and now we stand
all here. One of the things that I've noted is under strong mayor
powers, I don't remember seeing that the mayor has the power to
be able to manipulate or dictate terms and conditions of a police
services budget. I didn't see that. I may have missed it, but as
far as I'm concerned, that is a whole other process.
To my knowledge, there's a reason why the Police Services Board exists
and not police services under council, and that's to keep the two separate.
And under my knowledge, and I looked looked up, and I've asked people,
but there's nothing in the legislation I can see that gives the mayor the authority
to be able to dictate terms and conditions on the police services
budget. Having said that, obviously somebody
had to, to address the concerns of a 20% increase
in that budget, and obviously that is not palpable through the
population, including myself, which has— I pay taxes in this town,
and back Dave's point, I don't think there's an appetite, let alone
a financial condition, in which anybody's going to take a 20% hit
on any big blind item like the Police Services budget. Um,
one of the things that I would encourage this council, including the mayor, is to
work collaboratively. I'm not seeing a whole lot of love in here. You guys are
going at each other and positioning and jockeying for the next election, which is fair.
Having said that, there's an entire population of 20,000 people that depend
on you working together and getting getting it done, and that's not what I'm seeing
here. So as far as I'm concerned, yes, I do
appreciate a small increase in the levy. We've got enormous problems
in regards to these reserves issues. There are big decisions that need to be made,
and I'm not seeing a whole lot of collaboration, collaboration in
addressing the concerns of the public, which is what you are here to serve.
I have tremendous respect for each and every one of these council members, each and
every one of you put your lives personally,
professionally, financially aside to run for public office,
and you earned my respect right off the bat.
However, the terms and conditions of your mandate
is to serve us, the public, not your individual interests, not your
political aspirations, not your egos. And I
would ask each and every one of you in this election year,
especially during this time, which is an important budget because it
will lay the foundation for the next council's decisions to try to get along
and do the right thing for the people of Coburg. We have
been through hell and back since this council formed.
Crime, homelessness, drugs, the county forcing itself
upon— like, guys, come on. Okay, put your differences
aside for the next 30 days and do what's right for
the people of That's all I have to say.
Thank you, Mr. Bisson. Uh, do we have any questions at this time?
I have one, sir. I appreciate it. I want to be very clear, you're correct,
I don't have the ability to authorize reserves. Only this council
does, Mr. Bisson, which is why this is— so, Mr.
Bisson, again, we're, we're not, we're not going back in the back. And again,
the entirety of the police board's budget has been approved as submitted.
That's the difference, Mr. Buisson. No, no, I want to be very clear.
I've attempted to meet with the Police Board. I was never invited
to a Police Board meeting. I was never invited to come,
and it was only after I watched a Police Board meeting online did I know
that they even wanted to present to council. So then I invited them
to present to council, Mr. Buisson. After they presented to council, I then
sent emails looking to meet with the chief with the chair and
with Roger to meet with myself and Mr. Giddings. That was also denied,
sir. I've tried to act collaboratively. I would
suggest, sir, when you talk about a lack of collaboration, how is
it that the Police Board Service has already filled out an appointment
of a conciliation officer before the budget was even presented,
sir? How is it that I'm sitting here in— hold on— in
receipt of multiple legal opinions that are suggesting the
Police Board have— are intentionally looking to create a fight.
Specifically, why is it that we are being challenged
as the reason that we're not getting along, sir? And why are the other sides
not held accountable? And lastly, um, I agree
it is the Police Board that should be allocating reserves, and they have. In the
last 4 years, this Police Board has used $9.87 million
out of the corporate business service unit to fund
operations. And each and every year, Mr. Bisson— hold on,
I'm about to answer a question— each and every year,
sir, I've sat here and asked, why is the Police Board
not asking for more money, sir? So to your point,
what more in collaboration would you like to see, sir?
You are the mayor of Cobourg. It is your responsibility to lead this
council. From the time that Strong Mayor Powers
came on board, it has been contentious. No one's
gonna lie about that. Now, having said that, the police services
is the biggest line item on the budget by far,
and I can understand and appreciate you're trying to contain costs.
I get that. Having said that though, it is not through butting
heads with them and going to court, and it's not by, you know,
having dismissals of chief officers
to be able to come to a conclusion on this. There is
a Police Services Board. Two of your councillors sit on that Police Services Board.
I find it hard to believe, Mr. Mayor, that you couldn't sit down with them
over a coffee and start to hack some of these issues out rather than having
it all go through all these technicalities. Well, let's just call it what it is.
The Deputy Mayor refuses to meet with me one-on-one, and I
can provide the email that shows that neither the Chief Roger nor the chair wanted
to meet with me, sir. So again, I don't get to decide whether they come
to use my open-door policy, Mr. Bisson. I can only create the open door for
them to walk through. And again, I'm not here to— you know, you, you,
you guys are all adults, right? You guys know what the gig
is. You're supposed to help the population get through these things, and I'm not going
to start— you know, an election's coming in 10 months. The people
will decide Agreed. No question about that. And I will be active in that election.
Trust me. Now, having said that, you are all adults.
We're talking about somewhere in the order of $30 million that
you're managing on behalf of the public. I expect that you guys get along a
little bit and start acting a little bit more professional than pointing fingers at each
other like a schoolyard. Mr. Bisson, I appreciate the enthusiasm
you bring, but let's not start— Oh yeah, I'm not happy about it. I'll be
honest. Mr. Bisson, a little bit of decorum. We're having a conversation
and I can see how passionate and how emotional you're getting, but we're talking
about sort of six and one half
dozen the other. The police budget was approved in its entirety, all 20.5%.
Every ask that was asked by the Police Board has been met, sir. It's not
the end result, it's how we got here. There could have been a lot less
contention and buttheading. And again, Mr. Bisson, what I would like to ask
then as a final questions. You've been very poignant and paying
attention to the police board meetings since, well, the last 4 years,
to be honest. Can you point to a single suggestion that was
made by the chief that was not allowed on the budget line item
in 4 years by the police board? Because I've been unable to find one.
So I guess my question is, is it really the police board's budget, or as
we've heard in the most recent weekend media, it's just the chief's
budget? Okay, so having said, I'm not going to go down that road. As far
as I'm concerned, I haven't looked at a police service's budget in 2 years.
So having said that, all I'm saying is this: the Coburg
taxpayer has had enough of watching this headbutting
and finger-pointing and political posturing at our
expense. We want results. And as far as I'm concerned,
given the condition of our streets over the last 2 and a half Given the
budget items, given all of the cost increases, given the conflict
with the county, on and on it goes. This next election
is gonna be real important to be able to sort this out. This is Cobourg.
This isn't downtown Toronto. It's not Ottawa.
It's a small town on the lakeshore of Lake Ontario. Why is all
of this happening under this council? This is very,
very, uh, counterproductive. Have to
our town. Have you been reading much news, Mr. Bissell? I read news
all the time. So then you're being very well aware that this is not unique
to Coburg? No, that there are almost— sorry, Mr. Bissell, again,
let's have a little— I have a point of order, sir.
Point of order noted. The point of order, Mr. Bissell,
how you're
conducting yourself inappropriately. It is No,
I'm asking questions. I'm asking them calmly.
Mr. Bisson, you keep interrupting while I'm speaking,
yet I continue to give you the ability to finish your thoughts
before I ask another question. See, you're doing it just now, sir. Point of order
raised by the Deputy Mayor. By all means, a point of order.
With all due respect to the speaker, I appreciate your insight
and, and your comments, and my point of order right now is I feel that
procedurally we are getting into a debate between a member of council and
a citizen. I feel that we need to treat— you're
asking for respect, so I'd like to ask that we respect the time of the
speaker and the points made. And my point of order is,
I believe that if we can move on in the conversation,
unless there's other follow-up questions of clarity to the speaker. So my
point of order is that we get back to following our procedural bylaw when
it comes to— from the presentation.
And instead of an interrogation from a member of council to the—
um, what interrogation, Councilor, uh, Deputy Mayor? Let's just
be very clear with the insinuations. There was no interrogation, it was asking questions.
So would you like to recant the interrogation comment, or are you accusing me of
interrogating a member of the public? I'm not going any further because
I don't want to contribute to this ongoing tension. I've asked for a point of
order to return to this procedural bylaw, please. And I'm willing to rule on that
point of order. I'm asking if you're sticking by the statement of accusing me of
interrogation. It was no— it was no
accusation, it was a statement. I'm calling for a point of order.
And again, the point of order is what, Deputy Mayor?
The point of order is I believe as a member of council we have
distracted— we have, um,
drifted from our procedural bylaw. I appreciate
the speaker's time, and I feel that we need to move on in our budget
process. Process. Okay, so I'm just looking at a point of order.
So, um, we're going to go through this because we're going to stick to the
rules, as you'd like to, Deputy Mayor. Um, so a point of order— a motion
on a matter of privilege shall receive a disposition. So the chair shall preserve
order and decide points of order and points of privilege. When a member rises
to a point of order, he or she shall ask the leave of the chair
to raise a point of order, and after the leave is granted, the member shall
state the point of order and sit down and remain seated until the chair has
decided and stated the point of order. I'm trying to
do that with you, Deputy Mayor, and I'm asking questions before I can rule on
the point of order. So what I'm trying to understand is, when you accuse the
chair of interrogation, is that your point of order?
Are you accusing me of interrogating our speaker,
and is that your point of order? Or what exactly is the point of
order with which you are raising? I'm not trying to cause consternation. I'm trying
to understand your point of order. So for the third
time, I'm going to reiterate my point of order is I feel that we have
drifted from our procedural bylaw and a respectful exchange
with our speaker. And then I'm
going to ask a further clarification. At what point are
we allowed to ask questions, and at what point do you determine as inappropriate
asking questions? I'm not
going to answer that because I feel that I'm being trapped into again, and,
and clearly I'm always at risk of using the wrong word So
I'm just going to stick to, again, for the 4th time, I'm going to repeat
what my point of order is. I feel that we have distracted
ourselves from the exchange of questions
to the speaker instead of
just asking, you know, have you assessed the news, etc.,
etc. I feel that it's gotten off from what the speaker presented. And Mr.
Mayor, that is the 4th time in which I'm going to
express my point of order, and you as the chair, sir, you can rule
on it or not. I'm still unclear as to the point of order, so I'm
going to go to the clerk, Mr. Lamer. Mr. Lamer, could you maybe walk me
through what I'm to do here? Because I'm not sure what the point of order
is on, and I've read the definition, but I still— I'm trying
to get clarification and I don't understand.
Ah, that's got you, F. I understand. So the ruling
on F, Mr. Lamer, is the question Deputy Mayor, are you asking? So it says
members shall be permitted to ask questions. Questions to obtain additional information
but shall not make statements or enter into debate. You're accusing me of entering into
debate, is that correct? Thank you for reading that out. And then
yes, on the grounds of finding clarity within the point of order, I believe that
this exchange has entered into the arena of debate. I would agree
with you, and so I will rule you are correct in your point of order,
and I appreciate the time to get that right. As I said, I'm just trying
to be very clear here, Deputy Mayor. It's not about tricking or cornering It's a
simple question I'm trying to understand to make sure when I do make a
ruling, I'm doing so appropriately. Noting that, I will end my questions.
Thank you, Mr. Bisson, for being here today. Are there any other questions? Mr.
Bisson, thank you very much, sir. Have a great day.
At this time, do we have any other speakers? Mr. Larimer? Okay, so we finished
the delegation of speakers. We're 2 hours in. I'm going
to take, I would say, a 10— let's make it 15 minutes so Mr.
Mr. Buro has a chance for 2. By all means,
Mr. Darling, do you have something to say too? Well, I'm just
wondering if we were going to take a lunch break sometime this day.
I'm fine to hammer through, but it's up to this council. As I said,
it's your meeting, and I'm happy to sort of follow the will of council on
this one. Thank you. Okay, so we're going to
take— let's meet till 12:30 then. Is that enough of a break? That's 20 minutes.
If anyone wants to grab a snack or have a break outside, that's great.
We'll reconvene at 12:30, and we can make decisions about lunch at that point.
Yeah, and we can think about that at lunch if staff want to talk to,
uh, some of the council. Thank you very much. So to the public and to
our joiners, we will reconvene in 20 minutes. Thank you so much.
And we are live. Thank you very much. Uh, just to note, Ms.
Vaughn is with us, just finishing up on the coffee. She was last in line,
not a big deal. Um, but at this time, as we come to order,
um, I believe we're done speaking. We're done sort of general level
questions. I know Councilor Mouton, you warned us about multiple pages.
So, uh, I'm— by all means, Councilor Veer, you got your hand up. I'm happy
to listen. Sorry, um, I'm sorry to interrupt, but I do, and I do
appreciate Councilor Mouton's questions. I was just wondering if,
if the will of council, um, if we could actually
do the police budget now, and just
because we have so many in the audience, if that would be okay.
By all means, I have no problem with that whatsoever. If this will of council,
then we bring that one forward. Um, so yeah, what would
you like to discuss, uh, Councilor Buro? Because as is, the police budget, uh,
is exactly as presented from the CPS. So the floor is yours.
Um, yes, I would like to, um,
sorry, thank you.
Um, it's on the screen that
the mayor's, um, Proposed Budget 2026 Operating and Capital,
uh, be amended follows: that council amend the municipal operating
and capital budget to include the Police Service Board
2026 operating and capital request that was approved by
the board and submitted to the municipality. Perfect. So before—
I just want to clarify, so you're asking to go back to the way it
was without the $1 million to offset the tax levy, is that correct?
Okay, is there a seconder of this movement— motion at this time?
Seconded by the Deputy Mayor. It's on the floor for discussion.
Awesome. Um, if I might start, um,
with the updated,
um, mayor's budget, I know that that
would change a lot of numbers, um, for next
year. And if it would be okay, also at the will of council,
that the chief would be able to come up and speak speak on the numbers.
Um, I, I would be wondering, at this time the council is discussing
the budget and you're asking for the impact to the next term
of the police budget, is that correct? Correct. It would be, um,
it's, it's kind of imperative that we do get the full outline
of what will happen next year if we approve the budget as
it is. So is this going to be a presentation from the accountant
at the CPS Board, or is this going to be from the Cobourg Police Chief
in conjunction with the Or both would be great.
Okay. And just to be clear, this is a council decision. Does the council
wish to— because it wouldn't be technically part and parcel of this, so it'd have
to be an exemption to the rules. By all means, Councilor Mouton.
Yes, I think it would be helpful, so I would support the request from
the council. Okay, sounds good. Anyone else? By all means, Councilor Barber.
I have a question for the person who lives— for
Councilor Buro. What effect will that have
have then on the 2.7% that we have? What, what effect will that have,
your, your motion? Thank you. It would bring
it back up to the 20.5%, which I do believe it work out to 4.98%
on the tax levy total.
That would be 4.9% additional, right? Additional.
That would be correct, sir. Yes, sir.
And just so council knows, by all means. So I just— I believe
this would be an exemption to the rules. So we have to do a vote
to— I'm just wondering, Mr. Lamer, treat it
as a speaker before the motion— actually, motion on the floor. So we do have
to do it. So we do a speaker. So that's per— yeah, we do have
to suspend because the motion's on the floor. So we just have to suspend the
rules. That's what I thought. So, in order to allow speaker while motion's
on the floor, we just have to do a suspension of the rules. The motion
is to suspend the rules to allow the Chief to speak. We need a two-thirds
majority. I'm going to go to a vote. All in favor?
So moved. Exemption of the rules. So we've got,
I believe, 5 or 10 minutes just to confirm. 10 minutes. That's what
I thought. Okay. Yeah.
Yeah. Oh, yeah, with the 2.7.
No. So what would happen is, if we're going to change right now,
the component of the police is, I think, 1.36. Mr. Giddings can complete
that. But if we added that, it would drive the levy to about 6 to
7%, somewhere in that zone point.
Is the 1 million? Yes, correct. So if we're going to take that out,
then you're going to see the full impact of that, which is an additional 4.27%.
Instead of the 1.37— again, I'd have to get Mr. Gittings. Hold on,
Mr. Gittings, before this, I just need a quick question. Um, in the 2.7%
increase, what is the percentage of the 2.7,
Mr. Gittings, that is made up by the police budget?
So the question is, is we have a total tax levy of 2.7%.
I'm trying to understand, of the 2.7,
what of that is made up by the police budget as per the mayor directive?
Thank you. Yes, through you. Sorry, been a long week.
So I think the Town of Cobourg portion,
or that increase, I guess, is 1.2%.
So that's— so 1.5%
is currently on— is the police budget increase already? Yes. And sorry,
and just to clarify, so by going back to the 20.5%,
that would result in a tax a total
tax levy increase of 6.08%. Thank you very much. I appreciate
that. So the total tax levy going back to the original would be 6.08.
So 6%, then from the 2.7 up to that to follow
this motion. Thank you. And just so council knows, we will be doing mostly recorded
votes today. So the now microphone is yours, sir. So I'm assuming,
are you doing a 5-minute presentation that we get to hear from the chief for
5, or how are we breaking this up? I assume that I
was going to be responding to questions. Oh, oh, okay, by all
means. Um, questions away.
So, Mr. Bureau, did you want some questions? By all means, have at her.
All right, thank you. Um, so for the— if we stuck
with the mayor's budget, what would the percentage be next
year? It will be back to double digits, well over 21%,
because we will be be— sorry, true to me, to the member,
um, we will be now putting the $1.3
million now back on the levy, which we don't have now for 2026.
Plus we have a recently ratified collective agreement.
We'll have at that 4%, and recognizing that wages is just about
90% of that 4%, which we can't get away from, that will
come down to about 3.5%. Um, and then the challenge
we'll have is that currently, as it stands, we to fund all
our capital dollars from the net business revenues.
If those reserves are eliminated, which the plan is to be,
it means that we'll have to put the capital expenses on
levy as well, which will be an additional 4%. So when we
look at 13% plus 4% plus 4%, it's well over 20% in 2027.
Well, if I could just clarify, so This year, the Cobourg Police
is getting a 20.5% budget
increase, and you're suggesting that because $1 million is being
moved out of reserves, we're also going to see an additional double-digit
20% increase?
Oh, I apologize. The question was if we did not take the
$1.3 from reserves, what will happen in 2027? If we
don't take the 1.3 from— so again, I'm just trying to understand. So you're suggesting
if we don't take the reserves, then there's the increase. But if we do take
the reserves, again, I think we got this backwards.
I'm just gonna give Mr. Sorry, I always get your last
name. Thank you, Mr. Ramkinson. I just want to give you a chance to make
sure we're being very clear. So right now, Councillor Bureau is
asking, asking if the mayor's budget is allowed
and $1 million comes out of reserves on top of the $2.8 million that
the board already approved, you're suggesting that the tax levy increase next
year will be in the double digits. Is that— sorry, no. So let's just
clarify. Thank you. As of right now, the mayor's
budget is taking— is depleting all
the reserves except the building reserves. It's about $1.1
million. The cost of the police budget
does not change in 2027. How it's funded is going to be the issue.
We will not have those reserves again in 2027 to
fund the offset of the cost of the police budget, which is just
about $14 million minus 4% contractual increases, which we'll
have in 2027. Assuming the $2.8 million goes,
we will still have a cost problem of $14 million.
And I'm suggest— and I'm saying that if we don't
take the— sorry, if you take the $1.4,
that's just how it's funded. If we were to eliminate that,
then that 1.3— but that $1.1 million still has to come from
somewhere in 2027. We will not have that problem in 2026,
but the funding has to come from somewhere in 2027.
So 2027 will be status quo, but then come 2027,
we come back to the same problem. And is there not a chance that
a new council, a new police board, and a new chief are going to find
savings within the current operating model? I ask this specifically
because the Cobourg Police Board have twice now had
the budget in front of them and have been unable to even find a 0.25%
savings. And I'm wondering, is a change in the board and a change in
the police and a change in council So maybe going to be able to find
some savings where this board hasn't been able to?
Well, so we've gone through those numbers
in quite detail. I've spent a considerable amount of time fine-tuning
all the numbers to make sure that it aligns with what
the projections were. From my
point of view, from a numbers person point of view, I don't— I can't see
that we will be saving any dollars in 2027. That said, the direction of the
new chief and the new board at that time may make different decisions that I
would not be aware of. But as of right now, for the 2026 budget that
has been presented, I can see with a level of
confidence that there is no opportunities to cut any.
That's great. There's no question at this point. I really appreciate that. And I guess,
uh, Roger— sorry, sir, I just want to be very clear.
Um, you said you've gone through it in quite detail, the board, and, and the—
so could you please point to a single item that was presented in the last
4 years by you and chief that has been rejected by the board?
A single, a single, a single line in 4 years, please. I wouldn't,
I wouldn't say rejected, but there has been decisions made, for example, to stagger staffing.
So in the 2025 budget, we, the board did approve for,
uh, 6 new members to meet adequacy
standards. Those 6 officers were not hired in January as the
chief and the staff presented. 3 was hired in, uh, June,
July, and of course we have 3 other colleges right now who start in September.
So that's, uh, that was a compromise,
but at the end it did meet. We did, we did gather staff,
and yet we, we met for adequacy. I guess I'm confused,
and perhaps you can, uh, educate me, because I've heard
the chief both publicly and in this room state that that was a mistake
by the board to do that. And so what I'm trying to understand is,
if the chief is saying that it's a mistake for the board to have done
that, and I'm asking for a single example of when the board has made a
decision to counteract the chief and your budgets.
It seems that the only decision council or the board made specifically,
um, was then sort of called out by the chief as that
decision being made. So again, is there another example? And for you, again,
we're talking about 4 years and $9.87 million have been sort
of taken out of the business service units over the last 4 years and used
for operations. So again, I'm just trying to understand why the
$1.1 million going is what we're focusing on when the board
have moved $9.87 million over 4 years with not a single
pushback. And I'm just trying to understand why are we now worried about a single
million when close to 10 has already shifted? Um,
also, I think the— sorry to interrupt— I think the chief would like to speak
as well on this. We're gonna have Roger and then
we'll move over to the chief. Not a them will. So again,
I just— again, I'm looking for a single line item in 4 years
that the board pushed back on and didn't approve.
Sure. Are we not answering that question? Yes, Councilor Darrow.
Um, also, one of the— we have pushed back. We've pushed back on
a lot of different things of, um, hiring more officers
than 6 because um, 6 just kept us,
um, adequate and effective policing. It wasn't like we— there's
extra, extra officers that we have. Um, we had to deal
with WSIB as well. Um,
and the other issue is the MOU that we signed
between council and the police board. There's— we have— we—
council agreed there was out of the that, uh,
2.8, we started to pay back 3% every
year. This is where it comes up now, and I,
I get it, but we have pushed back and worked hard and
diligently over that budget. But there is nothing to cut in this budget
other than using the reserve.
So I guess I'll direct my question from yourself, sir, to the chair of the
police board, also a councillor. Um, can you point to a single
single item in 4 years of budget negotiation where publicly the board did not
allow what the chief was asking for to be passed? Because from my
recollection, and I've reviewed them this weekend, there isn't
one. And further, Councillor Buro, I'd be interested to understand why the past
3 budget meetings you've moved that the police budget be adopted
with zero debate by this council. So,
I don't think that is, that is true. Um, not only
have, have we asked repeatedly to present
to the, to this council, is for the police, um,
we practically had to, to beg in order to even come and present to
this council. Um, there has been, off the top of my head, there has
been, um, last year was
supposed to be a 14.5% But like this year,
and which I totally get, to bring that to council, which I said
this in the board meeting, I can't bring this to council, is too high,
not realizing the effect that it would have kicking it down the
road. And what we have been doing is with the capital projects,
not charging the taxpayer or putting
it on the tax levy for since 2012. There's been many different
many different ways that we've tried to save the taxpayers money and
use the business center revenue to do that.
This is what happens when we kick it down the can, and we've done
this. We've done this in council. We've done just like the consultant that came in
and said, with politicians coming in having low, low tax rates,
that it actually hurts the infrastructure. It hurts our
economy because we're not actually doing what we should be doing. Doing and setting
it properly. And this, this year is where
we do that. This is the time where we take all the mistakes that
have been made and we fix that. And that's what this budget is.
There's no frills, there's no anything else. We need to meet
adequate and effective policing, and we have to,
um, serve and protect the public. And that's what— and
that's what this budget is doing. So I just want to make sure I'm understanding,
Councilor Beer. I appreciate the opportunity, and I I appreciate your point. So your belief
is that the average taxpayer in Cobourg should pay
up to 6.7% on their levy because of
the mistakes the board has made in the past, and that they
think this year that everyone should just pony up. Oh,
sorry. Sorry, is that fair that your suggestion is that this is
the year that, you know, as I said,
9.87 million, the board has used from
the business service unit for the last 4 years, uh,
for a variety of purposes. I'm looking at it right now and they seem very
reasonable. And your suggestion is that this year, when,
uh, this council is proposing to move an additional million,
that that's the problem, and that we're not going to look at the $9.87 million
that have come out in the last 4 years? Yes, the— and it's— I
wouldn't say it was a mistake every year, it was pushing it down
the line line, uh, trying to save the taxpayers money. And that's,
and that's exactly the same with this budget. Fair enough.
So if I just, yeah, I just want to go point by point, if that's
okay. I don't mean to be rude, I'm just trying to understand, because, uh,
it's been 3 years where I've been pushing for the Cobourg Police
to raise their asks every year. So again, I'm trying to understand
now, Mr. Buro, again, sometimes I'm not leading enough,
and then other times when I do lead, I'm ignored. So I'm just trying to
understand here, after 3 years of asking every single time.
Are you sure this is enough? Police forces across the province need more money.
Are you sure this is enough? And every year I'm told that this is enough,
this is enough. Now what I'm hearing is that for 3 years I, I was
right that we needed to be asking for more. But again,
3 years ago we weren't in the largest and
most difficult cost of living increases in a generation.
So timing is everything, Mr. Bureau. And you're right, this It does
move it down the line, but it moves it down to a line, hopefully to
a board that is going to be willing to actually push
back on Chief and staff's requests to,
again, of one item, just one item during the budget process
that was not allowed would be really great. Instead, what I'm seeing is $9.8
million out of our business unit over 4 years and all those requests granted.
And here we are 4 years later under the first of the mayor's budget,
and now there's a 20.5% ask on the dollar. So again,
we'll just assume bad timing, but again, I don't think it's fair to be going
to the average taxpayer to make up for the mistakes of the Police Service Board.
I don't think it would— I would call it as mistakes as— no,
maybe it was. I'm just going with the chief's words. What I'm saying
is that this is the year of fixing putting
the tax— if— let me ask Roger this. Sorry, Mr.
Ramkins. If we do the 20.5% now,
what would it be next year? Approximately around 4% in
2027, assuming the funding
formula that we have adopted from the transfers for the business center revenues remain
the same. Correct. And what was the point of the MOU MOU between
the town and, and the police board to use
the surplus dollars from the, from the net revenues from the business and a specific
purpose, um, and to ensure that the spending
aligns to what was directed in the MOU, right? And also,
I just want to ask again, with the added new officers,
was it not the will of this council that We
do downtown patrols. We have an extra officer
that goes into when we had the encampment, um,
and people off sick and on WSIB. Was the
6 adequate, or would it have been— actually, should we have had 8,
9, or 10 onto that?
The 6 was able to allow us to meet adequate effective.
So it's the minimum standard? I would say so, correct. The minimum standard
is in this, in this,
um, budget.
Is this not the minimum standard of adequate
and effective policing?
Sorry, I'm not in a position to define what adequate and effective— I think the
chief did a fantastic job at that last week at council defining what it is.
Um, it is always nice for us to have
more, so if somebody calls in sick and somebody goes off on WSOP, we have
that buffer. At this point in time, based on the contractual
obligations on our staffing complement, there is no opportunity for buffer.
The details were provided to the finance committee well before
in terms of staffing. They know their numbers, so this is what meets.
I don't— I can't say that it exceeds it because again,
we don't have those extra staffing. Thank you, I think that's good. We're gonna have
the Chief right up, so that's a great question. And I think that's exactly the
reason why the budget's been approved in its entirety, because of that presentation by the
Chief. The 20.5 is going through so that we can have those officers. And to
your point, Mr. Cease— sorry, uh, to your point, sir, um, we here
in the Town of Cobourg have no longer played the game of hiring
and manipulating numbers. I think this is a good
idea moving forward with the police service, but I'm not on the board. And that's—
we actually have a rule now here at this level that if you're going to
hire anyone in the following year, it doesn't matter when you're going to hire them.
Instead, you take the entire cost of that position and include it
in the next year's budget. Any cost savings then go into a reserve
for staff contingency issues. And we have to use contractors between.
I highly recommend that the board look to that. It's one of the better practices.,
and it ensures that the situation we're in today doesn't happen moving forward. I've got
a question here from Councillor Darling, then one from Councillor Mouton. And did I see
your hand, Mr. Barber? Okay, we'll start with— we'll start with Councillor Darling.
Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Mr. Remskin.
I guess my question is, what do the numbers look like if it's a 50/50
split, if half comes out of the reserves and half goes
on the tax base? So as of the end of 2022, 2024,
our reserves balance across all 4 accounts is just about $1.6
million. As of right now, the direction under
SMP was to deplete the other 3,
with the exception of the building reserves, which will leave with $478
million in that account. It means if you were to do a 50/50 split,
we'll be doing $800,000 per se.
It means that that difference, which is about $212,000
will be on the levy. 212 divided 80, uh,
it'll be about an additional 5%.
Thank you. Councilor Matan.
Yes, a question of clarification with regards to court services and
court administration. Um, uh, would you be able to,
um, identify— does the service
receive any funding funding and how much, uh,
to, uh, towards the cost of the service,
court services and court administration?
So just to clarify, we do get funding from two parts
of funding for court security only. Court security
is the task associated with manning the courthouse at 860 Williams Street only.
We do get a part of funding from the province directly to
the Town of Cobourg for 2025. That's about $125,000. Then We
get about $553,000
from the provincial CSPT grant, of which the provincial
part is $125 million. Cobourg gets half a million dollars
from that part. That part has not changed in about 15 years. And then
the difference up to $275,000
is funded directly through Northumberland County. So we do get 3
distinct pieces that comprises the revenue offset
for the court security bill. That does not— we do— I'm
confirming we do not get dollars from any source for court administration.
That's strictly the back-end, back-office function of Crown
Briefs, and, and that, as the Chief explained two weeks ago. Follow-up?
Yes, so I just wanted to confirm the numbers that are in the budget
are separate from those
sources of funding, or including the sources of funding? It is included
as part of the recoveries and as part of the revenue sources. So the budget
is about $14 million. I proposed about $9.2
odd from the levy, which brought it at $20.5. The difference
comes from the different sources, and that has been included in the number.
While we're waiting for a follow-up, do you happen to know what the
budget— sorry, the reserve total was at the beginning of 2025 and
what the reserve total was at the end of 2025? So we're starting 2025
with $1.6 million. We did reconcile 2024.
Because we haven't closed 2025 yet, I couldn't comment on
what the number is going to look like at the end of this
month. We would not do that until the first quarter of 2025,
or a little bit later depending on when we close the book— sorry, 2026,
thank you— until we close the books for 2025. So I just want to
confirm, when was that sort of readjustment? Because I remember looking at some documents
that had the beginning at 2.6, and I'm just wondering, when did we reconcile that?
So we reconcile— I reconcile that with the town, Mr. Giddings,
annually. Uh, so we— the board has been provided with
a reconciliation of the reserves for the last 5 years, how we started, where we've
come down from and in numbers for 2023
and into 2024. I'm just— I'm a little confused because I
was going to ask questions that in the beginning of 2025,
I was under the impression we had $2.45 million
in the— or $2.6 million in reserves, and I was wondering where it had
gone. And you're saying that that has been reconciled recently?
Yeah, at the beginning of 2025, sir. What was our reserve balance at
the beginning of this year? At the end of 2024, which will be the beginning
of 2025, it's $1.6 million.
$1.6 million. Okay, $1.6 million. And what was the reserves
at the beginning of 2024? Ah, one second.
That's the one. Thank you. So I got my years wrong. So I guess my
question then, um, the reserves in 2024
were $2.5 million, and then at the end of 2024 was $1.6
million. So what I'm seeing is we're already using reserves on a
regular basis, uh, from the CPS. Is that a fair statement?
Thank you, Mr. Mayor, for that question. And if, um, and this, this has not
been discussed, so I'm just going to take the opportunity to probably just respond
inasmuch as the question has been asked. What has happened historically—
let me just back up— what has happened within the last couple of years is
that we get a part of funding from the levy, which is a portion of
the dollars from the overall budget of the police service.
So for example, For the last couple of years, we've been funded around 70%
of the total budget from the levy. The difference of that 30% is
funded through the court security grant, grants that we apply for CSP,
um, RIDE, and those things. So that 30% of that overall
budget comes from those different sources of funding.
What has happened within the last couple of years, and is that
any excess excess of funding or spending outside
of the funding that we get from the levy automatically gets charged
to the net revenues from the business center. And that
is what has happened over the last couple of years. Um, that is,
um, where we are right now. The Police Services
Board has not had a chance to look at some of those excesses to 2025,
but that is what has happened over the last couple of years. And is it
fair to say that the reason the MOU has been being pushed by the Town
of Cobourg staff is because that's not actually appropriate
practice to be operating that way, and instead it's just the way it's always existed,
but now we're trying to move to a more appropriate way of
accounting under the Municipal Act? Is that a fair statement? It will be fairly fair.
I would say it's fair. So we're coming in line now with actual
municipal law. So that's good to hear. I guess at this point,
the nice thing is, sir, is that the reality is is this budget can be—
we've got a motion on the floor to go back and to add it to
the levy. So if this council wants to do that, then that'll be the,
uh, the procedure forward. And I do appreciate the work because I know you've been
working a lot, uh, Mr. Giddings, and you've been going back and forth, and I
do appreciate all the time and effort. At this time, I'd like to invite the
chief forward, I assume, if there's no other questions. Or nope, come on forward,
Mr. Uh, Vender— Chief Vandergraaff. I'm trying to always use the titles,
as Mr. Darling— Councillor Darling wants me to use the titles all the
time, so I'm working I'm working on it, guys. Give me—
bad habit dies hard. We're working on it. Welcome, Chief.
Good afternoon. My intent here today is to answer any questions
that you may or may have, but I think Roger's done a fair amount of
the, uh, of the heavy lifting. The question's been
asked and not, not duly answered about what, um,
when I've been told no. So let me be really clear
clear. As I present the police budget, it is not my budget.
It is clearly stated within the CSPA whose budget it is. It is the board's
budget. It has been the course and the record and the history in
this municipality that the chief presents the nuances of the
actual board's budget, generally preceded by comments
of the chair. Don't know what the inference is that this is the police chief's
budget. It is not. It is the board's budget.
The question was asked, when have I been told no? Chair Kerr,
past Chair Kerr sat right there in one of our meetings. I can't remember which
money. There's been so many and said that this is the first year he's
never been able to kick my ass to the curb, pardon my French,
and say no to something. So you wanted exact
examples prior to this, just as this term of council began,
the decision of the municipality was to move to body-worn cameras. Cameras.
We were one of the first in Ontario to move to this very expensive body-worn
camera project, and the decision was made by then-member or Vice Chair Kerr that
if we were to proceed with this project, which then began— the
project began in earnest with this term of council in place— that all dollars
associated to that project, both capital dollars, infrastructure dollars, and ongoing
staff dollars, be borne by the, uh, Business Centre or the Corporate
Services services. So that was a time where I asked for body-worn cameras,
and I was told, yes, kind of, but you fund
it this way. Secondly, in 2024, I asked for 8
constables. Um, Your Worship, you'll recall you knew
that, uh, ask was made, and, and at the board meeting, the board
of the day did not approve that ask, and they sent
me back with lesser than, but we appreciated
it. Putting that in full context, this board was the first board in Ontario
to pass a supplemental staffing model that supported
our members across Ontario since 2016. As this council
has heard many times, we have understood a new reality
around occupational stress injuries. So this
board did allow for me to take a lead, took a lead, and then I
needed to increase the complement, not just replace. But increase the complement to
meet the, the competing demands. The board said no. The board
said no because they felt that we could do it more
incrementally. I went back last year and said, yes, I still need
those officers. And I said here in this room, and I've said before,
we agreed on a staggered start. I wanted them all in January.
I wanted those officers all trained in January. The board
said no. They said, we're going to stagger them. We're going to do them in
June and September. And that's fine. And I don't disagree with Your Worship
and your comments that when we choose to hire staff, we should put them
in for the entire year. And it would give me a bit of elbow
room as chief to recognizing the full cost of this, and you don't see
the increase. So I want to start by thanking the
recognition that 20.5% is the natural increase. This is the correction budget.
There is nothing new in this budget. Um, as I'm
thanking you, I will also indicate I'm highly
offended that the next chief and the next board is going to find a bunch
of money because it is pretty clear where
our money goes. So the new chief will have a new agenda,
the new board will have a new partner in the new chief.
God knows what the future looks like if he saves you or she saves you
millions of dollars. Congratulations.
My concern and my comments are this: we
are— and I have said it was a mistake of the board to kick this
down the road for $700,000. I have said
that 20.5% is a big number and it is
unpalatable or not palatable for many people.
How council chooses to manage to fund it that
is your decision. I have the 20.5% that my staff need to be successful,
and I'm appreciative for that. I'm indicating risk
when we push this down the road. And you've got the numbers from Roger,
but another 13% and whatever that next agenda looks like,
my concern is just purely that.
So this board holds me accountable.
Oftentimes the nos that chiefs of police in Ontario face
case, rest on capital projects, wishes and desires of capital projects.
They generally say yes to my reasonable capital requirement requests
because they're funded by corporate services, not by the tax levy. So that's why
there's this no big no or whatever that looks like. So anyways,
I've said enough on this budget. I don't have any more statements to make other
than questions to answer. I open up to the floor for members of council to
ask the chief directly. By all means, Councilor Charlie.
Thank you, Chief. Very thorough as usual. I guess, uh,
I could be corrected here if I'm not mistaken.
Um, this term of council, early in the term, uh,
passed a motion that we would not look at OPP or any other outside,
uh, interests as far as
policing. Um, it's too late, and it's too late
in the year now for our— we've had had several citizens and
comments asking us to take a look at an OPP costing,
and, uh, or maybe an amalgamation of police forces.
Can you just, for an overview for those listening and for this council,
give us a bit of an overview as to what that would look like and
the pluses and minuses maybe of it?
I'm looking at if we did
dual PP costing, is it gonna lessen the police service?
It might be less expensive, but is it gonna
lessen the service that our community gets now? So I'm gonna interject
here, Councilor Darley, and the reason I'm going to interject is twofold. One, there is
a fulsome report that was provided by Northumberland County that both the chief and I
had taken serious issue with because of the way that report was
conducted. So if the council members want, they can always review that too.
Um, I don't believe it's appropriate to be asking the Cobourg police
chief to be asking, uh, the pros and cons about OPP.
Um, it would put him in a professional inappropriate position to either,
uh, say negative things about the OPP or his
own team. I don't think that the question is appropriate personally,
uh, Mr. Dawning. So I'm just going to suggest that we go in a different
direction with questioning. Um, it's up for this council to decide, uh,
what they they'd like to do. And it's, I think, just, just erring
on the side of caution. Well, thank you. And I don't disagree
with what you're saying, but as the
citizens put a question out to us, I think the question has at least got
to be presented. And that's all I'm doing is presenting the question,
letting know that it has been asked. Maybe it's
going to get answered by the next council. We'll have to wait and see who
they And I do. Thank you. And I'll just state very
clearly and unequivocally, I stand by what I've always stated,
that the Cobourg Police Service is one of the major reasons why I chose
to relocate my family here, and I stand by their service and their quality.
And I would never entertain the
idea of an OPP, and I'll state that very clearly at this time. Mr.
Vander Graaff, I do have a quick question for you, if possible.
Sometimes I think I wish I had the, the power you do,
Mr. Vandergratje. And what I mean by that is the fealty you
draw from your team, the fealty you have with your board.
It's a, it's a remarkable state. And what I've heard is a bunch of
yes-buts. I didn't hear a no. And that's where I'm trying to
understand, um, because we're saying yes-but as well. We're saying
yes, we agree 20.5 is needed, but we can't load it on the
tax levy. We have to find a way. And I'm sorry you took offense by
my statements. It wasn't meant for offense. That said, intention versus impact.
So all this to say, Mr. Vander Graaff,
when we look at this and we see 20.5, and you see council approving this,
or looking to potentially approve the entire increase, I'm wondering
what can we expect in terms of service? I'm hearing from our— my
councillor, or the councillor here to the left of me, that this is the bare
minimum. And I guess my question is, is, is this 20.5% getting
us to a place where we actually do
something when we see people smoking narcotics in a vestibule
in the bank at 9:00 PM? Are we going
to get the move-alongs? Are we going to get the actual response
that we're looking for as a community in terms of a response that when we
see those kind of videos being happening. That's what I'm understanding, because I agree
we need the money, we need to support our frontline officers, and I don't ever
hold our frontline officers for account for policy decisions because
that's not them, it comes from the top. Thank you for being here and being
from the top. With $20.5 million, can we expect to see the
police get involved when it's very clear that, you know, individuals are
consuming illegal narcotics at 9 PM,
multiple, with clothes off, preventing our staff and from
our community from using those services. I'm just trying to understand what we're going to
be getting with the 20.5%. So I'll
answer the first question. Um, the no was I asked
for 8 officers, I got 4. That wasn't a yes but, it was a no.
We can rephrase it, we can play back and forth about yes buts or nos.
It was a no. Secondly,
in relation to what the people, what our officers do or don't do,
I'm going to simply answer that,
that I hear often,
you're never on foot patrol. And my initial response always, well, it's funny
because when we were on there, we didn't see you either.
So, um, the officers do a tremendous job to
do and meet the needs However, when we are
faced with questions around provincial acts that may or may not
have the teeth, and we can debate that, um,
what we can and can't do, the issue of chronic displacement around
homelessness and addictions is just that, is a zero-end
game. So we will continue to do great work.
Our officers will continue to arrest those accountable
accountable. My letter to the media on the weekend was, if we put ourselves back
into a bare minimum circumstance where all we can do is show up and
get enough people to come to work, then we're not going to do the added
crime abatement strategies. I am so impressed because of the board's commitment. It takes 16
months for me to hire someone and have them out as an independent
officer on patrol, and I love the fact that it takes 16 months because that
means I have the right person making critical life decisions around someone's charter of
freedom and rights. At the end of the day, my guys and girls
do a great job. We're not everywhere, we can't be everywhere at all times.
If they were there downtown Monday to Friday, 8 to 4, then at 4:05
we would not be there. So we do the best we can with what we
have. The 20.5% is a correction budget recognizing you've hired 6
new officers, and I'm appreciative of it, hired 4 more. When I became
chief, I had 32 officers, we have 51. We are finally right
side prioritized. Thank you, Chief. I agree. And, uh,
if we go back to that time when we were talking the 68 officers,
I believe you and I were in agreement that we wanted the full 68 officers,
and you and I from the get were in alignment that we need more good
officers like the ones we have. Give me 30%, we'll hire 4 more. The association
sitting beside, it's my evaluation time, so they may have something to say. Thank you,
Chief. And I do appreciate that. Again, these discussions at a
high level about finance have nothing to do with our frontline officers nor the job
they do. Councillor Darlan. Yes, just a follow-up,
just to the mayor's comment about yourself not supporting OPP.
I want to make it clear to the public that I'm asking the question.
I'm not saying one way or the other what I support or what I don't
support. I don't feel this is the appropriate time, but I think
it's appropriate that I speak to— just
sorry, just push your mic so that the public see it, sir.
I've said it 100 times, I'll never stand in front of anywhere
and say that the OPP isn't a great police organization. They're a fantastic organization
led by great people, full stop. The policing—
the choice of a municipality to have a local police service or the OPP is
a local choice. There are communities such as Deep River,
Elmer, Ontario, very small towns with very small police services, and they're content
and very happy to have them, and they're satisfied with the service delivery.
Equally, there are communities like Orillia and Napanee and other communities who
would love the fact that they have an OPP Detached Commander. The model that we've
delivered traditionally in Cobourg since I've been here will be different with the OPP.
Not saying it's going to be worse, not going to say it's better, but it's
going to be wholly different.
Thank you. Thank you. Sorry, thank you, Chief. Thank you. Follow up, because that's,
uh, I mean, the public has to hear these things, and, and that's all I'm
bringing up. I love our Cobourg Police Service. I've supported it all along,
Will it change? It may or may not, but the public has to hear the
comments. Thank you. Thank you. And I'm just gonna go to Councillor Bureau, and I
see Deputy Mayor. I will add to the Chief's comments, and that is, if anyone
wants to look at the OPP costing, I actually would recommend that you
look at the first 3 years of costing and then the following 3
years of costing to get an average, and not going by what
they cost for the first 3 years, because it's obviously an estimate. Estimate and
then the reality. And I'd look to any forces who have switched OPP in the
last 10 years, as I have, and to compare what they quote versus
what the actual cost is in year 5. Councillor Buro,
then I recognize Deputy Mayor after Councillor Buro.
Yeah, um, I guess
my question is twofold, so bear with me. Um,
with the new population of Cobourg that's growing year after year,
Thanks to our planning department and moving things along.
Um, when I first started on council, I think we were at 6,900
and something homes. We're almost at, as the mayor said, we're almost at
10,000. So, and in the future, that, as we
know, there's more developments going on and on and on. So my
question is, depleting the reserves are down to $400-something
thousand, no capital projects
for the next year or two, and with
the population growth, how would that,
how would that affect, um, adequate and effective policing?
Would it, would it put us a year behind? Would it,
um, obviously we're gonna in the future gonna have to have
more officers anyways because is there's the amount of homes,
amount of residents, the amount of calls. And, um,
I would think that in the future, if we're doing
it 30% next year, if this does pass as,
as the Strong Mayor budget, then would that not automatically
put the police department in a— in, uh,
behind the times? And then another catch-up
year would have to Captain?
Thanks, through the chair, a lot of hypotheticals there. I would like to think
the population is growing because people feel really safe in Cobourg and they
think the police do a great job and that's why they're moving here. So that's,
that's just my snideness, but I'm at that time in my career where I can
be really snide. So, um,
all seriousness, the growth of the community and the changing dynamics
of the community, numbers and population are one thing. The changing
dynamics of who's in those population makes it very different.
We have a senior population requiring different demands of their police,
different demands of their services, right? Um, so the growth,
the growth is, is an impact. We are not reactive in that sense.
That's why I asked for 8, that's why I asked for 6, is because we
were recognizing the growth. Um, we are
up against it, like we're lean, right? This budget is lean, and that's why I
take offense to the comments, is that it's lean, lean, lane.
By borrowing from reserves, you're, you're leaning yourself out
in a different way. I would argue that this council— and I don't understand it,
and this is for smarter people than I— does have access to developmental charges.
If growth is such an issue, maybe that's somewhere council can think of in this
term or future terms about how to offset costs of increasing
police, uh, policing costs, be it equipment, capital,
and/or staffing. But again, I don't know much about the development
costs other than There's— this is— that's the big thing that's out there. But I
hope I answered your question, sir. Deputy Mayor,
I'm fine. It's Councilor Buro kind of touched on the theme I wanted to raise,
so no need to be redundant. Thank you. Not a worries.
And by all means, Councilor Barber.
May sound like a silly question, but, um, where I think the
argument really comes down to the extra million we're talking
about transferring from the police reserve
to, uh, to the budget in order to be able to get it down,
uh, and off the levy. Are, uh,
is there any other reserves that we could,
uh, look at, uh, to do the same job? Just a
question for anyone who would like to answer it. Thank you.
Sorry, Mr. Barber, are you asking that question to the police or to staff?
Okay, so we'll hold that. I was going to say, Mr.— sorry, Chief Vandergraaff,
do you want to start? I was going to say, were you going to start
suggesting pulling from the Parks and Rec, sir? Uh, thank you, Mr. So we'll
save that for staff. Thank you very much, Deputy Mayor. Thank you, Mayor Cleveland,
through you to the chief. And perhaps this could have been a question to Roger,
uh,
20.5 as
a taxpayer, that does concern me. Compromising community policing though also concerns me.
Uh, depleting reserves concerns me. So if we move from the $1.3
million and it puts us down to just under that half million— my
understanding is even pre my involvement on the Police Services
Board and on council, previous MOUs— and MOUs evolve and
change over time— were intentionally drafted to build
up the those reserves. So if in one swoop we use
that to meet the policing need, what I'm trying to get at is how long
would that take for us to build back up said
reserve, and what risks are we facing,
um, with just having a reserve of half a million?
Uh, thank you. Through the chair, uh, Deputy Mayor, uh,
fantastic question. So it's taken us a while to build up those reserves,
and we are not building them up as much as we heard earlier, um,
in that we're depleting from them when we borrowed $700,000 from them last year,
which was an impetus to update the MOU for the right reasons.
And, um, the issue we have is that in addition to not
building up the reserves, we become highly reliant on the Corporate Services money.
So we're already borrowing $2.8 million. I don't want to say what
the future holds, but one would suggest we will at least
make that net revenue, and I would hope to see more, but you're only
playing with that extra, that beyond.
So we have to— every year we have to find $2.8 million, and then whatever
else is there, plus capital expenses, might be what we add to the reserve.
So as it looks right now, I'm going to suggest there's going
to be no substantive change to those reserve accounts for the foreseeable future.
Uh, Chief, can I expect at least the next 6 months you and I making
some trips to Ottawa to get that $40 million, uh, police building
budget, uh, moving in the right direction? Because I'm going to need your help up
there, uh, to see if we can get that $40 million reserve. Because if we're
trying to save up for a $40 million building, $200,000 a year,
uh, the CPS will be long gone before we ever get a
building built. So we're actually going to need to get up to the federal level,
and I'm just making sure that we can work together and make sure that we
do that. Because to your point, half million dollar reserve is going to take a
long time. So we need to get to Ottawa and make sure that the federal
government knows about the need for your station, sir. I'm, I'm having a real hard
time with this new chief, but I'll get to Ottawa with you if it means
the legacy of this service has a new building. Thank you, sir.
Councilor Maton.
Just, I have a few points, questions, and Based
on my recollection of your presentations previously, my understanding
is that there are social
service organizations that provide assistance to
address community needs,
but they don't operate 24/7, and the police have to
step in. Highly trained, able to deal with that,
but because other organizations are
operating maybe daytime, 8 to 4, whatever,
the, uh, the rest of the day, the rest
of the week, by necessity, is, is,
uh, supported, uh, by policing. Is that a general,
uh, statement that is accurate,
that I understand? Because I have some comments and questions based
on that. Yeah, uh, so through the chair
to yourself, Councilor Mouton, so the statement is, as I always say,
the, the social service agencies who are best able to lead in certain areas
of the, uh, intersect of homelessness, addictions, poverty,
um, are not the police. They're actually those agencies.
And, and they're not built like police are in the sense of they're not on
24/7 clocks. Our emergency room is built on a 24/7 clock
with a couple of respite beds. But those true people
who can move somebody from now, moment of crisis,
to dealing with it, to responding to it safely,
and there's all sorts of personal safety requirements when we're dealing with people
in crisis sometimes. They're just don't there. They're just, they're just not there.
And those social agencies are the experts, and we as
police leaders in Ontario want to see them in place.
We want to see them at 1 o'clock in the morning. We want the right
people dealing with the people at the right time to making real
But that is really utopic in view. I honestly don't
think that, because otherwise we're going to be having budget conversations around social services budgets
being 20.5%, and there's a reason why policing continues
to go up because the changing dynamic. So it is a statement,
but at 1 o'clock in the morning when somebody is suffering in our community from
a significant mental health crisis, be it situational or medical—
by situational, something happened in their life at this particular moment that's making them act
out or they're just under a medical distress.
Outside of paramedics, great community paramedicine, outside of fire,
not because the fire chief's sitting here, but these— but, but they're great people.
It's the police. So where I'm headed
with this, Mr. Mayor and Chief, is that I
learned a long time ago that if you are able
to make, you know, find the resources, skimp here and there to
make it happen. Other levels of government are going, oh, they've got it figured
out, we don't have to worry about giving them extra money,
or the way that certain other organizations
provide the services or other levels of government provide the services doesn't change
because, oh, they're managing, they're managing. So I'm a little bit concerned about that,
and because now we're facing this budget
increase. And so my question to
you would be,
I see that there needs to be some political interference with
regards to how things are evolving.
For example, our court costs in 2020 combined
was $296,127. In 2026,
we are looking at 1.865947.
There are some recoveries, but the
more the needs develop
and change, there needs to be other ways that
our costs are being compensated. I don't know if I'm getting to the point here.
That if we struggle to manage
it all ourselves, like I'm, this might be a little
bit of humor, but why is the courthouse not
an independent state, right? So that they have to go
out and get the funding in order to provide the services,
the administration. I mean, it's just, it just falls back on
this community and it's extraordinary the
expense. So is there— do we need to look
at things a different way in order to keep core policing?
Thank you for that. Wow, you are— everyone has become amazing
at asking 100 questions in one. It's great.
My jury trial time, although few and far between, it's taught
me well. So let's unpack this. So I agree with you,
they defunded ministries. Governments have passed— I don't care what color of government—
Government, governments of past have defunded ministries. And those ministries
were defunded for a variety of reasons, I'm sure they were reasonable at the time,
with no thought about what was gonna happen in 2025 when there
was an opioid epidemic that coincided with homelessness and poverty.
And they defunded all these agencies and then said, oh, the police will do it.
Like, why is it that when the power goes out, my 911 communicators get
phone calls to say, when's the power coming back? On. It makes no sense
other than we are there when you need us. We come. We are
the largest street gang in the world in the police force,
so we have their numbers. You're 100%
correct. I love your idea of making the courts an independent state.
They can secure it, they can manage it,
they can call us when all hell breaks loose, and our team will go up
there and provide that emergent tactical response once,
but it's not going to override when you have dueling ministries
fighting about a case. So I spoke clearly about the Jordan decision,
and yet you have to read it. It says that a person—
and rightly so— if you're charged in the offense, you should have the right to
be— your matter to be heard as soon as possible. Those timelines
are, are silly. However, we're a
proactive agency. I believe he's still in the back room.
Sergeant Kerr is in my space. He was tasked 6 months ago with
leading a substantive change at our courthouse.
The substantive change in our courthouse was pre-charge consultation.
In other words, before our officers laid a charge in most events,
it's not all, they would speak to the Crown, and then the Crown Attorney,
Ministry of Attorney General, would determine is it in the public interest to
proceed with this charge, is there a reasonable probability of conviction if we proceed with
this charge. We better do this work work before we arrest the person so that
we can get to court faster, more efficient, more effective.
That is a great system. We went to the local Crown Attorney.
I went with the office. The local Crown was, hey, Chief, we're all in.
This is happening in other places. They headed down the path,
I mean, as fast as I like things done. They beat my timelines
only to get our response 2 weeks ago, and the response was, we're having a
hard time staffing the Crown position in this plan.
So here we go, the Ministry of Attorney General tells me faster,
better, quicker, I concur, I deploy staff,
everybody in this horseshoe's mad about my court administration costs, we have the
right people doing the right work, I believe Kerry's in the audience, saying we're
gonna have the best digital evidence management, my board 4 years ago saw the problem,
said fund it out of corporate services chief, we're not funding it on
the tax levy, we've been building for this, we're there, we go
to the Crown, the Crown goes, yes, let's do it. Ah, we got no money.
So to your point, yes, there needs to be substantive
change to affect long-term change in the
cost of policing. We cannot be all things to all people
anymore. We have to be first response.
Chief, you could, like, I wanted to record that because
I can't wait to take that statement forward the way you succinctly pointed it out.
And that's why I continue to support the CPS and will always support
the CPS in Cobourg because of what you just outlined. Your team
actually cares about this community and actually brings innovative
change and innovative solutions. And to your point, Councillor, I am glad
to hear you're also thinking about a reimagined county, because I
think that's the reality here. Councillor Mitan, to your point, is that
we're sitting here discussing percentages between police and
fire here, and we're debating that it can't cost, and it's all going back.
And I think what you're seeing, Councilor Mouton, and what I'm glad to have this
conversation, is that here we are in Cobourg debating a
few percentages over a $30 million budget, yet what
we're not talking about is the $20 million a year that leaves
the Cobourg tax base and goes to the County of Northumberland. And then that
$20 million is distributed throughout the County and actually
increases the costs here in Cobourg. The reason we have the police budget
we do, and the reason our police force have had to go to such great
lengths to find innovative ways to fund their operations,
is because for the last 7 to 8 years, our community has
been dealing with the problems of the county on a $30 million budget.
The reality is, is when you look at Peterborough and Peterborough County,
Peterborough city has almost 5 times the
budget of Peterborough County. Yet when you look here, we're sitting
on a $29 million budget, and the county is 70 of just
what the lower tiers give it. When you start adding in the provincial transfers,
the healthcare transfers, all of their transfers, they're in the hundreds of millions
of dollars. And it— this is the pattern that can't continue,
Councillor Matan. And I appreciate you bringing it forward because we're sitting
here fighting over the penny while dollar bills are
being thrown away and used as firewood up at that level. Now, I'm very proud
that this year the county was finally able to get to a 3.7% levy
increase. It required a drastic change of leadership at
the county to be able to even have that conversation.
And I have been united with Mr. Vander— sorry, with Chief for
3 years, and I will remain united. We— it doesn't
matter. The board board, the police, or the chief in the position, when you're tasked
to clean up an entire county's mess on a single tier's budget,
who's ever going to win? And unfortunately,
it's the Cobourg taxpayers who are constantly asked to front
the money forward for the County of Northumberland's issues
being centralized here. I think, Councilor Métun, you are on
point. I've been screaming from the rooftops, a Reimagine We can't
do that alone. We need to talk to our tax base as well as the
province. But this is the problem. We're sitting here fighting for pennies when dollars
are being used at the county for firewood. And I think your point is bang
on. So I just wanted to state that. Thank you, Chief, for finding a way
over your career to do more with less while you've been picking up the pieces.
Any further questions? By all means, Council Bureau. Um, I agree with you
100% on that. Um, and I know that I have asked
asked numerous times to the minister, why would you be giving OPP money,
um, last year and then capping them at this, which, which I believe
in both years would total about 33% in 2
years, and nothing. And when I
stood up, the board was there, and I stood up and said, what about the
regular municipalities? Like, that we have our own, that we have to—
they are expensive. And he says— and he said, no, absolutely not
in front of everybody. And I asked and asked again.
Um, I do agree that there's a lot of issues that Coburg,
um, at the county level should be taken care of. But,
um, unfortunately, where it is right now,
um, it is falling on the burden of the police. Um,
but having said that, my question is,
in which we coming back to our dollars or pennies that
we're, we're fighting over. Um, if we deplete our reserves,
what would be the better way? Deplete our reserves and kick
it down the can, or take the budget out of our— out
of the police?
Like, I may— I'll say that again.
Should— is it, in your opinion, and even ask Roger this,
should we have, uh, the reserves depleted or
the 20.5.
I, I should run for office. I, I was going to— the duly
agreed-upon memorandum of understanding between the Cobourg Police Services
Board and the Town of Cobourg should stand the test of time,
but I'm not in the one making a very difficult budget decision in a time
of affordability crisis. But I truly believe the MOU that
was was hard-fought and nos were said and
feelings were hurt along the way and, and mended.
Um, I think that's the rule of the day.
Any further questions? Councilor Matan, by all means.
Yes, I don't know who I should direct this question to, but with regards
to the, the Police Service Board budget, it's from this
council, it's either a yes or a no. Yes, correct. We can't,
we can't suggest, you know, going splitting
it between this year and next year further to Councillor Darlings.
Sorry, I just want to correct. Yes. So when it comes to the allocation
of reserves, yes. When it comes
to operational line-by-line concerns, no, that is the job
of the Cobourg Police Service. We only fund, yay or nay.
Now, in terms of applying reserves, that does fall within our jurisdiction. Fall to the
reserve of this council, and that is it. So because of that, what you're
alluding to, that is this council's option. We can either choose through
the motion that's on the table to go back and put it on the tax
levy, or we can approve what the mayor's budget is, which is not on the
tax levy. Brent Larimer and I do this all the time, but you can ask
me any question about any line. You just can't say, hey Chief, knock off $10
off of this particular line. But you're more than welcome to ask me any question
about any line. It's just about council's decision is the whole
budget, or yes or no. But you're more than welcome to
ask me questions about why this and why that, just to be clear. And for
the clarity, everything that was asked is on the budget as it stands.
Any further questions of the chief? And I do appreciate this is much longer than
5 minutes, but we do appreciate you having the time and the willingness to be
here, Chief. Okay, at this time, um, we've got a motion on
the floor that's up for debate or up for conversation. We've heard from both,
uh, Treasurer Do we go with CFO or see what is— CAO
is the title. Thank you. So our CAO and Chief have both
had a chance to speak. We have the motion. It is a recorded vote.
Councillor Barber, uh, if I may get
an answer to— oops, sorry, may I— if I may get an answer to my
question, which I, uh, I apologize to the Chief, of course it
shouldn't have fallen under him. Is there any other reserve reserve that,
uh, that could or can be used under this circumstance?
That is aye or nay?
I'll leave this to staff as they're asking staff the question. I mean,
it again, it does fall to all reserves of the will of this council.
Uh, for you, Mayor, to the Councillor, um, just to clarify,
is this to reduce the police Okay,
I think in terms of utilizing another Town of Cobourg reserve just to
reduce the police reserve, I would prefer not to proceed down that
path. I think these are sort of Town of Cobourg reserve accounts, but again,
I think if it is the will of council, but as I've indicated,
I think in a few separate reports, one report that I presented in May,
a financial sustainability report, and then a reserve analysis
report that was discussed at the standing committee a few
weeks ago is coming to regular council on Wednesday. I think in both reports I've
indicated that the Town of Cobourg's reserve accounts, that's excluding the police reserves,
are well underfunded compared to similar-sized municipalities.
So my preference would be to not reduce those reserves further.
Before I follow up, I'm going to go to CO Vaughn, who also has an
answer. Thank you. Through the chair, maybe just
to build upon what our Treasurer has
spoken to, the other thing we've been really careful to do and really
deliberate about is demonstrating demonstrating the cost for particular
units of service and for particular services. So I think if you
were to take a non-police reserve to fund a
police budget, it helps— it continues to mystify
what the costs of a particular item are. So while we
wouldn't want to take reserves from the fire department to pay for community
services, because when you're trying to demonstrate to the taxpayer what
the cost of service is, it becomes really complex. So part of our financial sustainability
plan has been about building our reserves and, and doing all that due diligence,
but it's also about accountability and transparency and demonstrating,
telling the story about the cost of every service so it's really clearly
understood by the taxpayer as well.
Follow-up, please. Just very briefly, it is the answer that I expected,
but I wanted to get it on the record. Thank you. Thank you.
And again, I just want to point out it a couple times it's been stated
that the, the reserves would be depleted. There was
a very intentional decision. It would be highly inappropriate to
leave both the current and future Chief zero in the
reserves. We can't plan for emergencies. If there's
a, a police emergency, our CPS need to have reserves
in the bank at some point to be able to fund any kind of emergency
like that. So it— they haven't been depleted. Yes, they've been reduced by a
million 2 or 1.3 million, but I just want to be very clear, the term
depleted suggests that all of them are gone. There's 480,000,
just shy of a half million, and then that, yes, they can allocate. So,
Councilor Mouton. The chief raised
an interesting point about development charges. And I'm
just thinking ahead. Currently,
police services is housed in a municipally owned building.
It's quite clear that with growth of the community needs of policing,
etc., that a new facility would be needed.
My question would be, I guess, through you, Mr. Mayor, to appropriate staff
person, are we collecting development charges
for this future growth need for the town of
Cobourg specific to police services,
a structure like, like a new building? Excuse me.
And if not,
does it qualify? Does it
qualify for development charges moving
forward? Would Mr. Gittings like to take
on that one, sir?
Through you, Mayor, to the Councillor. So in the 2022
development charge study, a new building was not specified under that study. So technically it's
not being funded by development charges. So now we are redoing the
development charge study in 2026. So that is
something that we could identify. Having said that, I would clarify that only
a portion of it would be applicable for development charges because some of that is
a new building that's serving existing taxpayers. So only the growth portion
would be applicable for the development charges.
And then just to clarify as well, under the Development Charge Act,
it does not include wages. And so any new staffing and things
like that would not be applicable for development charges.
Just to clarify, the need for this police station
cannot be overstated. The timeline with which we need to ensure our officers
have the equipment and the building required to do the best job they can cannot
wait for another 15 to 18 years as DCs build up. This is something that
needs to happen sooner than later. And so with the greatest respect to the DC
plan, the reality is, is we need other levels of government to chip in
and fund this because this is what we need for our frontline women. And so
I've already been to Ottawa twice in the last month to start this
work. We need to start advocating for the federal budget.
We know $52 billion is going to be available for capital projects
for communities that are there and ready to move forward. And this council and
I need to be very, very on the ball with this one over the next
11 months, focusing on the advocacy piece, because the reality is,
is at a couple hundred thousand dollars a year, we can't wait the
15 years to get our officers into a new facility. We We need this in
the next 2 to 3, which is going to require intervention from the federal government
to actually access those funds. That's something we'll be committing to. By all means,
Councilor Matan. Yeah, so thank you for that explanation.
I think though, moving forward, yes,
to expedite the new building, new that
is needed, but I think we would be remiss if we did not add,
because we don't know what the future is going to bring. What perhaps growth might
require. So I think it— I can't see that one would
compromise the other, but definitely it is
an important community facility.
So I hear you, Mr. Mayor, but I think we can do both. No worries.
I'm just going to go to see— do I have— who wants to ask questions?
That's just so I can write it down. I've got Councillor Burkett right now.
Okay. So I mean, CAO, thank you. I think this conversation
helps to underscore the importance of master plans and strategies
and why we do you undertake that work at the
municipal level. If you do not have master plans and strategies that identify future
needs or growth needs, then you're not able to inform your DC study to ensure
that you're capturing those appropriate costs. So again, we,
you know, while we may know organically that something may be needed,
without those fulsome documents demonstrating what is needed, when it's needed,
how it's needed, you're unable to collect those DCs for those
those purposes. So take your point as well, uh, Councillor Maton. Certainly when we do
DC updates, but we continue to work both municipal
staff and police staff around how we identify those pieces, what studies are
done, what plans are put forward, so that we have that really clear,
concise, crisp information when we're looking at the DC study to ensure that
we can collect from, from multiple parties, because we'd like to take,
take the revenue from all sources.
Councilor Burkett. I just want to be clear
before we— before I have a, I guess,
kind of a conversation about, uh, where we're going forward on this.
What motion is on the floor right now? Just, I just want to go back.
Mr. Lamer, if I can have it up. So the motion on the floor is
to— for council to go back to the original
allocation of funds where 1.3 isn't pulled out
out of the police levy and it goes back to the original, uh, okay,
20.5 landing on the levy, making it 6 point—
what was the number? I'm sorry, 6.08, 6.0. Yeah, thank you. Yeah, okay.
No, I just wanted to make sure I was clear on what we're actually
voting for. At the end of the day, I think what we're
looking at here is like the board has asked for the 20.5% increase
increase. The mayor has presented a budget where it's taken from reserves.
Obviously, other— some other council members have,
you know, want to go back to what the existing
was, like the ask and go put it on the levy. I think at this
point, just— and this isn't really necessarily,
you know, it's kind of kicking it down the road in a sense,
but at the same time, I think we have to do to you.
Financially, we have to look at this in a different
manner. You know, with— to the mayor's point,
you know, let's go into with a fair and
affordable— like, there's affordability crisis, people are concerned about
that. But at the same time, then, you know, we're looking at roughly—
and I'm just talking about the general police budget, I'm not
talking about Like, let's take the court service and that stuff out of it.
I'm just talking about the general policing. Like,
this is something that, you know, we obviously have bigger
issues, which has been highlighted numerous times. It was a problem when I was on
the board, the court services, because it's here, it's here,
and it's our problem. Unfortunately, we have to live with,
but there's some advocacy going on with that, and hopefully we
can move forward with that in the future. But I'm just looking at the core
operation, the general policing. You know, if we stick with the mayor's
solution to this, you know, we're going to be looking at close to a 20%
increase next year based on the projected
numbers in the forecast. If we keep it as is with the 20.5%,
you're, you're sitting there looking at like a roughly a 5%
increase next year. Uh, so I'm
looking at like, let's come up with a, a middle ground here.
Let's not, you know, pull the full $1 million. I'm,
I'm proposing, and I don't know what the exact numbers are
unfortunately, it's, you know, I'm trying to go through it and,
and figure out based on the things. I'm sure our treasurer can come up with
an appropriate number, but I'm looking at at least pulling
a minimum of maybe,
maybe 5, maybe $600,000, you know, kind of meet it
halfway. So at this time we do have a motion on the floor, though.
Are you going to move to amend the motion, or do you want to have
this motion voted and then we decide from there? I just want to be very
clear about direction at the start. The problem is,
without doing the math, I don't know where it's going to sit at and how
it projects it in the new, new year. Because if— okay,
so that based on my numbers like, and I'm just trying to do it from
what I— the information I gather. If we do like about a half,
like half it, we might be sitting at like a 10
to 12% increase next year. So I'm trying to
meet in the middle. The middle, obviously I realize
this is kicking the can down the road, but at the same time it gives,
you know, us as well as future councils the opportunity to figure
out a solution moving forward with that about bearing the brunt of it now
or bearing the brunt of it next council, because like, quite honestly,
we'll be— both options are going to be not the best
solution. So I'm just trying to be in the middle. So I don't know if
I just want to ask a question because you didn't mention something.
Uh, Director Gittings, when Councilor Burkett is suggesting that next year it's going
to be a 20%, is that a guarantee or is that just based on,
on what? Just assuming all things being equal? I'm just trying to understand where this
20% increase next year that idea is coming from,
because again, I'm just trying to understand where that
increase is all coming from. By all means, Councilor Perkup. So basically
how I was coming to that calculations is we have a forecast of the 7.6
million next year for the operational of the general, and then I base that off
of if we, um, reduced the— what you're pulling
doing, and then taking in consideration only
doing next year, keeping it
kind of at either the same, the 2.8, or just—
I just want to point out, because if you look at— you're talking about the
CPS budget, I'm talking about the town budget. So I'm just trying to understand
the CPS budget. Oh, okay. So I'm not talking about the overall town, I'm talking
about the CPS budget. And if we, if we did what you were
suggesting And we, we kept it and we kept the reserve
at the 2.8. We could be looking
at a 20% increase. So that's what I understand. Where is
that fact coming from? That's just based on where
we are today, like reducing the number to the 7.6.1.
And then you look at what we're going to have to grow towards next year,
which is the 7.7.687
million. Million. I, I'm just going to confirm with Director Giddings, is that fair that
we're going to see a 20% close to, uh,
budget next year on the tax levy? And does that—
is that like a guarantee, or are we making a bunch of sort of crystal
ball predictions right now based on a bunch of factors we don't know?
Uh, thank you. Yes, through you. Um, so I,
I can't speak too much because I think it's the police budget. So, and I
know the the staff there had sort of indicated it would be around 20%.
I think maybe the other way to look at it is by utilizing those
reserves and then not having that reserve allocation in 2027
would at the very least result in a 13% increase.
So that's without any staffing increases or any other cost increases.
So in terms of the 20%, again, I think that might
be more applicable for the police to answer that. Follow-up question, Mr. Gittings. Did we
not receive a draft library budget that said if we didn't get a 38% increase
increase, then they would be forced to close 1.5 days. Was that something the town
received originally? Um, through you, I did—
sorry, it wasn't 38%. I think it was, um, the Cobourg Library
would leave their original draft, uh, be able to meet the mayor's directive of 3%.
They would indicate they would be required to close for a day and a half
a week. Yet here we are with a slightly larger increase and
yet no service reductions. Was that done through a negotiation compromise
with yourself and staff?
Through you. So I'd met a few times with
the CEO of the library, and we just went through their budget,
tried to identify a few line items that maybe they could reduce to get
down to the 3%. Now, they did come in at 3.41%, but they
were able to cut back in other areas. I think, in fairness,
I guess their budget is maybe quite a bit smaller, and they have some
different service level requirements than the police. I'm not sure if it's
it's apples to apples, but not comparing the two. I just want to be very
clear, in no way— I'm just trying to understand that here we had a
prediction from a department that said that this had to happen, and yet
we were able to find a way to not have that happen. So is that—
I'm just alluding to Mr. Burkett's point that while we're suggesting
there is a 20% increase next year, that would be up to the next budget,
the next CPS board, which will be a new— and a new chief
and, and new council. So again, I just want to be very careful
by making assumptions about what the budget cycle will happen when we've seen
just in this budget cycle expectations and then
realities being very different. So, by all means,
Councilor Buro. Um, the CAO, uh,
showed us what and why we automatically have a 4%
with staffing. That's inevitable. And then what
if for the reserves now it would be just kicked down the road?
So So I— to me, it, it's totally
understandable. No, 100% agree that for 3— it'll be 4 years, I would
suggest, of kicking it down the road instead of just 3.
Which brings me to my point. This is the correction year, and I
don't want to put that on the new chief, new board, new council. No,
you want to put it on the tax levy and the tax
taxpayer. Next question. Inevitable. It's— well,
you interrupted and you didn't let me finish. Please finish.
It's inevitable it's going to come from the taxpayer.
The— we've gone to the province, we've gone to the ministry, we've gone to everywhere
we possibly can to get more funding. It's, it's going to be
ultimately on the taxpayer, which it should have been on for the past 4
years, and actually before that. So this is the
correction year, that's what I'm saying. And to your
point, Councillor Buro, we've heard from Councillor Darlan beside you that because of this budget,
more and more people within our community are asking for a costing
from the OPP. So I guess that's my concern, is that I support
the CPS, I want to see the CPS continue, and I'm looking for ways to
reduce the impact on the average taxpayers so that they're not looking for alternatives,
that they are instead continuing to support our frontline officers.
Because no one— and I'll be very clear, it's inappropriate in my
opinion to expect a 20.5% increase with and
having the entirety land after $2.8 million are already being pulled.
And this contention that my— the $1 million that this council is
moving— again, guys, this council will decide to do it, not I.
This is just a suggestion. Question, but I find it unusual that you,
uh, Councillor, are having an issue with $1 million when over
the last 4 years you've been charged with moving almost $10 million out of saving
potentials. So why is it the $1 million that this council's thinking
about moving is so detrimental, yet the $10 million
that the board has moved over in 4 years was of no concern?
Well, that's an inaccurate statement. Of course there was of concern. Of course
there was a debate over and over again, of course.
And this is what we came up with. And you're right,
there— should we have done it last year? Yeah, we should have.
But it's this year, so it's the right thing to
do. Although 20.5% is
a lot. Nobody wants to bring this budget to council,
not, not me, not anybody. But it is to rectify
it for the future. And as we've seen, and we said last
year or next year, if we did it this way,
we're looking at maybe a 5 or 6% increase,
which would work out to a 1 or 2% on the levy.
So to me, this is— it is the right thing to
do. Yes, we should have done it before, but we can't deplete
the reserves even though there's still $400,000 in there. There, there's a
lot of issues that we need those reserves for. If there
happens to be, um, a major crime
that happened, a murder, anything, we would need those reserves to,
to be able to handle it instead of going, wait a sec guys,
we have to call an emergency meeting in order to get some reserves
off or get some money off of the town. Fair enough. I think
we've had a good back and forth, so I'm going to move on to Councilor
work out. Um,
so I'm willing to put an amendment on the floor.
Um, so at this point, this will be an amendment to an amendment. Would you
prefer instead to deal with the motion and then make a new motion, or would
you prefer to make an amendment to the amendment? Sure, we can deal with the
main motion, and then I can make another amendment, or if that is— if
that's easier. Councilor Matani, you had a question?
Um, not so much a question but a comment,
Mr. Mayor. So, um, I have,
you know, read about the concerns of the community requesting,
you know, exploration of something that Councillor
Darling said, uh, at the beginning of this conversation about perhaps
splitting between this year and next year. Mr. Mayor, I see, I see value in
that because a new council, rather than being handed,
okay, we've solved all your problems, I think the new council needs
to grapple with the state
of the servicing to our community and
how, if any changes or how
things evolve with regards to the needs
of the community. On one hand, I'd like to know
what the amendment is, but I think it's up to
the— to the councillor to decide whether he
would like to go forward. There's nothing saying we can't
move an amendment. Let's deal with the motion, then we move forward with that.
Yeah, let's get the motion up. And again, there's— guys, we're going to
call a vote is what I'm hearing. We'll move on a vote on this.
This doesn't— if this passes, there's no need to split it because it's done.
If it doesn't pass, then another motion can be moved. Forward. Very straightforward here,
ladies and gentlemen. So final reading. This is a
motion that was moved by Councilor Buro. He put— this is, this is amended
because the motion is the budget. And so what they
are amending is the budget. And so it's in— every time we put an amendment
forward is a motion to amend the budget document. As we said, it's just a
draft until this council chooses to be finished amending it. It does
not become the budget, and it is the council's budget once it is finished
the amendments. At this present, all you're doing is amending the mayor's draft.
And as I As I said, we don't have to do that. We could also
go back to start from scratch and go line by line again. I'm, I'm open
to it. I'm just saying that it's this council's option to amend us. So we've
got an amendment put forward by Councilor Buro, was seconded by Deputy Mayor Beatty.
I'm open to any other further comments or conversations. I've asked for a recorded
vote on this, and for clarity, this is about going back and putting the full
20.5% back onto the levy.
Any other questions or concerns? No returns. Then I hand it over to Mr.
Larimer, as I was the one who recorded— called the recorded vote.
Yes, through you, Mr. Mayor, would you like me or Council to read the rules
of recorded vote? I think we've all done this enough times to know the rules,
sir, and I like that you've created easy-to-fill-out forms so that we're
ready for them. Yes. Um,
recorded vote. Uh, so this is, uh, amendments to the,
uh, Mayor's budget per Section 6.1 Municipal Act,
Section 730, Reg 530-2022.
Amendment to the budget, a vote requested by Mayor
Cleveland. Votes will be in a clockwise rotation as we're in council chambers.
Yes, an affirmative. No, as opposed. All votes
verbal. No abstention. Abstention would be a vote in the negative.
Starting with Mayor Cleveland. I'm going to abstain.
Um, Councillor Buro.
Yes.
Councilor Darling? No.
Councilor Burkett? No.
Councilor Mouton? No.
Councilor Barber?
No. Deputy Mayor Beatty? Yes,
is defeated. So at this time, we will move to another motion that
anyone can move to put in. Noting to Councilor Burkett, by all means,
motion to go forward, sir. I'd like
to put a motion on the floor that we take an additional
$600,000 out of the business service reserve,
or You're
looking to balance it, Mr. Burkett, split in the middle. So what you would suggest,
if I may, what you're looking to do is to not have the $1 million,
instead leave $500,000 behind or something. You'll pick the amount that you would
like to leave behind and move his motion at that amount. That would be what
you're asking, unless I'm mistaken.
And please, so I want to reduce it by Funds.
Yes, that's correct. So to
confirm, you're looking to simply only add a 2% increase
to the levy. So that would take us from a 2.7 to a 4.7 levy,
is that correct, Councillor? Yes, basically. Obviously,
Director Giddings can give us the exact number, whatever that is, but this is essentially
what I would like. We— while Mr.
Giddings— to give him a second to do the math. I just need a seconder
of that motion. Seconded by Deputy Mayor. It's now on the Mr.
Gittings, the number would be— I know it's just over 300, so do we have
an exact percentage that this would then add to the levy?
Yes, through you, Mr. Mayor,
the total levy would then be 4.52%. Sorry,
what was the total levy going to be then? 4.52%.
4.52%. Okay, well, as I said, this is
the council's budget to decide. Recording vote, I will call again,
and if there's any other comments, by all means we can make
them now. Okay, so the recorded
vote added, we're ready to go.
So I'm— or do I just start since I called the recorded vote, or do
you want to, do you want to speak? A vote requested, uh,
by Mayor Cleveland. Mayor Cleveland, on this case
I will say no. No, I do not agree with this.
Um, Councillor Buro? Yes.
Councillor Darling? Yes.
Councillor Burkett? Yes.
Councillor Boutin? Yes.
Councillor Barber?
No. And Deputy Rabbidi?
Yes. Carried. So to confirm, that vote has now
increased the budget from 2-point-what to what,
Director Giddings? So now we are sitting at a 4.52%
council budget. Noted.
Okay. Um,
pizza's here. Apparently we have a break. It looks like we're moved. We're finished with
the police budget at this time. So we'll take a rest,
I guess, till what, half an hour, everybody? Is that
enough time to hammer some pizza and get through this? Thank you very much.
And to all the visitors and those online, we will see you in 30 minutes.
might have to go.
Okay, thank you. Welcome back, members of council. Councilor Burkett is in the
area, just finishing up a phone call. So we are going to continue on.
First of all, we do need a motion to extend past 4, so moved by
Councilor Barber. Do I have a seconder right now? So seconded by Deputy Mayor Beatty.
With the members of council I have present, I'm going to move to a vote.
Simply, the vote is to extend the meeting past 4 hours as
of right now. Staff have put that forward because technically we're coming up on it,
so this processes to extend past 4-hour meeting.
We don't have to if you don't want to. Again, this is the council's meeting.
I'm happy to follow the direction of council. So, seeing no further questions or
comments, all in favor of the motion to extend? So moved. Uh, Mr.
Larimer, that takes us to where we need to be. So at this point,
I turn it over to council for any further amendments, for discussion,
for conversation, or for decisions.
We're up to whatever you guys would like to be up to.
Well, maybe— Council Bureau, by all means.
All right,
through you, Your Worship, to Director Giddings,
how much is left in the reserve fund for Northam?
Um, sorry, through you, uh, to the councillor. So at
December 31st,
2024, the amount remaining
in the Northam Industrial Park Reserve account is approximately $974,000.
$974,000.
If just a follow-up question,
um, if we took $500,000 out of that and added that to
the levy, how much would that work out to?
So, uh, through you to the councillor, so taking $500,000
out of the Northam Industrial Park Reserve account That would reduce the levy
by 1.51%.
Again, I would offer that— I strongly advise against that as
the treasurer. I think I've indicated in separate reports from staff
that continually using Northam Industrial Park to
reduce the operating cost is not advisable. It's not a long-term strategy.
Northam Industrial Park does require those funds for long-term capital
infrastructure needs. So again, as the treasurer,
I would advise against that. Follow-up.
I totally understand what you're saying, and we've had a lot of talk about reserves
today, but I would like to throw that amendment on
the floor and for discussion of
using $500,000 out of the northern reserves. Okay,
so the motion is to increase the northern draw by
approximately $500,000 to offset the cap, uh, the tax
levy. Um, do I have a seconder of that motion at this time?
Uh, as chair, if no one else wants to, I'm happy to second
it so we can have a conversation again. So I'll pass the,
um, chair over to Deputy Mayor, and I will second the motion.
Thank you. So we have the amendment on, on the We have the
amendment on the floor. We heard the remarks from the treasurer. Are there
any other questions or comments? We're just gonna go to the director first, then I
see Councilor Darling, Councilor Mouton, Director Gittings.
Sorry, through you, I should have mentioned this initially, but we are forecasting
significant capital infrastructure requirements coming through Northern Industrial Park.
As you can understand, it's aging infrastructure. So we are looking at,
you know, $3 or $4 million in required infrastructure needs. So I
do want to emphasize that. Emphasize that continuing to take funds from Northam will
compromise those infrastructure needs going forward.
Thank you. Uh, Councillor Darling. Yes, thank you.
Um, yes, I just wanted to confirm with the director treasurer,
um, we got $283,000 from there
into this year's budget. Is that correct? For— looks like 2025
committed $283,000. Is that off of the 9?
Yes, sorry, so I should have— that is correct. So on the
reserve analysis, that does show committed funds. So those are capital needs
that have been identified in the past that are ongoing. So the
$974,000 would be offset against that $270,000. So it's
probably a bit more, about $700,000. So again,
not to keep repeating myself, but taking that $500,000 would deplete
that reserve down to about $200,000 remaining. Meaning. Yes, thank you. Well,
we were, we were against depleting— or some of us were against depleting the
police reserve rate down to nothing. So I don't think it's good management to deplete
the Northern Reserve down to nothing. Thank you. Thank you,
Councillor Darling. I have to agree, especially we have to remember what
we're looking at, at on December 17th, to a regular council meeting with respects
to some incoming possible decisions around our
reserve spend and policy My comments aside, I apologize,
Councilor Tanya, you're the next in queue. Yes, I just would like to point out
that in the mayor's budget format for, um,
operating, on page 15, I note
that, uh, the transfer from the
Northam draw, uh, proposed is $750,000
already, and that is a quarter million dollars more
than the staff had actually suggested. And I
guess I'll— I just point that out as a statistic.
Thank you, Councilor Maton. Mayor Cleveland. Yeah, I just want a chance to sort of
address that. Uh, good catch, Councilor Maton. So that, as I said, was one of
the 3 things that I did direct staff to change from the original budget.
Um, that was specific to sort of applying apples
to apples in the sense that, um, if you've noticed
in the budget when it came to the police sort of increase being at 20.5.
I've moved to move reserves from the police to cover that. This council
chose to reduce that. That's okay. On the other side,
we saw a large increase required under fire, not crazy
but substantial. And so my suggestion was again similar
to what I was applying to the police services, using police reserves to fund and
reduce the impact on the tax levy from the police board. So too I
suggest to the Treasurer and put forth in the draft budget that we
maintain the current pool, not increase it, simply maintain it.
So, Councillor Mouton, just to be very clear, the pool was increased
from staff budget to a higher amount, but that amount is
the same pool as the previous year that this council decided upon.
So it wasn't an increase from previous years. It was a maintenance of the same
pool from the year, just not a reduction as staff had suggested.
So this would be an ancillary to that, an additional
$500,000, the motion. And I'll just, if it's, if I may,
Chair, speak to why I wanted to second this. I think it's a good conversation.
I stick with the fact that we need to get the lowest possible levy to
the tax base. I've used this reference before and I'll use
it again. When it comes to reserves, it's kind of like it's always good to
build them. It's always important to have them, just like it's always good to have
teenagers who who have part-time jobs and you teach them how to save.
But at the end of the day, when your teenager just keeps coming back and
asking for $10 for clothes and $10 for McDonald's and $10 and $10 and $10,
when they're sitting on a couple thousand in savings, at what point as a parent
do you say, you know, we're going to use some of your savings to pay
for your, your needs and your wants? So that's the equivalent is the way I
look at it. And in today's financial issues, I,
I'm for anything to reduce that levy. And if this is the
suggestion by Councilor Buro, then I support it. Thank you for your
comments. Councilor Tunn. Yes, I, I can't support— cannot
support it at this time because the Budget Task Force actually
pointed out how valuable an asset Northam is.
And, and I hear what our Director of Finance
has said. I think to consider this motion at this
point in the budget, maybe a little bit later later this afternoon,
uh, to reconsider it. But at this time, I cannot support it.
Thank you for the commentary. Any other insights?
Okay, I'll call a vote.
I'm going to make it a recorded vote, if that's okay, Chair. Yes. Uh,
so over to Mr. Larimer, starting with member
who called it. I don't believe we need the procedural rules, so over to you,
Mr. Larimer. Um, Mayor Yvonne? Yes.
Sorry, yes. Uh, Councilor Buro?
Yes. Councilor Darling? No.
Councilor Burkett? No.
Councilor Mouton? No.
Councilor Barber?
Yes. Deputy Mayor No,
it's defeated. Thank you very much.
If I may, Deputy Mayor. Thank you. I'll resume the chair. Um,
another amendment, by all means, Councilor Darling.
Um, just wanted to point out here regarding
the task force, one of their suggestions was
closing Centennial Pool, $138,000.
Their— one of their comments was equitable community
spending. Programs or services that cater to very small groups
should not be disproportionately funded by the taxes. I assume
that to be the community grants. I could be mistaken, which is
$50,000. I mentioned the tree planting this morning,
that putting it off a year is $99,000.
So just pointing out to the public, and the mayor mentioned in just
a to go wants versus needs. That's a total
of $237,960,
which is close, you know, just below 1% of the levy.
So again, it's gonna, it's gonna come to a point where tough decisions
have to be made, and I'm just putting that out
there, excuse me, as food for thought. If I may, I'm sorry, Deputy Mayor,
I have to ask you to resume the chair again. I have a very important
phone call coming in that hopefully will affect future budgets.
Thank you, Mayor Cleveland. Uh, so, Councilor Darling, was that just a comment at this
time, or do you have a prepared amendment? Food for thought for council. Appreciate that.
Other questions at this time? I have one. Oh,
just, um, going through— sorry, we're just going through questions or
organized amendments at this time. Going through this, uh, Director Giddings,
the $10,000 multi-year commitment we've made to the
fair share— Northumberland Fair Share Food Banks via an MOU in
the dedicated page where fair share is listed.
I'm having a hard time finding where that multi-year $10,000 commitment
is. Yes. If we're talking about
that, I have to call a conflict. Okay.
So noted. Okay. Yes,
to you, Chair. So,
The $10,000 with the MOU with the Fair Share Food Bank,
that is incorporated into the budget. It's under the community grants
section. So I think in previous iterations
of the budget, there was a separate section specifically related to the
food bank. Now it is incorporated under the grants.
I can find a page. Page 59.
So I can confirm that then that $10,000 is
factored into the annual grants program. It's in the 2025 projection
balance, and we've incorporated in the 2026 budget as well.
If I may ask, is that page 59 on the staff version of the budget
or the mayor's version? Mayor's budget. That in
my package in operations. Yes,
is seniors activity.
Yes. So,
okay, thank you. Is it page 60 of the mayor's budget
under culture and community? That has the concert band, the art gallery,
concert hall. Yeah.
Yeah, but I think the page numbers are
off between— Yes, yes. So 60,
I think it's page. All right.
So are you saying, Director Giddings, the community grants, the $50,000 amount includes
10? Yeah. Thank you. Okay.
Okay. I may. Yep.
So I just wanted to— I did have a question on this
because there is actually a specific page for the
food bank, and it does not mention the amount there.
Uh, through you, Chair, to the Councillor. Yes, so I, I had mentioned that we
just updated the budget sheet. So although that sheet indicates that there is nothing in
there, it is incorporated under the, the community grant section.
So it's just, it's been allocated to a different section.
And then if I may, Director Giddens, to follow up on that. So the community
grants is $50,000 total less $10,000 for the fair share,
it gives us $40,000. Later, somewhere else in the
staff submission pages, it had $40,000 for
community grants, and then there was a line item that said $10,000 for
mid-year. So then we're really looking at the community grant
pool for the application purposes, should that proceed,
is $30,000, is the working envelope.
Uh, yes, that's correct. Thank you. All right,
uh, questions for members of council? Is there anything on the fair share?
Otherwise, I'll welcome Councilor Buro back.
Okay, if Councilor Buro is behind
the curtain— there he is. I just— Councilor
Darling, um, just a question for clarity, if I could,
to the director. Director of Parks and Rec, or Director Giddings,
um, page 53 of this, the CCC, um, I guess I'm,
I'm still working off the staff. I'm hoping they're the same pages. Shows general
ice rentals, and it shows an increase of $492,748.
I'm just trying to figure out how it went up $492,000.
Um, sorry, through you, Chair, to the Councillor. So, um, part of
that increase is catching up with the current year. So if you look at the
2025 projection balance, it shows about $783,000
as projected for 2025. And so I think we budgeted $782,000.
Um, and then I think as well, if you look at 2024,
the actual balance was a little bit less than $600,000. So part
of that increase is just catching up for actuals. We've also had user fee increases
as well, and there is some timing delay with that. Just when we do the
user fee increase for 2025 wasn't done
till a bit later, and so you're seeing a bit of catch up with some
of the user fee increases as well. Okay.
Other questions? Councillor Tahn.
Yes, thank you, Madam Chair. I just want to preface this that
I did indicate at the beginning of our gathering today that I had 4 pages
of questions. I'm looking to the clerk for
protocol on this. I thank staff and
the CAO for responding to my questions,
quite a number of them, not all of them. I still have a few left
to ask, but, um, I, with regards to procedure,
I'm perfectly fine in making my list of questions public.
I would need staff approval to make their
responses public, and I just look to
the clerk on the protocol for that. It could be, you know,
part of meeting minutes, or however, uh,
the public might be interested in knowing all my questions and the responses
from staff. Many of them were questions of clarification
And, uh, but I, I look to the clerk for a
suggestion.
Uh, through you, Chair, I'm not sure I have an answer right now for you.
I'd have to, um, because this is a— it's a statutory
meeting. This is a unique situation regards to the strong mayor budget.
Um, that's really the only document. And as this council knows, we did have to
have an opinion on having a staff budget here as well too. So questions like
like that. Um, I'm not sure how, um, through the agenda or minutes we could
make that public, but there may be opportunity, maybe working, um, the council the
next special round. These include as part of the public engagement part of it.
Council decides to go that route, that might be an option to put it somewhere
on those frameworks. I'm coming back if council has another meeting. If not,
we solve it tonight. So, um, I think maybe put that on hold
until later today. We kind of understand that.
Councilor Tahn. So I'm ready to ask my questions that do not
have answers. And just for everybody's information,
I used the mayor's version of the operating budget,
and then I also noted which page on the
staff version the same item appears.
So, um, I'll just—
just before we do that, I only have one last question. Sure, absolutely,
go ahead. If there's nobody else, we can— floor is yours.
Just on page 39 of the mayor's budget,
I'm looking at affordable housing assistance.
We are at a healthy reserve
balance of $750,000. I am pleased to see
that we continue to contribute $125,000, which, with a recovery from
Holdco, so it's net to the Um,
but I don't know if council has the appetite to talk about this,
or I will find a way to bring this forward through a future notice of
motion. Um, we're sitting on $750,000
for affordable housing amidst an affordability
crisis and a backlog in housing. I say that, you know, I know my
role. I know the jurisdiction of Cobourg. Um, we have
a somewhat idling CIP program, which I know has to
have a major rehaul or rethink. I don't
know if staff want to speak to that at all, or if other members of
council, if there's an appetite for discussion here.
Otherwise, I will work with the clerk to figure out
how to package this up and bring it forward through a future notice
of motion.
Are you asking if we have the appetite to cancel the CIP
for now and use the reserves that
you're talking about? Appreciate the question. No appetite not to,
um, not to cancel it, not to pause it, because again, it doesn't impact
anything that's coming from recoveries. I think I'm answering my own question, Councilor Borough,
when I said that out loud, is, um, I don't know if
it's germane to this meeting right now to start talking, doing design thinking around what
that looks like. I just find it amazing that we have $750,000
in a reserve for affordable housing,
and I feel like every other week at a council meeting we have
people coming at us with affordable projects,
and we're, we're putting it aside. I don't
think we're doing our part in investing in our own housing strategy, but that's just
my opinion.
I'm— yeah, I just want to follow up because I'm on page 39 and
there's only $119,994
left as of 2022. There had been disbursements to the developers.
That's a good point. I mean, that's obviously to Director Giddings. I read that as
$119,000 is what's the balance available from the 2022
program, and then there's the actual current day reserve balance.
I see the director nodding, but I never want to speak for staff.
Nope, that's correct. Yes,
what, what I said was correct. The two of
them together is correct.
Director Giddings, I shouldn't make fun of it. Could you clarify and confirm what the
true numbers are? Yes, uh,
through you, Chair, to clarify, yes, you are are correct.
You can move on. Um, anything else on— otherwise
I will— am
I the only one having this feeling and an observation about this
amount in our reserves? Councilor Metan?
Just a general comment, um, based on feedback,
uh, recently, earlier in this term of council,
uh, I think we need to be a little bit more definitive on
qualifications for these monies. I'm just looking at our Director
of Development, and I believe that
before we make a decision to disburse any of this,
we need to be very, very clear on the rules moving forward.
The province has changed some rules, um, uh, so I
don't, uh, Madam Chair, I don't know if the developer— or sorry, the director
would like to speak to this, but I would perhaps pause, and, and maybe
Council could look at this amount, uh,
over the next year if there's any qualifying projects. But my sense
is that we need, uh, we need to revamp our rules
for qualification.
Through the chair to Councilor Mouton, so I think if it's the direction of Council,
you could ask us staff to bring back a report on what we could do
with the monies that in there for the affordable housing initiative
now. There are some projects that potentially could meet that consideration, and I
think there's some options for us to look at. So I think the best course
of action would be for staff to bring back a report and present some options
to Council and get some further direction. Thank you,
Director Larimer. Can we make that motion here? No, that's a non— okay,
I'll make note of that for a future notice of motion. Councillor Bureau.
Thank you, Director. I do agree. Agree that
the affordable, that plan is very important.
My, I guess my question is, if there's $750,000
in there, would it, will it be used from next
year? Like, is that, is that the thing? Because if not, would the new
council want to start that up and we put that onto the
levy? And I'm just, I'm just talking
here. I'm not saying do it or not. If there's no projects
that's coming up that will use that, or we have to go for a report
back and we don't know how long that'll take— not saying
that you're not quick because you could— I'm just saying there is a
lot of work being done— would that put us in the lame duck period?
And if so, then, then would
that money, instead of just be sitting there, would it not be better on the
levy to reduce it down a bit. I just— as
talking, I'm just thinking, if there's nothing going to happen with it until the new
council comes in, then what would be the point of holding
it when we could take it off the levy?
That's fair. I think we just get back into past practice where it's—
that's a one-time contribution to pay it down. Or just other
school of thought is— other line of thought is, do we continue to plan
for it knowing that a future program or
qualifying projects would come forward? I don't know, it's— I'm neither here nor there.
We don't need to— we have more real-time items we
can go to. But well, then I'll make
that amendment just to throw it out there, to take the $750,000
in reserve. What was that?
7:42. I'm, I'm just throwing this out for more discussion to put that—
what would that work out to?
Well, if we did
the $500,000, it would be 1,
1.45 be the same as the Northern.
We did that, um, which would drop
the tax levy down to 3.07.
And I'm not— I'm just throwing it out there if it's just going to be
sitting idle anyways. And then the new council could decide on their next budget
just as a way to drop the levy. And to be honest,
um, I know
this, this is, um, a county council issue, and I know that when you brought
this up, this is a great idea, but we're just not at
there or having any projects yet. So I'll
wait for a seconder to put the amendment on, and then I'll— seconder?
Mayor Tideland, do you want me to pass the chair back, or are you okay
if I just finish this through? I think you started it. I'm happy to let
you finish, and I'm just seconding to have that conversation Thank you. Sorry, just before
I call another member of council, I just— and
I want to make sure not to go into Pandora's box of debating
housing. Housing manager
of the county, absolutely. Council— this council cannot forget,
first of all, we have a housing strategy passed down to us from the
county. Like, at the end of the day, we still play a role in stimulating
and activating the building of housing.
Um, my only concern, and I really appreciate the creative thinking,
and I know Councillor Buro, you always just put things out there for a fulsome
discussion, so I appreciate the spirit of your amendment.
Um, however, to completely put aside
years of investment into a program that when
we do have an updated tool
and updated policies and eligible a lot of projects,
especially given the amount of nation-building vis-à-vis for housing coming
from the feds, or if the province ever said, what skin
in the game do you have? And we don't have money in the reserves to
check that box. Like, I know that was a big requirement of the housing accelerator
that we applied for last year, even though we weren't successful.
I would be— for
that, I can't even entertain the— and I can't give the message to the community
that we're not going to continue to be a partner, in housing,
whatever that may look like, once our programs are reimagined.
That's my statement, but any other comments? Otherwise,
I'll— Councilor Matong.
Um, based on changes from
the provincial government, especially this year,
also hearing from a about
a development project that affordable is deemed
to be market rate with
regards to rents. I have— I think we have a lot of questions to
answer. I don't think— and I don't— and I agree
with you, I don't want to get into the nitty-gritty, but I really
would support a staff report back. I don't—
I would rather not deplete this account, maybe,
you know, take out $500,000.
And but in theory, I do support the idea
proposed by Councillor Buro.
Councillor Darling. Yes, here we go again,
looking at reserves and whatnot. And my understanding when
we put the money away each year was we were putting that money away,
$125,000 to be used to support affordable
housing that year for whatever projects come forward.
But we've used a bit of it,
obviously, on page 39. But having
that money sitting there, to me, there's a massive amount,
and I think we could leave $242,000
there. Like you say, if a project does come forward and the government asks
us what skin we have in the game. But again, we've got
to try to get this levy down, and I think out of all the reserves,
that's one that we, we could take from.
Mayor Cleveland, two points if I may. First point is,
we, the skeletal, could have chosen to take the police reserves and then we wouldn't
be having this conversation. So that is an option we had. We've decided not to
as a council. Council, and that's fair. The, the other one I have
is the council is
saying when other levels of government come forward— correct me if I'm wrong,
but these are the kind of reserves that we could have used. Just recently we
had a group come forward about rental units, and they asked for delay of DCs
and potential, uh, sort of pushbacks.
These funds could be used for that as well, ladies and gentlemen. So I just
want to be clear, this doesn't have to be government to government, these funds could
also— any development project that comes forward that we want to
help with, potentially like the one we've heard from— I wish it was the
name of the group that just presented asking for— there's that
one. And we also just had another one. Pardon me, PlazaCom. That was the other
one. So PlazaCom came forward and asked for that specific help. So these funds
could be going to that. And I just wanted to point that fact out.
Uh, again, I'm— I just want to be very clear,
Mr. Darling, we do have other options. If this is the fund you think is
more, I'm actually siding with the Deputy Mayor while I definitely second into this motion
to get on the floor. I— we have the option to reduce the levy.
We have it from the police reserves. They're now
going to be sitting at over $1 million. This is lower. So again,
I'm open to reducing the tax levy at all costs. But at the end of
the day, I've been a big proponent of rental units. I've been a big proponent
of driving to more affordable development. So it's— I'm a bit
of in a quagmire here because I want to see a lower lower reduction,
which is why I use the police reserves in my draft.
This council's decided alternatively, and yet I know that I
can't afford the tax raises as a father, uh, and, uh,
currently, and that we need to find solutions. So I'm in a bit
of a quagmire. If this is the option that council puts forward, I'm, I may
actually support it because at this point, uh, I believe it could go to better
uses. But because the decisions to date, I'm probably going to support this
because again, it's about that ultimate tax Levy. Thank you.
Okay, thank you. I'm just gonna make that last point. Yeah, we're— I think Wednesday
at regular council, to the mayor's point, we have a few different projects.
We have cooperative housing coming in. We've all been having conversations
with Workforce Housing with relation to our own
land that we've designated. We don't always have to wait for the
county to do housing. I just— I don't know.
I, I, we're moving reserves around from this and this anyways. I'm just against it.
But so I'll— there's no other conversation. I will call a recorded vote on this.
A recorded vote requested by Deputy Mayor
Beatty, uh, starting with Deputy Mayor Beatty. No.
Mayor Cleveland.
Say yes. Uh,
Councilor Buro. Yes. Councilor Darling.
Yes. Councilor Burkett. No.
Councilor Mouton. Yes. And Councilor
Barber. Yes,
it's carried. Back to you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you,
Deputy Mayor. So, um, picking up where you left off, do we have another
amendment to be made? Another conversation?
By all means, questions. So we'll start with Councilor Muttan. I'm going to go to
Mr. Darling next. I have a question. Councilor Muttan.
Councilor Darling. Councilor Darling, I'm just going to write— I'm going to put a little
sign right here so when I look at you Do I see Councillor Furr?
By all means. So, just before you go, Councillor Mouton, I've got a quick question
for the DM. So sorry, folks. Obviously, the motion passed. I just wanted one question
of clarity. So, because the housing reserves have always come to holdco,
but they've already been transferred over, we're holding them in reserves. That $500,000
is coming out of our reserves, not holdco. Like, we've already banked
it, so it's moving. Yes.
Again, you are correct. That's how it would operate. Okay,
Councillor Mouton, the mic is yours.
Yes. Could you please tell me, Mr. Mayor, were you in the room when I
asked about sharing my questions and answers to these questions?
Because I've received responses from staff, but they're
not publicly available. Yes.
I didn't know. I can't see your light. That's why I, for some reason.
Oh yeah, I didn't hear it, but I've actually been reviewing. I saw the email
this morning. I read through it all, so I'm very comfortable going through. It's up
to you or this council. As I said, I leave the meeting to this council's
discretion. So what I was planning to do is any, any question
that I had that has not a reply, I will deal with that first and
then just allow councillors to
review the replies. If, if So if, if the
reply was simply a clarification, I won't be bringing
it up. So, um, uh,
let's see,
um, page 12, and I'm using the
mayor's version of the operating budget.
My question is, uh, there's a significant increase in consultant
cost for 2026. Um, is this related to,
uh, uh, uh, SMP directive?
Mr. Giddings, I think that's, uh, under your bracket of finance.
Uh, through you, Mr. Mayor, to the councillor. So no, that Nothing relates
to Strong Mayor Powers with regards to that. So that,
I think as you're aware, we did have a vacancy for the IT supervisor.
So we did have a third-party contract who was providing us some
assistance with some of our IT needs. And so you can see
that in the 2025 projected balance as well as the 2024 actual
costs in which we were utilizing those services. So we've budgeted again for 2026.
Now we do have an IT supervisor. So we are expecting
those costs to go down. Having said that, we have— there is still some value
in being able to utilize that consultant.
While you're getting the next question, Councilor Matala, I'm going to move it over to
Councilor Darling. I assume you have a question as well. Just try to keep it
balanced while you work your way through your questions. Thank you. Yes, I'm just
looking at one of— excuse me, one of the reserves
was Safe Start reserve. I just need
an explanation on that. I think that was related from the COVID days,
and— excuse me— is it still— you know, there's $271,000
there. Is there parameters for that as to
where and when it can be used?
I think this goes back to you, Mr. Gittings. I'm going to keep deferring to
you, the reserve king. We'll call you from now on.
And if I get the page on that, Councillor.
So, oh, thank you. Through you, Councillor,
or through you, Mr. Mayor, to the Councillor.
So this was one was a bit before my time, but from my understanding is
the reserve was used to offset some of the financial pressures as
a result of COVID-19. Now I do have a report going to council that
was done at the standing committee a couple weeks ago, and then is coming
Wednesday as well, where I've proposed about reallocating some of
these reserve balances because they haven't been utilized in many years.
So we're trying to consolidate some of them. So I believe that account is
listed in there. Well, that to me, that's a good one because a
lot of the problems we're into today were a result of COVID so,
and the budgets that came through at that time. So I'm just wondering if
it's— if, if it too is not a good allocation for this budget.
Sorry, I should clarify, like, I presume this reserve
would have been utilized for any operating deficits as a result of COVID-19.
Any, you know, public health pressures and things of that nature. So I'm not sure
if at this point, a few years post-pandemic, if we could argue our cost
increases are related to COVID.
Okay, so I'm going to sort of
ignore the laughter and go with the question. Is there any further questions?
It was just a statement that I should definitely 100%
I can agree that that is from COVID-related issues and expenses.
Like, I think at the year that
COVID hit and we were in lockdown, we came up with a 0% tax
increase for that year, which we're still— yeah,
which— what was that? Just negative. Yeah, the negative
increase. I think if we— if it's
just sitting there, why can't we put it on levy.
Um, through you, Mr. Mayor, to the Councillor,
um, I think approving a 0% tax
increase and deferring the cost isn't a result of COVID That's a result of a
decision by Council. But that's
not a decision of the cost, right? There's cost increases. Council made a decision at
that time to defer those cost increases.
Follow-up?
I think we're saying the same thing, um, but if that money is not
allocated for, for anything, like,
it's, it's sitting in a reserve, right?
It's just sitting there,
like, it's not earmarked for anything,
right? Uh, through you, Mr. Mayor, to the councillor. So as mentioned, I do have
a report coming on Wednesday where we are going to reallocate that reserve balance
because it hasn't been utilized. So we are going to likely reallocate that into
the infrastructure reserve account, which will be used to fund
some of our infrastructure going forward as identified in the asset management plan.
Councilor Matan, I recognize you while these individuals are working on the
next steps forward. By all means. Uh, could I make a suggestion
that we, we track these suggestions because we have
forthcoming information, uh, that would—
may it be— inform, uh, the decision,
and that this council be willing to meet again with
regards to finalizing this budget,
especially after we hear from the public. Does that make sense?
Um, just to be very clear, the process
from this point forward is at the will of this council. So should this council
wish to take notes and reconvene another meeting, this council has the ability to do
that. I believe under the SMP legislation, this council has up to 30
days to make as many amendments as they would like and host as
many meetings as they would like. Um, and so your point is taken,
and I would simply just offer back, by all means, take as many notes as
you'd like, take as many points as you'd like, and call as many meetings as
required. Um, as this is, as I said, I thought
I did a pretty good job ripping it all up and going, we don't have
to use this, this is just an idea, and it's up to this council,
uh, the final product that comes forth. So I, I think those are great
recommendations. I suggest, uh, this council decides amongst themselves how they
would like to to do that. Deputy Mayor. Thank you, Mayor Cleveland. On that
point, perhaps through you to either the CAO or Mr.
Lomber, Mr. Gittings, um, so knowing
that on Wednesday we're going to be entertaining, um,
some reserve and spend policies,
hypothetically, and I'm just going to say I'm assuming they're going to pass or with
some amendments, do they take effect for 2023?
And if so, how does that— what are those implications
for the budget process?
Because my concern is, and I was part of an era of council,
as all councils are, we make a decision over here and then
we go over here, we make this decision. So what I guess I'm trying
to commit to say is, if we make a decision on Wednesday, and that—
does that take effect into 2026? And if it does,
what are those implications? Because Council's been going— I
was already breaking some of those policies if we set them as of Wednesday,
in my opinion.
So the question, just to clarify, the question is asking— I just want to be
very clear— the— you're asking the Treasurer or the CAO about what's
happening moving forward? I just want to make sure the ask is clear. I,
I, I lost track. I apologize. So I'm just trying to understand the question,
and that's fair. I went on a bit of a ramble, so I'm just going
to restate. We have a meeting, so I guess it's twofold.
We have a meeting on regular council on Wednesday. We have some
policies around reserves and spending on
the table. First part question, if it passes,
do those policies or the bylaw come in effect for
2026? They do come into effect. What implications do
they have for our current budget conversations?
Does that make sense? I think that's a great— much clearer. Thank you.
I will let the Treasurer and the CAO answer,
if whoever would like to choose to take on that question.
Through you, Mr. Mayor, to the Deputy Mayor.
So with regards to Wednesday, we do have a reserve policy coming forward.
Now, the reserve policy is essentially following what we're doing now, which is like
reserve allocations are approved by Council through the budget process. So there really shouldn't be
too much of an impact. With regards to these discussions,
there is a recommendation coming forward which does
consolidate some of the reserve balances.
So if that's approved, that would take effect for 2025.
So some of the reserve accounts that we're looking at now— now,
having said that, sorry, I should add a lot of those allocations or reallocations are
going into the infrastructure reserve, which is— I need
to emphasize— is being utilized to fund fund some of the assets that
are identified in the asset management plan. So we have earmarked those
funds. So I am reluctant to, at this point, you know,
utilize any of those funds. And as I've indicated before, our reserves are
underfunded, so there's still a reluctance to be able to draw on those reserves.
If council is making a decision, for example, the safe restart, to use
that reserve, then I presume on
Wednesday we can sort of take that out of the recommendation. But again,
to emphasize, the report
is reallocating those funds for future capital infrastructure needs. So there is
a lot of reluctance on my end as treasurer to start transferring
those reserves to reduce the tax levy at this point.
Is that fair enough? I guess, um, just, yeah, I'm quite
okay. I guess I have a question, um, both to Deputy Mayor or
to Councilor Buro, depending on if you'd like to answer
it again, I want to be very clear, this is a question, not an accusation.
And if it comes across as such, I will rephrase.
I'm curious as to, Councilor Buro,
your move to not touch the police reserves and
yet your willingness to go at town reserves. And I'm wondering if perhaps
you could explain that to council or the
mayor. Where we're not willing to negotiate the reserves of the police
service that are ultimately at the disposal of this council,
yet you are willing to sort of have that conversation around reserves that are
based on the town requirements. I'm just trying to understand
why is it okay on one and not on the other? And I'm not accusing
that. I'm just asking if there's maybe a
definition or a clarification that can be made so that I can understand
the difference in your mind. Mind? Yeah,
um, well, with the police reserves,
there's different things that were— that could come up,
such as cyber attacks, which are very expensive.
Um, I know that, uh, a lot has happened in the
past to neighboring towns that cost millions of dollars. Um,
and from what we've had in the past with the police, such as,
um, the unfortunate
incidences that were major crimes that we needed to go into those reserves
to make sure that we have them instead of coming back to,
to council. Um, but first
and foremost, I'm here to make sure as an elected official
and working for the public that the tax rate is as low as it possibly
can. So asking these questions and,
uh, Seeing with the reserves and the answers doesn't mean I'm
for it, means that I'm here to ask those questions as an elected
representative of this town. Um,
am I attacking them all? I'm allowed to question them, and I think that's what
a good councillor does. By all means, Deputy Mayor, if you'd like.
Uh, thank you, Councilor Spiro. Um, I think as of
so far, I haven't been, um,
looking at those reserves. I don't think I've supported a motion since that's passed regarding
those reserves. My question specifically was this: I'm also just trying to— like
I said earlier, we're going to be making a decision here in a few days,
a decision here. So what I'm just trying to do is I'm just trying to
myself making a personal commitment, uh, to be
mindful of policies potentially coming into place, as well as trying to steward
some of the financial management that we collectively have been doing
throughout this term of council. So I don't think I've supported any
other reserve conversations, and I'm going to try and stay consistent with that because,
to your point, um, I myself just want to remain consistent on how I'm—
as one individual is looking at this budget, which includes the reserves. Appreciate that.
And I would— you're 100% accurate, I think, Deputy Mayor, on that point. I guess
then I will redirect a follow-up to, uh, just Mr. Bureau. Mr. Bureau— sorry,
sorry, Councillor Bureau, thank you. Bad habits die hard, and I do apologize. I'm just
glad I'm going with Mr. Bureau instead of Adam So we're making steps in the
right direction here. But Councillor Buro, fair enough. I guess my question
is, again, this isn't an accusation, simply a question of clarity.
I'm trying to understand how it is that, you know,
we want to keep the tax levy as low as possible, but then we're unwilling
to use the police reserves, but where we are willing to
use other reserves. And again, I'm part of
that. I voted to support I support the use of the affordable housing fund to
reduce the levy because, again, it's an affordability issue. But I'm just trying to understand
the dichotomy here of yes to some reserves and no to other reserves.
And I'm just curious as to why there was such a negative
or pushback. I don't use the term negative. That's adding value. Why there was such
a motion before to have no police reserves touched and then
the support of half the reserves touched. Yet here we are looking at moving reserves
around where our the Treasurer is suggesting this is a bad idea in general.
We're okay with town reserves, but we're not okay with police. I'm just trying to
make sense of that. I think we're talking about two different
scenarios. Um, with the police, I, I agreed
on the half the reserves, but I didn't— um, I don't think they
should have been touched. I— it's just kicking it down the can. Um,
with these reserves here, it is specifically
just asking questions. If there's ways to save the taxpayers'
money, I would do that. Um, by no means
does it mean that, um, I want to drain all the reserves in any way,
shape, or form. We need to have them. They're important policy
on Wednesday, which was going to be one of my arguments.
But, um, yeah, it was just
basically, uh, I— the
police need them. I understand the town needs them. Two different things. But I
think we're allowed— we should have conversations on each one. And it's by
no means am I choosing one over the other in any way, shape, or form.
But I do want to keep the levy down, as I've tried every year
since I've been elected. So, um, for me,
love to have these conversations. And having said that, since we're going to
be going over this policy on Wednesday Wednesday, should we reconvene
in another meeting instead of keep going?
To me, if we're just going to be having more policies that'll be made
on Wednesday, then should we even continue until after then?
I, I— this is the will of this council. I will follow the directions set
out, and I think that's a relatively good question. So just to understand where we're
at, we don't have motion on the floor, is that correct, Mr. Larimer? There are
no motions on the floor. We're looking at 3:40 approximately time. How does this council
want to proceed? We can continue going and having some conversations, we can look for,
uh, other questions. I know, Councilor Mouton, we're nowhere near the 2 pages,
so if you want to pick up a few questions, by all means. Councilor Barber,
by all means, let's get you started off. Well, I'll be very brief. I want
to make sure that everybody now knows that we're actually kicking the can down
the road. That's the whole expression.
Uh, but I, I want to say this, that I,
I would like to at least be able to leave here knowing
that we've covered off the 4 pages that, uh,
Councilor Mouton has, and then move forward from there. Thank you.
So, Councilor Mouton, that puts the onus on you. You said you're going to have
some questions that weren't answered. If she would like, and if this council is approving,
I'm happy to go through the unanswered questions. I'm assuming if they were unanswered,
there's a reason for that, but maybe we'll find some answers here on the fly.
But mic is yours. So the good news is it's no longer 4 pages,
it's about half that. So, page 22 of
the mayor's budget, future parking meter change. I have heard
a number of complaints that QR code tampering is
rampant in various municipalities. So I'm hoping
that the budget— I don't know if it's covered— that we are looking at
sort of streamlining, tamper-proofing our
parking meters. Um,
there's 3 questions on this page. Uh, the second question,
parking-related contracts, $86,000.
Um, I'm not sure what that's for.
Um, and also, are all parking lot rents
good through to the end of year 2026? So first of
all, what page are we talking about, Councilor? Page 22 of the mayor's budget.
Mayor's operating under this. We're under parking. So Mr. Larimer, I guess that's your ball.
Well, just to be very clear, Councillor, just so we are having
a few directors who are on vacation, we have a new director, so we will
do the best to get through. The reason some of your questions may not have
been answered is due to vacations of a director and/or still onboarding
a new one. So we'll work our way through this, but we'll start with this.
Director Larimer. Sure. Yeah, through Your Worship to Councillor
Mouton. So the first question, we don't have any reason to believe that any of
our QR codes are being tampered with. We'll make sure that if they are,
that we address that, but we have not received, or I don't have
any received, any comments from staff related to that. And, but I will
follow up definitely just to make sure that's okay. In regards to the $86,000
contract, so previous budget we used to have parking,
parking enforcement, parking on lots, and we've combined
that into one parking budget sheet.
The $86,000 is related to parking lot gardens,
on-street garden maintenance, the Darcy Ontario,
William Burnham snow removal and parking lot snow removal. So that's based
on that. That used to be, and it's kind of also organized by Public Works.
Laura hasn't updated it, so we just contract that out to make sure we're maintaining
our lots as well too, including our
lease lots as well too. In regards to the rentals right now for
the lots, yes, those are currently current. As you know, there are some
development discussions on a couple of lots. So, uh, right now
we're holding still until kind of those results happen, or anything comes from those
developers on those lots, or the landlords at least, uh, from that.
Hope they answer the questions for you.
Shall I continue? By all means. Okay.
Um, on the mayor's budget, page 36, uh,
just Just have
to get through here.
Yes, on page, uh, 36, uh, and it is,
um, uh, with regards to,
uh, social and family, the 2027 forecast
is $125,000, but there's no money allotted
for 2026. I'm just wondering, um, how that—
this would be our forward-thinking treasurer, so by all
means I'll let him answer this one.
Uh, through you, Mr. Mayor, to the councillor. So, uh, not so
much forward-thinking as much as making a mistake. But, um, so for
2027 and 2028, and this is on page 39, so the recovery
from Holdco was been carried through for 2027 and 2028. So I'd
have to update that so that the tax impact
for those year— or the, sorry, the tax levy impact for those years for that
specific department is nil.
So I will mention page 37 is— we covered
this about the food bank, $10,000. So there
is a separate page which is there. Let's see.
I've covered that. We've covered that. Oh, page 42,
which is page 37 in the staff report.
I just wanted to highlight, doesn't seem there's consideration for
future additions to our dog park. We currently lease the lands
for the dog park. Very, very popular. Popular, but with our community growing,
I just wondered if, if there is consideration,
or is that a future discussion?
By all means. Through you,
Mr. Mayor, to Councillor Mouton. Thank you very much for the question.
You're correct, that's something that would or should come through
the Parks and Recreation Master Plan, and we may have already heard it through
the engagement. Um, and as you know, last week
at the committee meeting, we discussed additional engagement opportunities that
are coming in the new year, but the information can also come through the
task force to staff and to the consultants as well.
Thank you. Page 53,
marina security. I noticed that the cost is up 900%.
It's not clear to me whether this is a private contract or
whether it's a recoverable, perhaps from fees or other,
let's say, a town department.
By all means, after you, Director.
Through you, Mr. Mayor, um, Um, thank you for the question again,
Councilor Mouton. Um, from the information
that I've received from our community services staff, we did
experience some ongoing issues, uh, this last year at
the campground and the marina. So we are
looking, um, or we have seen additional costs
in security. And speaking with other directors
What we're hoping to do is sit down in the new year and take a
look at security needs across the town and
to see how we can better operate
as a whole and not necessarily individual departments,
also while maybe leveraging our internal bylaw enforcement staff
as well. I'm just, I'm just going to jump in and
say something that perhaps staff aren't willing to say. Or appropriate for them to say.
Um, this has to deal with a continual issue that
we're dealing with at the Town of Cobourg building, the marina, throughout town,
and that is damaging, uh,
our property on a consistent basis by individuals who are in our
vulnerable community members. We're requiring security now at
all of our buildings. We're requiring security at the marina and the campground.
This is part and parcel of what we were talking about earlier. Councilor Metton would
costs, uh, of being the center of social services for the entire county,
yet the Cobourg tax base were bearing the costs of that. And this
is another example of a $10,000 cost of security that I guarantee no
other lower-tier municipality in the County of Northumberland are having to
consider. They're not needing to secure their marinas or secure their buildings
because they don't experience the problems we do here in Cobourg.
I'll continue on page, um,
58. It's another, uh, community services item.
Uh, could you please clarify what is meant by miscellaneous receipts?
I know it is— it's good news, up 900%,
um, but I don't know what that might mean.
By all means, Director. Do you welcome the budget? Say through
you, Mr. Mayor, and thank you. Um, uh, my understanding from
staff, Councilor Mouton, is that is This is just a— we're
working with finance on this amount, and it is, it is a good
news story. Our manager of recreation services
started with us about a year and a half ago and has done a lot
of cleanup as far as our ActiveNet, which is our parks and recreation booking system
that we use. So a lot of cleanup there,
and this is just an amount that needs
to be tied to a GL account. Account, but we're just working
through, continually working through to just tidy up
some, some GL accounts on our end. So always
like when the cleanup is in the positive, Director. This is a good way to
introduce yourself to the corporation and a way to make friends with our treasurer,
for sure. Councilor Mouton, next question.
Yes, I have heard from several citizens concern for
the concert hall plaster And I am aware that there are
some roof matters that are under repair that
are causing leaking in the concert hall. My question is,
and this is further to questions that have been posed to me, given that there's
upcoming plaster repair due mainly to roof water damage,
is it advisable to increase more than 100% the
events, including loud event
use, in the concert hall in 2026? It is
my understanding the room and plaster walls were designed for
acoustic music, uh,
and, uh, it's not heavily amplified sound.
I'm just wondering if we could get some feedback on that. I think
you're up on that one too, Director, but I'm open to have anyone else.
Director Giddings,
through you, Mr. Mayor, to the Councillor, um, I'd have to take that away
and I know you did send the questions out yesterday, so I can send that
to staff and I'd have to get back to you on that. I know we
have been doing some roof repairs before we do work on the plaster in the
concert hall, just in terms of a clear process of when we're doing the capital
work. But I'd have to take that away and get back to you.
Getting close to the end here, Mr. Mayor.
Councilor Matan, there is absolutely no rush. Take your time. So I
actually do have some questions with regards to some large numbers numbers
on the development department side, given that we
did have a planning department. And I was surprised
that the, uh, the,
the large— the largeness of the numbers, given that we did
have something before. So I don't know whether
this is more of a one-to-one conversation, but, uh,
is there a simple explanation And
I look to the director. By all means, uh, do you have a page that
you'd like to talk about just so that the public can turn to it?
And we have an allocation. Is there a specific page you want to talk?
69. Thank you so much. I'll turn the mayor's budget.
I'm happy to turn the mic over either to the CAO or to the director
of development. Thank you.
Through the mayor to Councilor McTavish. So I'll give a kind of brief synopsis or
scenario about what the cost drivers are to the development. Division this year, and then
happy to take any other follow-up questions. So, uh, there are 3 FTEs
that are being reallocated internally, uh, to the Planning section.
So those are showing up in the budget this year. So those are fully approved
and funded through the 2025 budget already. So those are not a net increase,
those are just an internal reallocation, uh, to the department there.
Uh, second, uh, is a decrease in planning revenues for
next year. So in 2025, we carry $300,000 through.
So I took a look at the past years being 2023, 2024, and 2025,
and our actual planning revenues were between $130,000 and $150,000
or so a year. So we have lowered that projection from $300,000 to
$150,000 for next year. We're sitting at about $133,000 this
year, and we just got another check for $27,000, so we're about $160,000. So $150,000
is kind of the average baseline for the last 3 years. I didn't think it
would be appropriate to over-project predict what we thought the revenue would be.
So best practice was to look back to what our actuals
were in previous years. There's been an increase in
the consulting line item in development as well too. So we have several
appeals that we are going to be dealing with at the OLT coming into 2026.
So there is money for legal and consulting fees for that.
There's some work that we're proposing to do in terms of engagement
with First Nations and duty to consult. So there's some money that have been put
aside for legal fees of that as well too. The comprehensive zoning bylaw is
coming to a decision of council on the 17th.
There's a chance that may be appealed in 2026, so we have
to be prepared for that appeal as well too. And then there's other— sorry,
consulting fees that are in there for, say, heritage work that has to happen as
well. So those are just some of the special items that we've flagged for this
year in addition to normal work that we'd use lawyers and consultants for in
terms of site plan agreements and development applications.
Just to add to this before we go to your next question, at the next
council meeting, we'll be seeing a report come forward about a lot of this reallocation
and the decisions. Just recently, I had a meeting with the Director of
Public Works, the Director of Development, and CAO Vaughan. We went
over the strong mayor directive that was given several months ago.
Um, all the staff have found a way to come together on the same page.
As between directors, as they always do, and came forward and
began presenting to me. And I said, oh, if you all agreed, and they all
said yes, I said, well, then bring it to council, because if the 3 of
the professionals agree, then I think it's time for council to hear that. So I'm
looking forward to hearing that. It's on our next agenda. I believe some of that
will be showing up. I'm not 100% sure if it's this one or the January
one, but I know it's coming soon. As I know Director
Wills and Director Challenger are both sort of working working through the weeds of
the details. But yes, the point here being that there are no
net levy increases. This is simple reallocation from one department to the next.
And I actually want to commend— appreciate Director Challenger— I want to commend staff on
this because it's very easy to overestimate revenue and
then deal with it later. It takes a courageous leader to be transparent
and accept that the revenue projections— I needed to come back in line. And so
this is the kind of work that I just want to say is great that
We have directors and the treasurer working together to not just sort of hope that
we're going to have $300,000, but actually look at the fact that it's never come
to fruition. So why do we keep putting that number down there? Especially considering
this council has given clear direction to the development department to get back to the
basics, to clean up the mess so that we can start the next term of
council, whoever that might be, sort of with a fresh, fresh approach.
So my commending again, that's hard to do, and it takes courage
to reduce revenues. Revenue in a, in a budget season. So good job, team.
It's called realism. By all means, Director— sorry, Councilor Mouton.
Yes, on the same page, uh, 69, I noticed
a significant increase for the Committee of Adjustment of over, over 330%.
Uh, could you please identify
what's happening? I'd love to start that one, but I believe that's going
to be regarding our OLT, but maybe I'm
wrong. Through the chair to Councilor Burtell.
So what I've tried to do in the budget this year is align costs
with the actual respective different departments and planning. So we have Long Range
Planning and we have Development Review. So I think this is just a typo that
we didn't catch to move forward, that it should read Development Review instead of Committee
of Adjustment. So what I've done is I've taken the costs
that are actually in Development Review and the costs that are actually long-range planning.
So those staff that are there and any of the requisite expenses that are there
and have two distinct divisions, because right now everything was just lumped kind of into
planning and we don't really know what the true cost of that is. I think
it's important for Council and the public to understand what those cost drivers are.
And if we look to do like a planning fee study in, say,
2027 or beyond, I think it's important for us
to be able to really understand kind of what those costs are and what's driving
driving them, and especially as it relates to if we look at amending our fees
at some point in the future, they can be requisite of the actual costs that
are there. I do know there's one thing I do need to flag because
it's on Councillor Mouton's question, so I'm sure it's going to come up soon anyways.
There was a mistake on my end that I have to own.
So in the long-range planning section, we had some
amazing kind of changes that didn't make it through just because of timing towards the
end. So 2 things that were going to be removed from there. So there's the
Heritage Conservation District Plan and the
Downtown CIP incentive program. So there's recoverables for
both of those. So it would be— those would both come off and it would
be no impact to the tax levy.
And where it says development area Cobourg East, that should have been updated for
the actual official plan in itself because the Cobourg East was
funded and started this year, but it's the OP. OP that is going through
for next year. Follow up.
This is on page 72. Yes. Okay, so, uh,
yes, you did anticipate my question, which was the OP.
Uh, so will you be reissuing that page,
or Mr. Mayor, you would be— oh no, my draft is done. I've already ripped
mine up at this point. This is Director Gittings. Uh, so could you
please repeat what— I'm sorry, I didn't— I wasn't sure what page you were
on, and I And could you please repeat those items? Sure.
Through the Mayor to Councilor McTavish. So I'm on page 72 of
the Mayor's budget. So there was 2 special projects that were noted,
the Heritage Conservation District Plan, the Downtown CIP incentive
program. So both those would be falling off, so the costs and the recoverables.
And we had— I missed updating where it says development area Cobourg East, that should
read the Official Plan projects. So that would bring forward a budget for the OP.
Project for 2026, and those other 2 would fall off.
So again, more reallocation, not new funding, not new models, simple reallocation. Is that
fair to say? Uh, through the mayor to the mayor,
yes. So it would be no impact to the tax levy. Uh, the OP
is being funded in part from Development Charges Reserve, and the rest will be coming
from the Planning Studies Reserve.
Thank you. So again, once again, this budget does have a very very, uh,
I think balanced approach to using capital and reserves. By all means, Councilor Matong.
So that means— so with the 2026 budget
under this page, would that be closer to zero at
the bottom? This one I'm
open to. It looks like we're saving $250,000 here.
Sorry, what is the question, Councilor Matong? I just want to I understand.
So the question is, we've had a couple of studies that are removed
off the list, but they may have been recoveries,
and then we had a study that was clarified
that it will in fact happen, the OP. So the, the,
the final number there on the 2026 budget on page 72,
which now reads $287.94, will Through
the chair, Chair to Councilor McTavish, it'll still read, um,
$287,994, uh, because there's a cost
and then a recovery, uh, for those two special projects that were, uh,
highlighted on here. So that nets out to zero.
Um, there were the development area, Cobourg East, that should read
official plan. Uh, there are recoveries for that as well too, so we can pull
$65,000 $25,000 from development charges because it's identified in the DC
background study, and then the remainder of it would be funded through the
planning studies reserve. So you'll note I'm putting money into the planning studies reserve
this year. So my plan is to put a small amount of money each year
into the reserve so that we have a fully funded planning study reserve
when we need to draw from it, and then the remainder balance would be drawn
from that this year.
I'm on my last page.
Why is that? We need a motion to extend.
Oh, do we need an actual proposal to do those, or those aren't just to
be— oh, because it's already been drafted and prepared, it needs to be adjusted.
Nice catch, Mr. Larimer. That's why they pay you the big bucks, sir.
So the The ask from our director is to
basically do what was meant to be done in the past. Is that correct?
Yes. And for the— well, yeah, I just need that last number for our clerk.
Further, that council add how much?
So we're essentially where it says recoveries development area Cobourg
East. That would be just replaced with the official plan. So we're budgeting essentially
the same amount that we did for the Coburg East Secondary Plan this year.
And then we would have to change the funding allocation. So part
of it would be coming. So you'll see $65,000 is in there for the reserve,
and then it would just be the remainder that comes from the planning
studies. And just for the public's edification, Director Giddings,
these things have already been talked to by you and approved by the two of
you. We're not just doing this on the floor. Is that correct?
I'm getting a bunch of head nods to the public who don't know the sign
language of yes. That's yes. So there we go. So this is not director—
one director just making amendments on the floor. This has already been discussed by staff
being brought forward and we're making the amendment. So, Mr. Larimer,
are we clear on what we're doing from a perspective?
No worries, we'll take a vote.
Moment. We're just going to hold a minute to give Mr. Larimer a moment to
get straight, and then we will move on to that question.
23355, same number,
same number, correct.
Miss Johnson, just have a quick look, as long as Miss Director Giddings, if the
two of you can just confirm that this is what's required.
Open whenever you guys want to do.
Yeah, I'm just— go ahead, Councilor Matan, while the directors are looking to see that
this is acceptable. Uh, yes, a question to
the developer— uh, director, sorry.
I've done it again. So when we move— remove the Heritage
Conservation District Plan special project and special project for downtown CIP,
is that for 2026, or are you— what is the
intention there? Because those are both valuable projects.
Is it to defer to some time
in the future through the Mi'kmaq Council?
Yes, so it would be to defer those projects. So Next year, the priority is
going to be getting the comprehensive zoning bylaw approved and implemented,
finishing the Coburg secondary plan, and then all of the work that needs to happen
on the new official plan. So those are our policy priorities coming
into 2026. Anything that we wouldn't consider— I
don't consider foundational will be 2027 and beyond. Once we get kind of those
core planning documents done,
then we can start to look at other items. If I may, Mr. Mayor,
then if we use the word remove, that we remove for 2026,
or use the words defer until
a future budget year, those two projects. I just,
I think they're valuable. I don't think I want to say that we're— they're
going to disappear entirely. I have no problem that we're still looking for a mover
and a seconder. So this is still in discussion. So by all means,
I think the clerk's hearing that and moving that.
So moved by Councilor, uh, Barber, seconded by Councilor Any
other questions or concerns at this time? I just want to make sure that we're
doing this, uh, on the up and up,
so to speak. Director Challenger, we're all good on your side with
what's been proposed,
uh, through the mayor. I would just have to double-check with the
treasurer or with the clerk. Um, I think
so. We We've got $65,000 for the official
plan project that is coming from development charge
reserve. So that's noted in there as well. I just need— I think we need
some clarity that $168,255 would be funded from the
planning studies reserve as a recoverable.
Yeah. At $168,255.
And Mr. Mayor, if it's okay to, to use the word defer rather
than remove in the first paragraph.
I noted that. Um, is that the hand raised there, Deputy Mayor? Is there another
question on top of that? Deferred, not removed. Is that
understood? The two movers
and seconders are fine with That.
Okay, any other further
considerations, issues, negotiations?
Deputy Mayor, in the past when we've
deferred, is it just assumed that the deferral, it'll be rolled over into
2027 for discussion? I know in the past we've indicated as
such. I just, I don't know if we need— does imply that the deferral
means it just bumped up a fiscal year.
Otherwise, if we need to indicate that in the motion,
uh, I— Mr. Chair, um, uh, in response to the Deputy Mayor,
I'm okay to, to include to defer, uh, to 2027,
and then that, that time, uh, it can be decided
by council whether it's deferred, uh, further.
Yeah, next year will be another strong mayor budget, whoever the mayor
is at that time. So it doesn't really matter what you defer because it'll be
up to the mayor at that time to present it at that time. Could I,
could I then include the date just as a little reminder, a gentle reminder?
This is your motion. I have no issues or concerns. Uh,
so, but just, just be very clear, the same thing will happen
next year is it'll be up to the mayor at the day to decide whether
they want to consider that or not. But I, to the Deputy Mayor's point,
I don't want to lose track of it. So noted.
So sure, if they want to put that in, that,
that it, it comes back to the— I think to the idea is that they'd
like it to go back to the way it always was.
The concern is that there's the heritage plan and the special recovery
project would be forgotten, and time. So just for simplicity,
if I may offer that the first line, that the long-range planning project
sheet, uh, uh, to defer to 2027
the 2026 special budget projects,
or whichever— whatever the clerk feels is most suitable.
Councillor earlier
that to defer something generally meant a year. Uh,
if, if that's true, we certainly don't need to add the year in there.
But if I'm wrong, then fine. Let's just, uh,
whatever needs to happen to move forward and get this done onto the next subject,
I'm for that.
Okay, any further questions or concerns regarding it?
Seeing none, all in favor? So moved. Thank you very
much, Councilor Muttah. Any other questions? Yes,
one last one. Sounds like a plan. Okay, so on,
on page 50, there is a reference to the marina workshop
roof is being replaced, which raises the question.
I believe the town has contracts for solar panel,
solar panel installations on many town-owned
roofs, and I was wondering if we could get an update
on that. That revenue-generating
process and whether the marina building or
the new roof on the, um, the proposed new roof on the utility
building could accommodate solar panels as well. I don't
think staff's going to have that answer today, but definitely I think we should take
note of that. I'm seeing a head bob from the director. We've heard
mixed emotions and mixed feelings and mixed facts around this.
When we look at the fire hall museum and that
building and all the complications that the town has had to address because
of that contract, I would suggest that we be very cautious moving
forward. I'm seeing the head bob of my CAO, or the CAO to
the right of me, agreeing with this fact that when we do those installations,
they often have a turnaround repayment of up to 10 or 20 years.
It requires future councils to then navigate a problem. But I saw
Director of Public Works— Director of Parks and Rec.
Thank you, Lucretia. Director Barker, no, and I'm sure she'll get back
to you with that study and/or report for the future.
Okay, going once, going twice, sold on Councilor
Métan's questions. We're sitting at 4:10. What would this council like
to do next? Councilor Buro.
If we could reconvene on another day if we need to.
I know I got— I gotta get going soon. Um, so yeah,
as I said, this budget is at the council's discretion for up to 30
days. Uh, this council gets to choose how many times they'd like to meet and
how many amendments. So, Councilor Matan, I would support
the Councillor Buro's, um, idea, and it would be very helpful
to have all the budget sheets up to updated,
uh, current current, uh, to the, uh, further the—
from discussions today. So, Councilor Matan, you're looking for some
of the amendments to be put into a draft budget. Is that what you're asking?
Because right now there's the mayor's draft budget,
and then there's a few amendments, but none of those amendments have actually been voted
on yet. Like, they're amended, but it's not— the budget hasn't been passed yet.
So they have been included in the budget. So those— perfect. So then we can
just simply have the Treasurer update the amended amendments to date, and then
you'll have that at the— I'm noticing a smile, which means that's possible.
Thank you. So yes, I think that's very plausible, uh,
Councilor Matane. Deputy Mayor. Thank you,
Mayor Cleveland. I was going to ask a similar question. So the amendments that have
been made today, if I can use the word— so now we have the mayor's
draft budget has now been revised as
a council budget now, the council
budget. I can use that language because— okay, Council, the, the draft 2026 budget has
been revised. I did send a motion to the clerk for consideration.
I don't know if this Council— oh, I mean, I'll put on the floor,
but if we reconvene again to just review the
revised budget, the beginning when we opened up, we did talk about some type of
community engagement. Um, I mean, I'm open to wordsmithing,
but I put this together earlier this this morning.
If there's a seconder, I'd be happy to speak to it, but I do what
I'm— Seconded
by Councilor Darling. May I? By all means. So again,
it's just to— so it's now the
council's— the community's budget. It's been revised,
putting on to engage COBurg with a short survey, or at least a simple—
and a simple form to collect feedback might
be helpful. I also wanted to include a presentation from the task force,
but I don't know if that— the task force report,
how pertinent that is at that time. I think we've done a good job of
working through. So in closing,
I feel a responsibility to put an invitation out to the community
to very short high-level survey, a pulse check on the budget,
and a correspondence form, um, so that we've
at least offered that, uh, invitation to, uh,
to the community. Um, and I've put in December
27th as a ballpark date. It could go into the new year. I would
look to the mayor and/or the clerk, um, to advise on, um,
the, the timelines before us.
Uh, CAO Vaughn, would you like to take a stab at that in terms of
this by 27th, meaning we're not until the new year till the second
I'm sorry, Your Worship, what are you asking me to take a stab at?
So the Deputy Mayor's put that forward. Sorry, I just wanted to see
that, if that's okay, that the next report would be gathered,
the public feedback would be gathered by December 27th, which would mean
the next special meeting of council would have to be after the December 27th revised,
and the next— the 30 days ends January 9th, I believe,
7th. So that— what would that mean is this budget would be approved
at some point between the 27th and the 7th.
Does that work for staff?
So, uh,
I think understanding that there are vacations that have
been scheduled during the holiday period. So being as respectful as that, I'm just taking
a quick look at our coverage just to see who is off
and on. Certainly staff are going to do everything in our power to
abide by the wishes of Council.
If we have a little bit of wiggle room in those dates
with respect to, you know, if we're gathering it by the 23rd, July 27th.
Let's have a few days that we have some turnaround time. So staff do
have a couple of vacation days that they have
some space to come back. If Council
wants to propose some, some dates, I'd be reluctant as
a staff member to suggest the date that Council would, but certainly a
few days' grace would be appreciated given the time of year.
Mr. Mayor. All right, by all means. I'm just writing a note there. Yes,
Councilor Darlington. Question, uh, for the rest of council,
we've got till the 7th, so as long as it's passed on the 7th,
is that correct?
Before the 7th. Okay, so we got basically looking at the
5th or 6th of January, which gives a few days after January
1st holiday. How does everybody look
So the question was asked by Councilor Darling about days. We'll hold that.
Councilor Buro, it's already on experiencecober.ca,
correct? So no, just to be very clear, Councilor Buro,
the mayor's draft budget is on Engage. What the deputy mayor
is suggesting is that that be replaced with the 2
amendments, the 2 amendments, so that the police— yeah,
the Police Reserves versus the Northern Reserves.
Thank you. We've had a few amendments today,
but so it's on Engage Cobourg. My understanding was, as I
look at it, so just the documents are there. There's been no, um,
survey, there's been no comment window for submissions.
It would be very late at this point. Again, I'm just standing by my personal
principle as a member of council on engagement.
That's all. I, I feel I have a responsibility to put this out
there for council to discuss. I recognize it's a very tight window,
um, so we can update
what's on EngageCo-op Algonquin Anishnaabeg, um, the task force. I would
love to have a few questions specifically about the task force
because to the earlier point, going into next year, if this
is a pulse check on where we're going, the community really has to have
an understanding of the reality we face.
I'll just leave it at that.
Councilor Matana, and just before your question, again, the other option is, is we could
just move to approve the budget. Budget as amended today. I just throwing that out
there. This council does have that ability as well. Councilor Mouton,
if I could ask the Director of Finance— so now we are looking at
calling this the council budget, it's the draft council budget.
Um, realistically, making these changes,
uh, making sure everything is, uh, okay, and posting
it on the Engage Cobourg website, how many
How many days would you need to do that realistically?
Through you, Mr. Mayor, to Councillor— to the Councillor,
I've been updating this stuff as we go, so I can get it done tomorrow
morning. I would— sorry, I would suggest that Director Gittings was hopeful that we would
have a budget document for today at the end of this meeting, so that he's
been going on the fly because staff are eager to get those orders out to
get this work going. That's what I was referring to here. About that.
So, uh, by all means. Um, yeah, I,
I for one don't have any other cuts or amendments
to the budget. Um, I'm— if anybody else does,
let me know, but I'm, I'm okay with passing it today.
Councilor Garland? Yeah, just, uh, for the final number, we've thrown around a
bunch of numbers here. Just what is with all the amendments today? 8, what is
the final number? Uh,
through you— uh, sorry, long day— through you,
Mayor, to the councillor, uh, the final is right now at 3.01%.
At this point, uh, so this is the options, um, so we
right now we have a motion on the floor to push
this back and have another meeting. We can deal with that, or we can do
what this council wants. Again, the council's budget has been done.
We've got 3-point. I'm open to suggestions.
By all means, Councillor Darling. Yes, I second this motion. I kind
of agree with that the Deputy Mayor is saying, but, uh,
no matter what we pass and when we pass it, there's still going to be
complaints. So I'm thinking 3.01. We're not going to do
much better than that, and uh, with the holidays and everything
else that's going on, I don't know how many people are going to be that
interested in the next couple weeks of what's really going on. But, uh,
so I'm not going to support the amendment that I seconded, and I would put
a new amendment on the floor if this one fails. So are you pulling your
seconding at this point, Councilor John? Because that— you're allowed to do that. I'll just
pull the motion. Motion pulled. Noted.
Motion on the floor. Would anyone like to propose a new motion? Councilor Councillor—
I propose that we accept the budget as amended.
Noted. Do I have a seconder at this time? Seconded by Councillor Buro. We— oh,
sorry, sorry, I caught you late there, Councillor Burkett. I am seeing you, and I
appreciate the clerk's team having him up on the screen at all times. If we
can somehow figure out how to do that moving forward— pardon
me, we have a report for that, of course. To have a report for that,
but, uh, I look forward to that report. But yeah, thank you very much.
So we now have a mover and a seconder to accept the amended budget.
Now, when we're talking about the amended budget, are we talking about all of the
budgets, or are we talking about the operating budget first, then we're going to pick
it and go through all of them? Or did we want to just do a
single motion that approves all the budgets? It's open to, uh, council's choice,
and I just want to be very clear. Councillor Darling, um, as we've had very
little discussion on the other ones, I think everybody's all quite agreeable on the
other ones as far as operating capital, environmental, and stormwater.
So I would propose that all 2026 budgets be approved at
this time. So the clerk's team, just to be clear, we've got a clarification from
the mover. I'll check with the seconder that he supports that motion, that all 5
budgets are approved in a single motion, not just operating capital,
but also stormwater, environmental capital, and what's the
last one I'm missing? I know there's a 5th one. Operating capital,
stormwater, environmental, and environmental
capital. Environmental capital. That's the one I always forget. Forget it, I appreciate it.
Sometimes it takes a while for me to catch up, Director. Um, so that's
all 5, so we're going to put all 5, uh, to accept as amended.
The council approve, and it's no longer the mayor's budget. Council approve.
It is the council amended budget. You— I will
call it, you know, names matter. Mr. Larmer, go ahead.
Mr. Larmer, so through you, uh, this motion
is good, it provides direction, but the 30 days doesn't matter about this.
So it's 30 days. So even Council makes this motion today,
January 7th is when the date of the budget will come in effect. So my
suggestion is Council has authority to reduce the number of days needed
for the passing of the budget. So I have a suggestion just to make us
all clear, if that's okay, Mr. Chair, Your Worship,
is that maybe we pass this direction,
to the Treasurer, myself, to prepare that motion for the Wednesday regular
meeting, to have it on the agenda with a date to
amend the timeframe for the approval of the budget from 30 days.
If Council has an ability, we can debate, you guys can debate at that time.
You might hear for a couple days from the public, but that's just an option.
Or you can prove it all today, but you still would have to reduce the
number of days anyway. So either meeting, so it allows the Treasurer and
ourselves to kind of gather our thoughts to get a good motion for you,
how you want for the public to see, but totally up to this council.
But the days have to be reduced. Other than that, it'd be January 7th
that would take effect, even with this motion today. Notice the motion right now,
just— okay, so I've understood that. Does anyone else have clarification on
that? Um, so the suggestion
from Mr. Larimer is to simply hold till Wednesday to make a final and sound
vote. I'm seeing some nods of approval, but that's the move. Um, does anyone
want Because even if we do approve a full exception and support the
budget, that doesn't mean that council can't call a secondary meeting and make amendments
at that point. There still is within that 30. So we can simply approve this
motion. If council decides to change their mind, they can call a second meeting and
amend it. On Wednesday, we're going to hear from the treasurer and Mr. Larimer,
a suggestion of how to shorten that period, and then we'll go forward with that.
Thank you. The only piece I wanted to add is that working with Mr.
Gittings in communications, we could update community engagement pages. So that
it's very clear what the amendments were as a result of the meetings today.
So then the public is aware prior to Wednesday what
council is actually contemplating. So then it is out in the public domain,
'cause I think that's very important. So just wanted to capture that piece
as well, that we will ensure that that is made public as soon as possible.
So in that case, I guess we're gonna defer this vote and it would be
the maneuver, right? We defer.
Yeah, so basically we said we have We haven't— we
had moved it, we had seconded it. The motion was to approve and it's fulsome,
but what we're hearing now is a deferral of this motion till Wednesday is what
I'm hearing. So moved by the defer— so deferred by Councilor Darling,
second defer— or seconded by Councilor Beothuk to defer till Wednesday.
It's okay, we're just working through the, uh— I,
I like when the clerks have to figure out exactly the minutia detail.
It's, it's why they are the clerks.
Okay, so now we have the motion to refer, moved by Councilor
Darling, seconded by Councilor Buro. The council refer the motion regarding the
budget to the December 17th, 2025 Okay, perfect. We can read.
Any further questions on the comments? Seeing none, all in favor? So moved.
That puts us to confirmatory bylaw.
So I need a mover and a seconder. There's a confirmatory. So moved by Councillor
Barber. Do I have a seconder for the confirmatory bylaw? Councillor Burkett, I saw on
Pompous. Is that correct? Yeah, got the head wave. Perfect. Thank you. Any questions,
concerns? Seeing none, all in favor? So moved. Thank you very much,
Council. We will adjourn this meeting, being there no further business.
Business at 4:25
PM. Signature, sir. You and your—