[0:02] Good afternoon.

[0:06] Welcome to Vernon City Council. September 8th, 2026, 1.30 p.m. I'll call this meeting to order. As mayor and city of Vernon, the spirit of this gathering, I recognize the city of Vernon is located in the traditional territory of the people of the Okanagan nation.

[0:28] Just as I did it, we get underway. I'd like to take a moment since this is our first time that we have met since the Bradley Creek wildfires.

[0:36] fire and the kilp took wildfire. As Mayor Vernon I want to express my sincere heartfelt condolences

[0:44] to all those affected by the Bradley Creek wildfire. Thousands of people were evacuated from the

[0:52] fire zone and had to seek temporary accommodation leaving them to worry about what they'd left behind.

[1:00] As evacuation orders have been lifted, residents have returned to find their lives upended and upside down.

[1:10] Lost homes, structures, animals, and livelihoods.

[1:14] I can only imagine how difficult this must be for them.

[1:19] I also want to say how proud I am of the people of City of Vernon.

[1:25] There has been a huge outpouring of support from the community.

[1:30] Many people have donated food, clothing, other necessities, or have given to the wildfire

[1:37] response funds, the Salvation Army Food Bank or the United Way.

[1:42] School District 22 and local and regional businesses also stepped up to organize donations

[1:48] without a word, without a word of their own recognition.

[1:52] In addition, staff at the City of Vernon and other local communities, staff with provincial

[1:58] organizations, professionals, and paid on-call firefighters, BC wildfire service personnel,

[2:05] emergency operations staff here, emergency support staff, services staff, volunteers, and

[2:12] Okinawa, Indian band and emergency personnel.

[2:15] All deserve a huge thank you.

[2:17] for how, for you, for your professionalism, generosity, and commitment to helping others

[2:24] during a traumatic and dangerous situation.

[2:29] So as Marin Council continues to focus on response and resilience to drought, fire, and other

[2:35] extreme events.

[2:36] My thoughts were made with those who suffered the losses this summer.

[2:41] And thank all who pitched in.

[2:43] Mr.

[2:47] Wood, are there any amendments to today's agenda?

[2:52] Your worship, there is one addition to the agenda.

[2:56] We'll go under item 13.a.2.

[3:00] It's the Science Center request for letter of support, and there's a copy of them at your

[3:05] desks.

[3:07] Thank you, Mr. Wood.

[3:09] Can I have a motion to adopt the agenda, Councillor Gai, Councillor Dernay?

[3:13] Any comments on the agenda?

[3:15] Seeing none, I'll call the question.

[3:17] and all those in favor.

[3:19] Those opposed seeing none, motion is carried.

[3:23] Can I get a motion to adopt the regular meeting minutes

[3:26] of the 20th of July, 2026?

[3:29] The public hearing of the same date

[3:31] and the committee of the whole also of July, 2026.

[3:35] Councilor Munn, Councilor Garres, any comments?

[3:39] Seeing none, I'll call the question.

[3:42] All those in favor?

[3:43] Those opposed, motion is carried.

[3:46] So moving now to General Matters, we get a presentation from the RCMPs, second quarter

[3:51] report, and the superintendent gets to be the first one to drive the new bus for those

[3:57] who are online or in the council chambers, you'll now find yourself facing another direction.

[4:05] We've turned the council chambers 90 degrees and for those who knew the council of days

[4:11] gone by, it was like this.

[4:13] Yes, so we've returned back to the old and they've refreshed things like carpets and

[4:20] electronics and cameras, hopefully to improve the experience for everyone involved.

[4:27] Welcome Superintendent and Inspector Kennedy, so you're standing at the back, much appreciated.

[4:32] The floor is yours.

[4:38] Okay, good afternoon Mr. Mayor, thank you very much and council members and city staff.

[4:43] Thank you very much for having us here today.

[4:46] I have Inspector Kennedy who's actually going to present the quarterly reports for us and I will stay for the duration as well.

[4:55] And just so you know with yourselves and all of our communities, this is what I'm having is I want to have that people are actually connected with operations a bit more.

[5:05] I'm going to present the stats because they are theirs and they are well aware of the information and what's going on in real time.

[5:12] As you can see, the stats end at the end of June, so that's why I am having more of my

[5:18] operational people presenting these, but I will be here moving forward for the presentations

[5:22] as well.

[5:23] So thank you for having me.

[5:24] Thank you.

[5:24] And I'll turn it over.

[5:26] Appreciate it.

[5:26] I appreciate it.

[5:30] Good afternoon, Mr. Mayor, staff and councillors.

[5:35] Quarter two reporting for the period of April to June.

[5:39] This happens to be a quarter that I'm happy to present because as you'll see, our numbers

[5:43] are actually very good.

[5:48] We get right into the first slide, total calls for service,

[5:55] working and I'm not working

[5:56] at all.

[5:57] I've been given the control watch out people.

[6:01] Okay, here we go.

[6:03] You see, for a city of Vernon, you can see that for the same quarter reporting from 2025

[6:08] to 2026, your numbers are very so slightly 0.3%, so running about the same as this quarter

[6:15] last year, from 5,028 to 5,044. So just marginally, I've ever so slightly criminal

[6:26] code cases.

[6:27] We are down almost 3%. So these are your total of all types of criminal code offenses,

[6:34] down from 1755, down to 1704, from the same period in 2025.

[6:40] 5.

[6:43] Violent offenses. This is something to celebrate. Down 16.3% in this quarter from 319 in 2025 to 267.

[6:56] And property offenses just up ever so slightly. 2.1%. Again, a very small number of change from 922.

[7:05] 20 more occurrences in 2026. Same reporting period, 942.

[7:10] 2.

[7:15] Area where we're still striving to fit in all operational pressures and be visible

[7:21] out on our roadways. We're down 19.8% in our overall traffic contacts for the city.

[7:28] Then we spoke last year about this time about body 1 cameras and the demands pressed put

[7:33] on the police with extra reporting for Crown Council and so again this is a direct linkage

[7:41] to the reason for the decline.

[7:43] We do have a reserve constable that's being brought on board who's primarily, one of his

[7:49] primary duties will be traffic enforcement in the city of Vernon 2, so we hope to have that

[7:53] number back up.

[7:57] I'm just going to speak real quickly on some of our key other areas such as prolific offenders

[8:03] just to give you an update in this reporting period we had 11 identified prolific offenders

[8:07] for who are remaining custody and seven who are not in custody of these seven reside in or known to frequent the city of Vernon.

[8:17] On our re-voy, which is our report, repeat violent offender intervention, which is the provincial program that's funded through the province.

[8:27] We currently have six individuals identified in the Vernon, North Oregon, three currently remaining custody and three are out of custody who do reside in the Vernon area.

[8:36] And then we have a new provincial program that was introduced.

[8:40] Believe I spoke about it last meeting which is your chronic property offending intervention

[8:45] program.

[8:46] We're moving away from the term prolific offender as we transition those most highest

[8:51] repeat property crime offenders into what we're now calling C-poi, the chronic property offenders.

[8:56] And we now have two individuals who've been identified and are part of that program.

[9:02] And that are being monitored by our partner agencies as well as the police.

[9:05] I'm

[9:13] just going to go into one last one.

[9:15] So our mental health files down 37.7%, 532 occurrences compared to 331.

[9:23] I checked in with our Integrated Program, the ICIR Integrated Crisis Response Team.

[9:29] They've been working very hard to do a lot of education, working with clients that repeatedly

[9:35] call police for support, and there's been measures put in place to reduce those calls, which

[9:41] which means there's less police intervention on what would typically be a mental health

[9:45] or a health crisis.

[9:47] So that is a direct result of the efforts and the education that's being done jointly

[9:51] through our interior health partners and the nurses that work with us and our hospitals

[9:56] that work with the program.

[10:01] In this reporting period, we had a few community things that just make note of, so we ended

[10:07] up out in the community. Again, it was the Jean-Mingé Youth Academy. We had 49 successful candidates

[10:16] or 50, I believe, that went through another great successful year. We participated in

[10:22] the capi days and also special Olympics softball game with special Olympics, which was a really

[10:30] a good event.

[10:33] Out and about in other communities as well.

[10:36] So, I can take any questions or concerns. I can also speak quickly on our efforts in

[10:40] regards to e-bikes and e-dirt bikes. I know that was a hot topic last time. So, just

[10:46] I'll give you a little preview to next quarter reporting, but since then, we have actually

[10:52] charged two individuals on the Motor Vehicle Act and the criminal code for driving while

[10:57] impaired on E devices. We have had also a 13-year-old, I mentioned last time it was going to happen

[11:04] our community sooner than later. An incident unfortunately, luckily the 13-year-old youth was not

[11:10] hurt but was involved in a collision with a vehicle because they were failing to abide by the rules

[11:16] of the road. So that's just a little brief update and we've had two alcohol-related instances where

[11:23] where we've seized the, and seized the, the e-devices, and they've been impounded.

[11:29] So,

[11:32] the next, what I have for you this afternoon, happy to entertain any questions.

[11:37] Thank you, Inspector.

[11:40] Councillor Dernie.

[11:41] Thank you, and thank you for your presentation today.

[11:44] It's always excellent when we get positive news.

[11:47] I just have a quick question just to clarify for me, the Repeat Violent Offender Intervention

[11:52] in the initiative and the chronic property offending intervention initiative.

[11:59] Are those individuals like duplicated, like are they separate, or are they do some

[12:04] belong, does an individual potentially belong to, like, both of those initiatives?

[12:10] Yeah, it's one or the other.

[12:12] So there's criteria that the individuals who are presented to the programs that must

[12:16] meet, and it's where the best are going to be monitored.

[12:20] So, if an individual is both violent and commits property crime, but the violent

[12:25] offenses take the priority and they're going to be better suited to be monitored

[12:29] through that program, they're part of the re-voi.

[12:32] Individuals that are strictly just property crime and committing, like I said, it's

[12:36] usually the 5% committing 95% of the crime.

[12:39] They would be strictly the new property crime C-poi program.

[12:44] So, there is no duplication, so I want to speak of numbers.

[12:48] They would be completely separate parties.

[12:49] That's good information, one more question.

[12:52] Absolutely.

[12:52] So I did notice this warning that at the coast a lot of the schools are not allowing e-bikes to chain up her secure on property for the youth.

[13:03] I'm wondering if our school district here, if you've talked to them regarding any initiatives around maybe going in the same direction.

[13:11] Yeah, so last time I presented, I mentioned we presented to school district 22.

[13:15] They've taken the stance that no immobility devices will be allowed on school property.

[13:21] However, I will have to follow up with our school different superintendent to see if they're going to apply that to the 16 year olds that are actually illegally allowed to ride electric assisted bikes, or 14 year olds who are allowed to legally ride light ebikes.

[13:35] I do believe at first, first blush, they were going to not allow any, but I have to see if their positions changed.

[13:43] But for sure, no e-shooters, they weren't allowing any, you know, segues or the e-dirt bikes at all.

[13:50] Excellent.

[13:50] Okay, thank you so much.

[13:52] And thank you again for your work.

[13:55] Councilor Schur.

[13:56] I agree with you.

[13:57] This is a good report to come in and report on.

[14:00] So I had a question around mental health.

[14:03] So your mental health calls increased by 37.7%, which is positive.

[14:07] With the ICRT's response to 200 calls and the rollout of the Health IM app,

[14:14] Can you comment on how the real-time data is improving outcomes?

[14:19] I was prepared.

[14:20] I did not have quarter two's Health I Am report for you, but starting next quarter I think

[14:25] it'd be appropriate to share some of that data for you.

[14:28] So for example, I can speak to August.

[14:30] I have August, it's not part of this quarter that I'm presenting on, but just to highlight,

[14:36] we had 13 mental health occurrences of those 13, 13 individuals were apprehended

[14:43] under the Mental Health Act, two were repeat clients, meaning we had previously apprehended

[14:49] them.

[14:50] There was the other 11 were brand new, brand new, present, what they call brand new presentations,

[14:57] and there was no chronic.

[14:59] Cross.

[15:00] Or in a 90-day period, we did not have any of those. So moving forward, I am prepared and will provide you with a quarterly two or a quarterly three report of the overall meant to health breakdown. We can include that for you. Starting out to be a very valuable tool. Helping officers make a better informed decision. And also, like I said, to the work of our program, the ICRT car, that partnership is proving invaluable as far as reducing

[15:29] using the amount of time police officers are spending on what is otherwise a mental health call.

[15:36] So then one last question, so is anecdotally do you feel then that it is actually saving time for your members?

[15:42] Like are you seeing that time reduction?

[15:47] Time will tell.

[15:48] Okay, but I would be more than happy if you ask that question to me in three to four months.

[15:54] I can show you the statistical data on our wait times at the hospital and I can tell you right now

[15:59] our weektimes are averaging anywhere between 40 minutes to one hour which is

[16:04] really really good. We like to see it down under 40 minutes but we're working

[16:08] with our partners and they have their own pressures as well but with that is

[16:13] where we're also seeing a benefit is that real-time data getting to the

[16:16] hospital in advance of our attendance for it to be reviewed for them to be prepared

[16:20] for our attendance to see a quick turnover between a police apprehension and then

[16:25] when the doctor makes the decision to commit or not.

[16:29] I could tell you, comparatively, from the law of mainland, you're looking in excess

[16:33] of three hours of wait time, which is a huge drain on police resourcing, right?

[16:38] So here, we're very fortunate that we've got a great partnership with Interior Health,

[16:41] and that our wait times are, in fact, on the lower end of under an hour, which is really

[16:45] promising.

[16:50] Councillor Gai.

[16:51] Thanks, Mr. Mayor, and thanks for the report.

[16:53] Like you did, as you said, it's a good report.

[16:55] I had three points and you've actually touched on all of them already.

[17:00] The first was about mental health files, but you answered my question in your presentation.

[17:05] On the traffic counts, you focused on the Vernon numbers in your remarks and indeed they

[17:14] are down.

[17:14] But overall, in the region, they're up almost to the level they were at two years ago.

[17:22] up 20% roughly overall, and including this category,

[17:26] Vernon Provincial, where there are almost like twice as many as last year.

[17:32] Do you want to say anything about that?

[17:35] Many of them are up, it's really just Vernon that's notably not up.

[17:44] Right.

[17:44] Generally, as an integrated attachment, any road safety that's done anywhere

[17:48] through any of the communities, is a direct benefit to the city of Vernon.

[17:52] Our citizens travel throughout our region, not exclusively just in Vernon.

[17:57] So, Vernon resident could possibly be stopped in Armstrong.

[18:01] So generally speaking, stat setter up, traffic wise, it is a benefit to the greater area, isn't it?

[18:09] Okay, thanks.

[18:10] And the other thing was about the kids on e-bikes, that was another thing that I was concerned about last June when we talked about it.

[18:16] I think it was June, and at that time you talked about your heavy focus being on education.

[18:24] And now that school is back, are you going to be ramping up your presence in the schools,

[18:30] doing education for kids and parents and teachers?

[18:33] We'll be going back again, too, so we're going to work with our partners and leverage that

[18:38] capacity and have school district assist us because it's not possible for us to present to

[18:43] every single parent, but we will make ourselves available at certain meetings where it would

[18:48] be most valuable for us to be present and to present on this, but we're going to really

[18:53] leverage the partnership that we have with the school district to really champion this.

[18:57] Our time again is, we don't have a lot of unfettered time, so we'll choose to use it wisely,

[19:03] but where appropriate we most certainly will go in and join with our partners with the

[19:07] school district to make presentations.

[19:09] So I don't have anything lined up, but I'll be working through Constable Chris Trolesky, who does is our primary point of contact for the school district management.

[19:22] Council and the additional comments.

[19:26] I've noticed in my summer minor summer holidays this year that this issue of electrified devices goes well beyond the confines of the North Open.

[19:37] I'll get, and it's a common comment amongst other provinces and other jurisdictions.

[19:46] So I'm glad we're taking it serious when you see an individual that the crossbars on

[19:55] a electric kick stutter are almost at his chin, then you know that the child is a child,

[20:03] And probably should not be on electric kick scooter when the handlebar is about at their chin.

[20:12] So yes, this is an ongoing issue.

[20:16] And I know there are many communities that are quite concerned about the electric dirt bike, particularly.

[20:23] And we've had our first incident here, unfortunately.

[20:28] So we do appreciate you joining many forces,

[20:31] fair across the country beginning to deal with this.

[20:35] New and somewhat say enjoyable, but not so safe have it that's beginning to form.

[20:42] So much appreciated Superintendent, thank you also for the work you do.

[20:47] And seeing your members out in the boat, very helpful.

[20:51] And also the two major wildfires in our area.

[20:55] And I do know that your staff was there at the beginning, knocking on doors,

[20:59] helping panic to people, move the region very, very quickly, so I've had a

[21:05] number of thank yous expressed to me, whether I was in a grocery store or

[21:09] somewhere else people wanting to make sure that your forces were aware of how

[21:15] they changed their life by having one of your members pounding at their door

[21:20] and saying no, they didn't have time to welcome their trailer and it was time to go

[21:25] and go quickly. So thank you very much. Thanks here, your force for reacting so quickly on that

[21:32] very traumatic Saturday afternoon. Much appreciated. Thank you very much. Appreciate it.

[21:39] Council, could I have a motion to receive? Please, Councillor Garrison,

[21:42] Councillor Mung. Any comments? Seeing none, call the questionals in favor.

[21:48] I suppose motion carries. Thank you, gentlemen.

[21:56] Next item.

[21:57] My presentation of the Council Remuneration Committee and I welcome Ms. Rachel and so much

[22:04] to appreciate it.

[22:05] Thanks for joining us this afternoon.

[22:08] The floor is yours.

[23:00] Have

[23:09] we got you up on the screen or have you got your notes?

[23:15] I got it.

[23:16] Click.

[23:18] Missiles, are we waiting for something?

[23:22] Good.

[23:22] And is it operating?

[23:26] The microphone is not operating?

[23:33] No, they're going to have to go green or blue. There's a second color.

[23:54] We're a high technical place here.

[24:10] All right, we'll start with that. Pardon us.

[24:13] Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council.

[24:25] So sorry.

[24:54] Thank you, Ms. Alas.

[24:55] Okay, let's try this again.

[24:56] We'll start again. Thank you, Ms. Ann. Sorry if the first day after major changes.

[25:03] Good afternoon, Mr. Mayor.

[25:04] Councillors and staff. My name is Rachel Ns, and I'll be presenting the Remuneration Committee

[25:13] report. Myself Glenn Benesheck in Debra Law met over the summer, did quite a number

[25:21] of, sorry, quite an amount of research about pay structures within City Council and the

[25:33] there, we compared Vernon with several comparative cities and our conclusions were the recommendations

[25:47] that were making to council was to find the right balance between keeping costs for

[25:56] payers reasonable but also suggesting a fair inequitable pay structure for our

[26:06] counselors. Our findings are the summary of our report is that the mayor's

[26:16] salary is to be adjusted in 2026 by applying the average of the previous four

[26:24] year, sorry,

[26:32] trying to read it, applying the previous four-year annual BC consumer price

[26:39] index, August over August, to their salary, a cost of living adjustment, effective inauguration

[26:45] day. So, in other words, the mayor's salary will stay on par with what it is. Counselor's

[26:53] salary will be increased to 40% of the salary of the mayor after the salary of the mayor is adjusted for the consumer price index effective inauguration day.

[27:07] The mayor's salary will continue to have an annual cost of living adjustment based on the previous four years effective November 1st of each year.

[27:18] Mayor and council will receive the exempt staff benefit package with the exception of long-term

[27:25] disability and the municipal pension plan. We've eliminated the committee meeting pay stipend

[27:33] found in the policy and that was because of the increase to councilor salaries.

[27:45] And we made one

[27:46] Another recommendation that should the acting mayor be away from their role for either an

[28:00] injury or a long term disability, if that becomes greater than 60 days, the counselor who is filling in as acting mayor will be paid at the mayor's salary for the months or months that are in addition to those 60 days.

[28:19] And that is the gist of our report.

[28:24] Thank you.

[28:26] Thank you, Ms. Ns.

[28:27] I appreciate it.

[28:29] Council and any questions of Ms. Ns representing the committee.

[28:36] Councilor Monten.

[28:39] Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

[28:41] When you look at it, it looks kind of bad at getting an increase as we're going into this year.

[28:48] But I thought about this and I said it would be look even worse if the new council came in and they were making the decision so I think the decision will be best if we make it.

[29:01] I'm glad that we're getting rid of the stipend. I think that's the right move. I've always I've never collected the stipend of my 12 years here.

[29:08] So, um, but I think that's, uh, I've always considered a part of our job.

[29:15] Then you got to consider if there's any committees where people have to travel.

[29:20] Um, I think there still should be something there, you know, um, you're, when you're traveling,

[29:27] sometimes you have to travel, protect and wail to Sam and arm and then meeting and then back.

[29:33] Again, this isn't for me, this is for consideration for others who may have to take time off work to do this committee work.

[29:42] That's otherwise, I like the recommendations, I'm fine with them.

[29:48] I just want to make sure that we consider not just ourselves, we think we're all pretty well off here, but somebody else runs for...

[30:00] Can't hesitate time off of work to do the jobs of traveling out of town. Probably should be paid for somehow.

[30:17] Council gears. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And thank you very much for your group for putting all the work together. I know it's not an easy task to determine what the best remuneration would be for any incoming council. With regards to this to the stipend, I do agree with that.

[30:35] I like my fellow councillor here in the eight years I've been here, I've never actually taken a stipend, but I think it's important for us to note that that is, if I'm correct, that stipend is only applicable to internal city of Vernon committees, not external.

[30:52] Most of the committees where you tend to do some traveling are usually external committees and they're not typically the internal ones anyway and there's different.

[31:02] and rules and regulations that are around those external committees from those organizations

[31:08] that are putting that on.

[31:09] So I think with the increase in the Councillor Pay that offsets what those stipends would be

[31:15] and it makes it a bit more fair and equitable because the one thing I don't think we've actually

[31:19] acknowledged is that you may never get on any of those external or those internal committees.

[31:27] And so those individuals that are continually on there would have that advantage to be able

[31:32] to collect that stipend, even though we might be placed on a bunch of external committees

[31:38] that don't actually have a stipend that's applicable to that.

[31:42] So I think this is just fair and it allows the public to really know exactly what that value

[31:47] is and it's consistent across the board.

[31:50] So I think the recommendations are fair and I would be prepared to support the recommendation

[32:04] Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And thank you, Rachel, for this excellent work. I also, I'm in support of not having a stipend.

[32:14] I do just have a question, it's only because I don't know any task is, when Councillors travel or, like excessively, for their role,

[32:25] is there anything internally with the city that covers their kilometers for travel?

[32:34] I

[32:41] believe there's a separate policy for travel.

[32:44] Okay, and I do know that some of the committee meetings they actually pay you to travel, so thank you for that, and thank you for your work.

[32:51] I think it's excellent, and we're moving in the right direction for the next council coming on.

[33:00] Councilor Guy.

[33:01] Yeah, thanks, Ms. Nair.

[33:02] Yeah, firstly, external committees have their own salary and the way of dealing with pay

[33:09] for meetings. So we're not talking about that here. We're just talking about internal committee meetings.

[33:15] And we set up the membership of those meetings every year, and each of us sits on two or maybe three such committees.

[33:26] And we don't do much traveling. Any traveling meetings are usually right here.

[33:31] So I don't think that's a problem, so I like what you've suggested there.

[33:35] Acting pay for absences of more than 60 days.

[33:39] So it's a good idea, except that we have a different acting mayor every month.

[33:44] So for the first 30 days of an absence, we've got one mayor for the next 30 days.

[33:49] One acting mayor for the next 30 days, we have another acting mayor.

[33:53] And then after day 60, there'd be a third acting mayor.

[34:00] So, no acting mayor is the way we do it is ever going to act for more than 30 days.

[34:06] So I'm not sure that as long as we keep the way we're doing it now, we don't need this.

[34:15] So who would get the big boost in salary?

[34:18] Sorry, the third acting mayor came in on day 61.

[34:22] Ms. Boyle, good question.

[34:27] Thanks, Your Worship.

[34:30] When council appoints their acting mayor as your corrects every month, should the mayor

[34:35] not be in attendance for greater than 60 days, whoever the acting mayor is in that given month

[34:42] would be eligible for the mayor's salary, as it rotates to the next person, then they would

[34:47] be eligible for that salary until the Americans returns to the chair position.

[34:55] Okay.

[34:56] That's fair.

[34:57] Okay.

[34:57] The other question about long-term disability, your report says that counselors aren't eligible

[35:05] because we aren't full time.

[35:08] In that case, why do we do it now?

[35:11] And why does any municipality do it now?

[35:13] Now you said in your report that about 10% of the municipality surveyed actually do it now,

[35:17] but none of them have full-time councillors,

[35:22] Mr. Wood.

[35:24] Thanks, Your Worship.

[35:26] The current benefit package currently on the books and with the current policy is that the mayor's

[35:33] full-time position and councillors are part-time positions at greater than 20 hours per week.

[35:38] As such, that's how the benefit package rolls out.

[35:40] So the mayor is eligible for a full-time benefit package, and council is eligible for the part-time benefit package.

[35:48] The only change that would be considered should council approve the policy is that the benefits are all the same as they currently are, except for LTD will not be included in the benefit package, but nothing else changes.

[36:04] Quick question. Has it been in the past that LTD was part of the package?

[36:09] Yes, it has. So it's part of the package now.

[36:15] And the recommendation is to remove it from the package.

[36:21] And the reason is that we aren't full time.

[36:25] No, I would suggest the reason is that the reason would be is that you're not ongoing

[36:30] past four years,

[36:34] potentially.

[36:35] No.

[36:38] Okay, as long as the reason is holds up, it just seems inconsistent, like some municipalities

[36:44] do it and some don't.

[36:45] Yeah, your worship, when we did look at all the municipalities, there was very few

[36:50] who actually offered LTD as one of their benefit options.

[36:55] Right,

[36:58] okay,

[37:01] okay, that's good enough for me.

[37:07] Come to fair.

[37:08] Yeah, I have a question I've always been curious about, but never asked, and that was the

[37:12] perfect time for. Around, since the Councillors are considered part time over 20, part time employees

[37:22] would probably be eligible for pension contributions. I'm just curious as Council has ever been

[37:27] and just around the rationale.

[37:34] This would.

[37:35] Your Worship, the Municipal Pension Plan does not allow municipalities to offer pension

[37:41] to health for members.

[37:43] Yeah.

[37:44] Thank you.

[37:48] And in the past for the future, no other pension plan type system is being proposed.

[37:58] Okay.

[37:58] Thank you.

[38:02] The only question I have is related to the historically, we established $2.44 per person

[38:11] as sort of the base that we worked from and based on the population of 2021.

[38:18] So, it's now in 2026 and this will apply to late 26 and early 27.

[38:26] Is there a reason for not having that 244 apply to our new population,

[38:35] in a sense?

[38:36] Yes.

[38:38] The numbers that we were looking at, we weren't just looking at 2021 population.

[38:45] We are also looking at cost of living increase and other metrics that

[38:57] increase the mayor's salary.

[39:00] So we didn't think that the 2021 numbers were too far out of line with current numbers to make a significant difference.

[39:11] So if population went up by 2,500 over the last five years, we would see an essence in

[39:22] burden situation of 5% or 6% growth in total population.

[39:27] And your indication is that that's not significant than we did.

[39:31] We don't need to bake that into future salaries.

[39:34] That's something for the next remuneration committee to look at when that gets re-evaluated.

[39:44] Because we've had significant population growth between 2021 and today.

[39:51] Because CPI just means that you're getting paid the same thing that you've got paid in

[39:56] in 2021, and it's just that your state, even with cost for living, I mean, there's been

[40:03] no change essence in the salary.

[40:07] There's been a change in the amount, but in terms of purchasing power, it's flat.

[40:11] Which is good. That's good. I'm not complaining about that.

[40:14] I'm just saying that it had this extra element which was that we should make it associated

[40:20] with size of the community. So we decided to drop that.

[40:24] That's not appropriate at this time.

[40:27] We didn't think that the change was significant enough to this time around to adjust it for that,

[40:36] or to anticipate what it would be the next time it's evaluated.

[40:41] Okay. We'll watch that Canada.

[40:46] See what it says.

[40:47] But we are projecting at the time growth rates in the neighborhood of 2% annually.

[40:55] So substantial.

[40:57] I don't know what's actually happened over time.

[40:59] We'd leave that over to Mr. Nurali.

[41:02] He might have a better idea of what stats can as assuming our population is.

[41:06] But what is it, 44 up to 47 or 48?

[41:10] Yeah, so it's gone out almost 10% 9 and a half for 10% in size in five years.

[41:20] We weren't just looking at the 2021 population numbers.

[41:26] Okay, all right.

[41:27] No, I'm just trying to make the logic work here because we've had this gone from 44, probably 47,

[41:35] 7 or 48,000, so almost 9% growth in size.

[41:41] Okay, but I'm just trying to tie it to the other.

[41:46] Councilor Yeager.

[41:48] Thanks, just one other quick question, Rachel.

[41:50] On this stipend, the percentage of mayor's salary

[41:57] boost is 3% from 37 to 40, that you're recommending.

[42:01] And that's a fair, a good-sized boost.

[42:05] So we weren't making a boost to the mayor's salary?

[42:10] No, no, no, but you're saying that the percentage of the mayor's salary that a counselor would be paid would change from 37% to 40% right?

[42:21] Oh, correct, yes.

[42:22] Counselor's salary, yes.

[42:23] Yeah, yeah, and when you looked at the comprobals in terms of what that percentage should be.

[42:34] You concluded that 37 is a little low, so you wanted to put it up to 40, that's fine.

[42:39] But the comparable that you used, it used sort out in terms of those that pay meeting

[42:47] stipends separately versus those that don't.

[42:51] The comparable were looked at population size.

[42:56] So, some of those that pay the average of which you said was 39 percent, so a whole bunch of those might pay meeting stipends, and a whole bunch of them might not, you don't know.

[43:10] We were just looking at the base salary.

[43:14] Right.

[43:14] As far as I remember, we were looking at a lot of different things.

[43:18] So, before we were today, right now, we're, we're, we're, counselors are paid 37% of what the mayor's paid, plus there's these, there's a meeting stipend of $137 per meeting.

[43:29] Yes, one of the other reasons we decided to do away with that stipend was that no one was really collecting it.

[43:36] So it was, even though it was available, most counselors were not utilizing it,

[43:43] And so we've found it to be both unnecessary and irrelevant.

[43:49] So yeah, plus I assume that's a bit of administrative efficiency gain, too, without having another process.

[43:55] But anyway, so, okay, that's fine, I guess, on balance here satisfied that 40% is the right, about the right number.

[44:09] Okay. With no stipend on top of the 40.

[44:20] Council, any other questions for Ms. Enth?

[44:30] All right. Much appreciated, I think, so I'll put it up with a few pointed questions

[44:34] if we try to get clear on this. This is great. I'll call for a motion to receive.

[44:40] Council adjourned. Councillor Faire. Any last comments? Seeing none, call the question.

[44:46] All those in favor?

[44:47] Those opposed?

[44:48] Motion is carried.

[44:49] Thank you very much.

[44:50] Thanks for your committee work.

[44:52] And thanks to your colleagues.

[44:55] We'll move forward now.

[44:56] Do I?

[45:00] And you close your by-law, six, zero, eight, six of 2026. So I'll open up public input for the road closure.

[45:10] Ms. Wood, has there been any written submissions? Your worship, there's been no written submissions received. Thank you. So I'll call for a first time for any presentations from the public.

[45:27] I will now call a second time for presentations from the public.

[45:35] And I'll call for a third and final time for presentations from the public to the 43rd Avenue Rose Closure by the law 6-0-8-6.

[45:50] Public input is closed.

[45:53] Council, do you have any questions of staff?

[46:05] In kind of a motion, please.

[46:07] Councilor Guy, Councilor Durning.

[46:10] Any last comments?

[46:11] Seeing none, call the question.

[46:13] All those in favour of those opposed?

[46:15] Motion is carried.

[46:17] We'll move now to item 6, Councillor Inquiry, so are there any Councillor Inquiry's?

[46:27] Seeing none, we'll move now to Administration Updates,

[46:33] the move, Councillor Munn, Councillor

[46:36] Garis.

[46:40] Any comments on the updates?

[46:44] Councillor Gai?

[46:46] Yeah, thanks. Just one thought that occurred to me reading this report, mentioning the Pelle

[46:53] wheeled park boat launch closure.

[46:59] James there, yeah. I just thought this might be a good

[47:04] opportunity to add a muscle, invasive muscle stencil, cleaned, rained, dry muscle stencil

[47:14] to the surface of the boat launch. This is something that OB has been working on forever.

[47:20] they've arranged a really good price on a large stencil

[47:25] that would go on the boat launch.

[47:28] And it just requires the launch to be closed for a day or two.

[47:34] And the best time to do it, obviously,

[47:35] is after the main boating season.

[47:37] So I'll be in touch with Carmen at the OBWB on this.

[47:45] They're installing, municipalities are installing

[47:48] these stencils on their main boat launches up and down the valley now. I'll talk to you later.

[48:04] All right. Call a question. All those in favour? Those opposed? Motion is carried.

[48:13] All right. Move, John. Finish. Business Council. Compensation says review committee draft report and

[48:20] policy recommendation. Could I have a motion, please?

[48:25] Councilor Durning, Councilor Fair, any last comments from Council?

[48:33] Seeing none, call the

[48:34] questionals in favour? Those opposed? Motion is carried. Thank you, committee. Much

[48:40] appreciated.

[48:43] Just to close in comment, I think, in following up with Councilor Mundes' comment,

[48:47] I think it is best that we continue with this process of putting it to the end of Council's

[48:53] term as opposed to bringing it forward to the following council. I think that's been a great

[48:57] addition. I think it was Council from Monday who started that process and when he was

[49:01] mayor, so I just want to recognize that the process is a good one. And then thanks to the

[49:06] committee members who do this quite willingly. Obviously, Mr. Benesheck has done it now.

[49:14] I think three times, which is really good. And I appreciate that. And I also appreciate

[49:19] to two others who've taken it on Deb Law, who was familiar with these seats here for many, many years.

[49:25] And welcome yourself, Rachel, much appreciated.

[49:28] You would take some volunteer time and address what's your critical issue.

[49:33] Thank you very much.

[49:36] All right, we'll move now to these declassivitation motions.

[49:41] Do you read them out or no?

[49:43] They're just in the agenda.

[49:45] We've got the Business Research Expansion Economic Development Partnership.

[49:50] For declassification, we've also had fire service pilot automation aid agreement with

[49:56] the district coal stream.

[49:57] We also have the active living center commercial retail unit lease.

[50:03] All three of those are declassified motions from in-camera meetings.

[50:07] We'll move now to item 10A, active living center nearing project milestone, aquatic center commissioning.

[50:16] I

[50:21] think Mr. Ross, who's attended many, many times, was probably not expecting we'd be here

[50:25] by now.

[50:33] Welcome Mr. Ross, perfect timing, much

[50:42] to your surprise, your years and years of being

[50:45] near this, you must have got an untimely sense of time.

[50:55] Just in the nick of time, thank you for making time for me this afternoon, I've got a brief

[51:01] memo for you about an upcoming project milestone with the Active Living Center.

[51:08] Some information in here that is about the filling of the pools and there's also some

[51:13] about water conservation.

[51:15] So if there's any more detailed questions you have about the water reclamation site or

[51:19] things like that, I'll ask for James to step in and answer those, but I can provide you

[51:24] with the update on the ALC.

[51:26] So construction and the Active Living Center is progressing towards its planned opening and

[51:30] in later this year. The project is now entering the final stages of construction, testing, commissioning, and inspections.

[51:38] The project's nearing a major milestone as we get ready for the aquatic center to move into the commissioning and systems testing phase.

[51:46] This critical work will ensure that the aquatic mechanical filtration and air handling systems are operating as intended before the facility opens.

[51:54] The facility has to be brought up to its full operating temperature so that we can test all of the air handling systems and things like that.

[52:02] The city has worked closely with the regional district who is authorized the city to proceed with the filling of the ELC pools as part of this next phase of the project.

[52:11] And that work is scheduled to begin the week of the 14th.

[52:16] And again, that is required to do all the testing for all the systems.

[52:20] to get on the water house key and the pools has to be brought up to temperature.

[52:24] This is timely because it actually aligns with the agricultural irrigation season when

[52:29] demand we understand for demand for irrigation has decreased.

[52:35] The aquatic commissioning is on the project's critical path.

[52:38] So this is in addition to testing of the aquatic mechanical system, the pools need to be filled

[52:43] than operational before they can be inspected by interior health, who issues the operating

[52:48] permit. In the spring, the city developed a plan to reduce municipal water use during

[52:55] stage three restrictions and work closely with the regional district to implement measures

[52:59] across its operations. The city reduced overall municipal water use by 60%, saving approximately

[53:06] 55 megalitres of water, which exceeded the city's conservation targets. In addition, the city

[53:13] We continue to expand the use of reclaimed water to support agricultural users.

[53:18] The city partnered with regional district to temporarily connect Vernon's reclaimed water

[53:22] system to the Arduino Non-Paudible Irrigation Network.

[53:26] That initiative expanded access to reclaimed water for approximately 100 agricultural customers

[53:32] providing additional sources of irrigation supply during the ongoing drought conditions.

[53:37] The ALC requires approximately 3.8 megalitres of water to fill its aquatic facilities.

[53:46] In August alone, the city supplied 77 megalitres of reclaimed water to supplement Arduino's

[53:52] non-potable irrigation system, so that's equivalent to 20 times the volume that's required

[53:58] to fill the ALC.

[54:00] Use of reclaimed water helps reduce demand on potable water supplies.

[54:05] The city has considered alternatives, including transporting water into Vernon by truck and from another water system as well as trying to reuse water from lake view and

[54:15] laving to outdoor pools. Both of those options would have added significant costs to the project. Using water from the outdoor pools was also not recommended because it's previously been treated and it potentially could have debris in it from outdoor use.

[54:31] Delaying the aquatic commissioning would have financial implications of approximately $100,000

[54:36] per week.

[54:38] The dry side of the ALC could potentially operate, but that would not avoid the costs associated

[54:44] with delaying completion and commissioning of the aquatic components.

[54:51] So the project team and the communications department will continue to provide project

[54:55] updates as the L.C. moves into the next phase of work and prepares for facility opening.

[55:00] And I'll be back and provide a more detailed report to Council on September 28th,

[55:07] when the facility will almost be ready to be opened.

[55:12] Do you have any questions?

[55:13] I'm happy to answer them.

[55:14] And again, if there's something technical about the rekindler, I'll ask James to step in and

[55:19] answer those.

[55:22] Thank you, Mr. Ross.

[55:24] Council,

[55:28] Councilor Guy.

[55:29] I like the argument that you made a decent rationale for giving us a bit of room to fill the pool with fresh water and actually it's even more than 20 times you mentioned 20 times the 77 that we saved with irrigation but then there's the 55 that we saved ourselves you know 130 or so total we saved right or more so that's more like 30 times or more than 30 times the pool volume so yeah good rationale, good report.

[56:01] Council or any other comments?

[56:08] Councilor Mondt, Councilor Garros, all in favor?

[56:12] Motion is carried.

[56:14] Thank you, Mr. Ross.

[56:14] We look forward to the 28th and the clink of someone handing over keys.

[56:20] Yes.

[56:20] Thank you very much.

[56:22] Thank you.

[56:25] All right.

[56:25] Move now to item 10b.

[56:27] The Kalamalka Lake Road, 14th Avenue, Highway 6, multi-use path to the East Hill amendment.

[56:34] Can I have a motion, please?

[56:35] Councilor Guy, Councilor Journey, welcome Mr. D'Haniac to our new facing, south-facing gallery, and presentation.

[56:50] It's right.

[56:53] Any questions from Mr. D'Haniac?

[56:58] Councilor Guy?

[56:59] Thanks, Mr. Smith.

[57:00] Just one question.

[57:03] Maybe two.

[57:05] I'm looking at the multi-use path just a minute now.

[57:13] Or maybe it's just a sidewalk.

[57:15] I guess it's a sidewalk along the northwest side on the diagram.

[57:22] The northwest side of Highway 6 going from pottery road down the hill to the gym.

[57:28] You want to put it up there, March?

[57:29] Yeah,

[57:37] it's that teal colored piece on the north side, northwest side of the highway running from

[57:49] pottery road down to the gym.

[57:53] So it looks to me on the diagram that it stops before the

[57:59] gym on the uphill side of the gym. And so what I'm wondering is why would we not extend that at least

[58:07] He's down to that driveway at the gym and maybe even beyond the gym all the way down to the existing intersection of Kelleg Road and the highway to meet up with that new sidewalk that we're going to build along the east side of Kelleg Road right there at that intersection.

[58:27] I am.

[58:28] You were shipped by a apologize.

[58:30] We did not show that there was an existing sidewalk in that location already.

[58:34] So there already is a sidewalk for that entire stretch.

[58:38] We highlighted some of the existing sidewalks.

[58:40] I apologize for not highlighting that one piece as well.

[58:44] But there is a sidewalk there.

[58:49] Oh, sorry, Councillor.

[58:54] Go ahead.

[58:54] In that case, it's even a smaller job than I thought to extend that a few meters to the

[59:00] driveway or even all the way to the intersection, pass the driveway all the way to the intersection.

[59:08] Mr. Dye?

[59:09] Your worship, our intention is to connect to the network completely in that location.

[59:14] So the budget that's presented will connect the network.

[59:17] So even though it doesn't show in the diagram, you're going to extend that sidewalk all the way along

[59:25] I can't speak for certain, but I'm pretty certain there's a sidewalk in that location.

[59:33] Okay.

[59:34] Yeah, but not all the way down, and this is-

[59:36] I don't have it completely memorized each piece of the sidewalk and that network, but our

[59:41] project team is planning to connect the entire sidewalk network and the multi-use network

[59:48] through this project.

[59:49] Okay.

[59:49] Well, that little piece is quite important.

[59:51] It's a well-known danger zone for people who get to the end of the sidewalk.

[59:56] And then they

[1:00:01] Especially kids and kids on bikes. Okay.

[1:00:15] I don't see any other comments or questions on this one. Sometimes

[1:00:21] you just have to yell hooray. This is a this is a project that's obviously been on our to do this for quite a while.

[1:00:33] Personally, there's one extra element here.

[1:00:37] I'm really pleased to see the 14th Avenue, no post barriers being shifted from the

[1:00:44] north side to the south side.

[1:00:46] So I think that that in itself will lower my heart rate.

[1:00:50] So I appreciate that.

[1:00:52] That one was one that always, for me, generated significant anxiety when I would watch people

[1:00:59] crossing 14th Avenue there to get to the other side to ride behind the barriers to then cross again, and at the west side of

[1:01:13] Keltair Head Office, it was always sort of interesting to watch the antics. So thank you, Mrs. Huston, and those in the transportation

[1:01:20] the transportation department for recognizing that.

[1:01:24] So much appreciated, Councillor Gareth.

[1:01:28] Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

[1:01:29] I actually just wanted to recognize that there is one really big hooray on this one and

[1:01:34] that's the signal, the new intersection.

[1:01:38] So if anyone drives past that intersection like I do on a daily basis, especially today with school being back in,

[1:01:44] the turn lane was incredible.

[1:01:48] For people trying to turn on to pottery road because of course I can't get to the 15th Street intersection.

[1:01:53] So out of all of this, the public who was saying what is the city doing?

[1:01:58] Well, this is what we're doing.

[1:01:59] We're putting in a signal.

[1:02:01] So right at the team on this one.

[1:02:10] I just need to go back to that light blue line indication that there is a sidewalk.

[1:02:17] My, when I go up onto essentials right now, there is no sidewalk between pottery road and the gym.

[1:02:28] There is a sidewalk from there to the intersection at the end, but the light blue section is missing.

[1:02:42] There is no sidewalk there today.

[1:02:45] I'm sorry if I wasn't clear. So that magenta piece we plan to build but there is sidewalk to the, I guess, northwest along the frontage of the gym.

[1:02:58] Right.

[1:02:58] Yep, so we do intend to build that piece of sidewalk and the way that we're doing it in this project is like quite a bit more economical than what we planned originally building a wide multi-space.

[1:03:10] path, the intersection kind of gets rid of the need for that multi-use path on the highway,

[1:03:17] but we intend to connect the sidewalk fully to pottery road and up to the existing sidewalk

[1:03:24] on the frontage of the gym there. Yeah, sorry, I wasn't clear there, I apologize.

[1:03:28] Super, thank you. I just was trying to, we were trying to clarify here up on the table and I wasn't

[1:03:36] getting it all off Mike, so to speak.

[1:03:39] Good.

[1:03:39] Thank you.

[1:03:41] And I'm thank you very much for your application

[1:03:43] to the grant funding.

[1:03:46] And it's quite amazing when you get this amount of money

[1:03:51] for a project like this, so much appreciated.

[1:03:54] Thanks for your work and thanks for your work,

[1:03:56] I'm a sir on making sure that this actually came up.

[1:04:04] Council, I'll call the question.

[1:04:06] All in favor.

[1:04:07] It's it.

[1:04:08] Those opposed.

[1:04:09] Seeing none.

[1:04:09] Motion is carried.

[1:04:11] Quick question.

[1:04:12] Does this now become a 27 project?

[1:04:16] Your worship.

[1:04:17] So the way the motions written is it's amendment of the 2026 project.

[1:04:22] Yes.

[1:04:22] With approval to spend the grant funding.

[1:04:26] And then the use of some reserve funding that came back into reserve accounts from the hearing process.

[1:04:33] So you'll have design in 26 and construction in 27.

[1:04:36] That's correct. We intend to to go for competitive bids in the next couple weeks super. Thank you very much. Yeah, great

[1:04:49] project. All

[1:05:01] right. Next was the crown lease.

[1:05:04] Yes, you move it. Second. Yeah, the roses pond.

[1:05:10] Any questions from Miss are seeing

[1:05:16] none. I'll call the question. All is in favor.

[1:05:18] Those opposed motion carried much of it many of us put a lot effort into the roses pond one and it's great to see this working together so easily

[1:05:27] Next item Ken Beach the old community's strong fund grant application

[1:05:35] Can I have a motion please? Yeah? We've got councilor Durning the councilor guy

[1:05:41] Welcome Miss Price do

[1:05:46] we have any questions from Miss Price regarding

[1:05:50] can we put

[1:06:05] the concept up for those who are watching online?

[1:06:33] The only thing I was surprised

[1:06:34] about is the comment that the playground is aging out because the equipment seems to

[1:06:40] be in very good shape. We don't have chipmains, we don't have, like it's surprised, but would

[1:06:46] we use it somewhere else? Well, what will happen to the equipment from the

[1:06:50] And it can be just as it's now, Mr. Reyes.

[1:07:00] Thank you, Mr. Reyes.

[1:07:02] Thank you, Your Worship.

[1:07:03] We do have a professional risk and site inspector that does regular inspections on all of

[1:07:08] our playgrounds, even though the Ken Beach playground from a distance looks like it's in good shape,

[1:07:14] but actually has reached the end of its useful life.

[1:07:16] So there's very little there that would be salvaged for any other use.

[1:07:20] All right, thank you, and I've looked at it much closer than that because I have grandkids, but if that's like a professional sense,

[1:07:31] miss Price, any comment?

[1:07:34] No, all right.

[1:07:36] Council adjourned?

[1:07:38] Thank you, and I agree the park does need a new park from my experience up close.

[1:07:45] Also, I'm just wondering, there's a lot of hustle, it seems every season for the vendor

[1:07:51] spots down there, it being so far away from service seemingly.

[1:07:56] I'm just wondering what that will look like, how many vendors, if there's kind of an idea

[1:08:00] of what it would look like, world out for the potential vendor hub.

[1:08:06] Mr. Brighton.

[1:08:08] So right now, we have the two vendor locations pulled into the park adjacent to the playground

[1:08:12] there.

[1:08:13] And so we are looking at having two mobile vendor opportunities there as well.

[1:08:20] And then there's still some areas closer to the beach to explore other waterfront vendor opportunities there as well.

[1:08:29] So a blend of food opportunities, as well as whether that be water rentals.

[1:08:35] I was full.

[1:08:35] I'm happy to hear that we're open to that because I've heard some things over the past years.

[1:08:40] and I think staff have handled what's gone on down there well, so given us a little more

[1:08:46] open opportunity to be able to accept vendors and small businesses on wheels is kind of a

[1:08:53] great thing, so thank you.

[1:09:00] Council, any other questions? Seeing none,

[1:09:03] I'll call the question all those in favour? Those opposed motion carries. Thank you very

[1:09:07] much.

[1:09:16] We'll move now to the procurement policy update.

[1:09:19] I

[1:09:30] have a motion, please, Councillor Gareth's, Councillor Monter.

[1:09:34] Any questions from Ms. Marshall?

[1:09:39] Seeing none, I'll call the question all those in favour?

[1:09:42] Those opposed? Motion carried. Thank you for all these updates. These

[1:09:45] old pieces is important. Thank you.

[1:09:47] Yes, thank you. Your worship.

[1:09:50] Next one, advisory planning committee, finance committee, terms of reference amendments and meeting

[1:09:55] schedule. We're going to deal with the APC first.

[1:10:00] Can I have a motion please? Councilor Guy, Councilor Durning,

[1:10:06] any questions for Miss Wood or Miss Isles?

[1:10:12] Seeing none, call the question holes in favor. Those opposed? Motion is carried. And now we'll do

[1:10:18] us the finance committee terms of reference. Anything from those of us sitting on the finance committee? Any?

[1:10:24] Councilor Guy, Councilor Durning, any no questions for Miss Wood? All in favor?

[1:10:32] Those opposed? Seeing none, motion is carried. We'll move now to Fees and Charges Park

[1:10:38] Services, Bila 6062. Amendments to Fees and Charges of Bila 3909. Welcome, Ms. Walker.

[1:10:50] Council, any questions?

[1:10:55] Seeing none, I'll call for a motion. Councilor Guy, Councilor

[1:10:59] Fair,

[1:11:01] any questions from Ms. Walker saying none, all those in favor?

[1:11:09] Councillor Gidey, do you have a question before we?

[1:11:11] Councillor Gidey?

[1:11:13] Sorry, Councillor Gidey.

[1:11:15] I missed your light.

[1:11:19] Yeah, firstly, good work.

[1:11:23] Impressed with the effort and the thought that's gone into this and I really like the adjustments.

[1:11:30] I know we passed the motion in June, I think,

[1:11:33] to on the fee structures, but there's other things in there now too, and there's several

[1:11:43] new concepts here sort of at another level of granularity that I really like and for

[1:11:51] example these promotional pieces that I think are going to be great right out of the gate.

[1:11:58] And I read through it on the weekend and I originally had lots of questions, but it managed

[1:12:02] answer most of them myself, but I do have a couple that are three or four maybe that remain.

[1:12:11] So if you don't mind, I'll just flip through my hard copy and ask you the odd question.

[1:12:24] The firstly, just for clarification, we originally were going to do a 4% facility fee enhancement

[1:12:35] or facility enhancement fee for non-residents and you're recommending we change it to just to clarify that's starting in 2027 or only for 2027.

[1:12:49] And the reason I ask that is because looking at call that various tables, there's an inconsistency, sometimes that the fee is removed in the 2027 column, the 28 column, and sometimes there is still one.

[1:13:02] There's still a 4% facility fee in some of those columns for some of those categories

[1:13:08] Walker

[1:13:09] You worship so the intention is to remove it as of

[1:13:13] For 2027 onwards

[1:13:15] So we will

[1:13:17] Before the finalized copy comes we'll go through it a bit more to make sure it is all removed for 2027 onwards

[1:13:23] It's not it being removed until 2027 because we have some groups that have already paid for this year and have already signed contracts

[1:13:29] So we're working on it for a 227 forwards.

[1:13:34] Okay, thanks.

[1:13:37] That's a good, good idea, good answer.

[1:13:41] On your idea to add a rental fee for the concourse in Caltaire,

[1:13:48] play south, is this a common thing to do?

[1:13:55] Do other communities do this in their arenas?

[1:14:02] So it's common for the whole facility to have a fee, so right now our facility fee is

[1:14:08] only an arena rental fee, it doesn't really encompass the whole facility, and because

[1:14:13] CalTire plays south, differs than CalTire plays north, and there is differing requirements

[1:14:18] in that facility for rentals, we're adding it in for people that want exclusive use that

[1:14:23] are then closing it to other users like the walkers.

[1:14:25] So, if someone cannot use the concourse how it would normally be used during an ice rental,

[1:14:31] they would then be required to use the concourse as well.

[1:14:35] Right, and other communities do this, and our pricing would be consistent with what other communities charge.

[1:14:41] Yeah, so other communities do use a whole facility fee for the cost.

[1:14:46] It is in line with our subsidy recovery of 65%.

[1:14:50] Okay. I had a question about the...

[1:15:00] All rights. There's no, I didn't see any rationale. You've said that it would be $50 an hour for custom branded displays in $100 an hour, where they feature third party advertising. What are those numbers come from? What's the rationale for picking those particular numbers?

[1:15:24] First, it's too sure that we can retain some advertising up there.

[1:15:35] Currently, anyone that wants to use that for, they can use a city branded scoreboard and

[1:15:39] all of our city advertising at no cost to their rental.

[1:15:43] If they want to brand it so that it takes away from some of our advertising, there's a minimal

[1:15:48] cost of $50 an hour.

[1:15:50] And then if they're selling advertising on top of that, it does double their costs of rental as that's consistent with our commercial rates and our

[1:15:58] Because at that point it becomes a commercial cost if they're selling advertising to for the scoreboard

[1:16:05] Okay

[1:16:07] On the list of community organizations and recreation

[1:16:12] It's on page nine if the

[1:16:14] package of the memo. There's a whole long list of different sports groups there.

[1:16:22] It's not a complete list of all the sporting organizations in town, though.

[1:16:28] For example, there's rugby, people play rugby in town and they travel around

[1:16:38] different places. I don't know if they have an organization or not, maybe they

[1:16:41] don't. And the same with cricket. I see we're going to charge a new fee for using the cricket

[1:16:46] pitch, but they're part of a league as well. So would they just apply to become listed

[1:16:53] on your list? Like with this walker? There's big advantage to being on the list, obviously,

[1:16:59] right? So that used to be called our minor sports organization. We have changed the title to

[1:17:05] be kind of more in line with it being a partnership for between us and these organizations. So one

[1:17:11] One of the main factors for becoming that organization and being part of that list is

[1:17:17] being part of either a provincial sport organization or a national sport organization.

[1:17:22] And any group that has, as part of that, is welcome to apply and we have a process in

[1:17:28] place.

[1:17:29] Those organizations that you mentioned have not approached us to apply at this time.

[1:17:34] And the only new organizations on that list are Skye Volleyball as well as Okinaw and Indian

[1:17:40] The other ones were all there.

[1:17:44] Okay.

[1:17:46] On the, the Vernon resident program on page 12.

[1:17:52] The tables, table one, table two, a, table two, b.

[1:17:57] In the title of those tables, it says single use, single use rates.

[1:18:06] They're single, the title is single visit.

[1:18:11] But then there's, I just want to be clear on the terminology.

[1:18:16] We used to call that drop-in.

[1:18:17] But the word drop-in is gone now.

[1:18:20] So it's single visit, and it applies to not only the single use,

[1:18:26] the single day use, but the 10th pass and the monthly and the annual

[1:18:32] memberships, just to be clear that those are still referred to as single visits.

[1:18:38] Am I right here on the understanding terminology?

[1:18:40] Yeah.

[1:18:41] Like a, as opposed to a program where you go every Thursday or something like that.

[1:18:46] Is that what single visit means?

[1:18:48] He's in all of it.

[1:18:51] Yeah, yes, that is the intent.

[1:18:52] It's a single, because we also offer drop-in sports and drop-in programs.

[1:18:56] We wanted to differentiate between what's a drop-in facility use versus a drop-in program use.

[1:19:01] So we went to single, single visits.

[1:19:04] Okay.

[1:19:07] On under fee regulations, 0.7

[1:19:12] refers to events that require a special event permit

[1:19:16] and a $100 application fee

[1:19:19] before the permit is reviewed.

[1:19:22] And then it says if the event goes forward,

[1:19:24] it's gonna be applied to the deposit.

[1:19:26] What if it doesn't go forward?

[1:19:28] There's nothing that says what happens to that $100 if it doesn't go forward, if the event doesn't go forward.

[1:19:34] Just to walk her.

[1:19:36] Your worship, so the intent is that if it doesn't go forward, then that would, the application fee is not returned.

[1:19:44] A lot of staff time goes into those event applications and we want to make sure that when people are applying they understand what they're applying for and we can help them through that process.

[1:19:55] Yes.

[1:19:57] Okay.

[1:19:57] Thanks.

[1:19:57] We have one last quick, super quick thing on page 45, it's table 22.

[1:20:03] Under community use, this is for the ALC, this is for track rental.

[1:20:09] The three categories are adult youth and minor that we don't use the term minor anywhere else.

[1:20:14] It's called preschool in the definitions.

[1:20:20] This walker.

[1:20:21] Good catch.

[1:20:22] We will update that to say CORE, so that is a minor UCDR CORE group, so we will update that to say CORE.

[1:20:28] Thank you, thanks for catching that.

[1:20:32] Thank you, now it's your guide for Leukeannis, so careful and much appreciated.

[1:20:37] Mr. Wood, we have one of the minor adjustments, Mr. Wood.

[1:20:40] Thank you, Worship, just to clarify with Ms. Walker, all 4% facility enhancements fee should be removed from 2027 and 2028, is that correct?

[1:20:53] That's correct. On the new fees though for 2026 of the ALC, the 4% doesn't apply. It's only

[1:20:59] on current fees for the rest of the year. For 2027 and 2028. 2026 is only on current fees

[1:21:08] so the ALC won't see that 4%. Everything else as of January 1, 2027 won't be 2%.

[1:21:14] Thank you. So if it's okay with Councillor Guy and Councillor Fair who made move the motion,

[1:21:25] if we could do third as amended to remove all 4% facility fees from 2027 and 2028 and

[1:21:35] to update minor to preschool throughout the documentation document, then we will be able

[1:21:42] to give it third reading.

[1:21:45] It's an update minor to court.

[1:21:47] To court, court.

[1:21:48] Got it, thank you.

[1:21:51] That allows us to approve it,

[1:21:52] because there's some minor adjustments you made.

[1:21:56] It's okay.

[1:21:57] Move it in seconded area, fine.

[1:22:00] We've got a minor and you go on

[1:22:01] and make a motion on the amendment

[1:22:03] and then a motion or just take the all motion.

[1:22:06] Okay.

[1:22:08] We have to be okay.

[1:22:10] We're good.

[1:22:10] All right, allow me then to call the question, all those in favor, those opposed, motion carried, that says, permitted.

[1:22:21] Thank you.

[1:22:22] Thank you, Ms. Walker, and thanks for dealing with the right to tell it on the details.

[1:22:26] This has been a long discussion and probably much longer for you than it is for us, but I appreciate your comprehension of the details, much appreciated.

[1:22:35] it. Always said too much of your life on these fees and

[1:22:39] judges. Thank you so much.

[1:22:45] All right, next item is the zoning

[1:22:48] text amendment for CMU and zone, amended by law 6091. Secondary

[1:22:56] Councilor Mund,

[1:22:59] any questions from Ms. Campbell? Councilor Cutte?

[1:23:03] One, thanks, Mr. Mayor. Just one thing to clarify my

[1:23:06] understanding of the memo, I'm fine, I'm fine with changing the viola as recommended,

[1:23:11] but just to clarify, because of the provincial moratorium that exists for the next six years

[1:23:17] or whatever, it's a 2032, none of them are going to be added. No liquor stores will be added

[1:23:23] to that zone in the next six or seven years. Correct. You would have to relocate an existing

[1:23:28] approved license within BC. Okay, but it just allows us to do that. Okay.

[1:23:33] Okay, allows us to do that into that zone.

[1:23:37] Yeah.

[1:23:38] You can also do other zones, but you can bring one from somewhere else.

[1:23:41] Yeah.

[1:23:42] Yeah.

[1:23:45] Good.

[1:23:46] Miss Campbell put up with a lot of my new sense of questions at APC.

[1:23:50] So I appreciate that.

[1:23:51] We had a very deep dive into this during APC.

[1:23:55] Council.

[1:23:57] Call the question.

[1:23:58] All those in favor?

[1:23:59] Those opposed?

[1:24:00] Motion carried.

[1:24:00] Thank you, Miss Campbell.

[1:24:04] Next item.

[1:24:04] and permissive tax by law number 6089, can I have a motion, please?

[1:24:10] Councilor Mund,

[1:24:14] Councilor Dury.

[1:24:16] Thank you, sorry, there's only looking one way at once.

[1:24:18] I wouldn't pass kindergarten.

[1:24:24] Any questions from Ms. Crossin?

[1:24:28] Seeing none, call the questionals in favor.

[1:24:30] The supposed motion is carried.

[1:24:33] Thank you, Ms. Crossin.

[1:24:34] And thank you to the Finance Committee who's been looking at this in significant detail.

[1:24:42] That's Councillor Yaris. Any questions for staff?

[1:24:53] Seeing none, all those in favor? Those

[1:24:56] opposed? Motion carried.

[1:25:04] Any questions, comments?

[1:25:09] I'll call the question. All those in favor?

[1:25:11] All those opposed? Motion carried.

[1:25:16] That one we need to pause if we do that. It's a very significant

[1:25:19] one. We're creating a village center here. We've got a motion counter running. We've got a second

[1:25:24] Councillor Gai,

[1:25:28] this would be a significant thing if it goes ahead.

[1:25:32] All in favour?

[1:25:34] Those opposed? Seeing none, motion carried.

[1:25:41] Any comments on the landscape regulation

[1:25:44] update?

[1:25:47] Seeing none, call the question, those in favour? Those opposed? Motion carried.

[1:25:57] Let me get that. Councillor Ferrer.

[1:26:00] I'm going to declare a conflict of interest as BC housing owns that property and turning

[1:26:05] points is contracted, and I work for ten points.

[1:26:07] Thank you, Councillor Ferrer.

[1:26:15] Never.

[1:26:17] Miss Wood is too sharp for that. And as have the ones before, Miss Wood,

[1:26:24] confidence

[1:26:25] staff is always a good thing.

[1:26:29] Council, do I have a motion? Councilor Munn, Councillor

[1:26:32] Yarris, do I have any questions on this holiday agreement? Seeing none, call the question,

[1:26:39] All those in favor?

[1:26:40] Those opposed?

[1:26:40] Motion carried.

[1:26:42] Do you want to grab Mr. Counselor?

[1:26:43] Mr. Counselor here?

[1:26:45] What?

[1:26:46] Maybe Mr. Raul.

[1:26:54] I know.

[1:26:54] I forgot to do something.

[1:27:34] All right.

[1:27:35] We'll move now to Council

[1:27:39] updates.

[1:27:46] I need to start on my immediate right.

[1:27:51] And

[1:27:55] all of us have done a probably a few things since the 20th of July.

[1:28:08] Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So I had the honor of being the acting mayor for the last part of July.

[1:28:18] And I did want to thank our community for all their support during that time, during

[1:28:24] extreme drought and their cooperation. It's just absolutely been phenomenal, especially

[1:28:30] it's been a dire for so many and I just want to say thank you to the public for that.

[1:28:36] I was very proud to be able to be the acting mayor for the connection of the reclaimed water

[1:28:42] initiative initiated I think primarily by the city and was very happy to see that and see that

[1:28:51] active as of today that water distribution. So a real win for the citizens and a real win for us

[1:28:59] as the city of running. Also several of us were on site for the wildfire

[1:29:08] evening of the wildfire and I got to tell you it was impactful. I think that's

[1:29:15] the only word I have for it. Something I won't soon forget and my heart is the

[1:29:20] mayor says it also goes out to those people and seeing that that night was

[1:29:25] pretty horrendous and was something I've been watching kind of roll out to today even so the

[1:29:34] need is still there so we need to keep keeping supportive of that. I've also attended several

[1:29:44] events business after five. I was able to attend the Clona Airport Advisory Meeting for

[1:29:50] Councillor Monde and I never have been to that and I understand that grab one of the reasons

[1:29:54] we moved here was for.

[1:30:00] How much I didn't know about the airport and the impact on the entire region. So thank you, Councilor Munn, for giving me that opportunity, and that's all I'm going to report on today.

[1:30:15] Councillor Verne. Yeah, last week I attended two different overdose awareness events for overdose awareness day and burning. Prior to that, I attended the City of Vernon Finance Committee, Climate Action Committee, and the Youth Climate Course YCC Showcase over at the library.

[1:30:36] also completed the city's annual respectful workplace training,

[1:30:42] invited to be a guest speaker over the National Cadet Advisory Council,

[1:30:46] which was great. I attended two art exhibits, one put on by Archway Society for Domestic Peace,

[1:30:53] and the other for by the Canadian Mental Health Association.

[1:30:56] And as Councillor Dernie said, I spent some time with her volunteering

[1:31:00] hearing for that open organ Indian Vence emergency reception center at the the night of the fire and

[1:31:07] Yeah, it was definitely a very song we're experience

[1:31:10] Just to see the the trauma in real time and just my hats off to okay at the council and the fire department and everyone else

[1:31:17] That was so instrumental in responding

[1:31:25] Count you guys. Thanks, was mayor going back all the way to July 22nd. It was an already an all meeting on

[1:31:31] on the 29th GVAC held a special meeting relating to the 2026 drought and also relating to some proposed new wells in the Cold Stream Valley aquifer.

[1:31:45] Being a special meeting, it conflicted with another meeting of mine, the Climate Action Advisory Committee, so thanks to Councillor Faire for stepping in for me on that one.

[1:31:53] On August the 5th, I went down to an official opening, ribbon cutting for a segment of

[1:32:02] the rail trail running from North Kelowna, from the airport right up through into Lake

[1:32:08] Country.

[1:32:08] So there's only one tiny piece of the rail trail left to complete, and that's going to happen

[1:32:13] pretty soon.

[1:32:14] And then on the 2nd of September, the collaborative leadership table, which we're part of, this

[1:32:22] this organization of mayors and chiefs up and down the valley.

[1:32:26] There's a couple of committees that that group has, governance committee being one of them,

[1:32:31] and I'm chairing that governance committee, so we had a meeting on the 2nd of September.

[1:32:40] Councillor Gears.

[1:32:42] Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

[1:32:43] So I attended to Chamber meetings for their advocacy committee for both July and for August.

[1:32:53] I also had several meetings with the Okanagan Regional Library for discussing obviously

[1:33:00] the provincial funding, and I have good news to report, due to all the advocacy efforts

[1:33:06] that we put forward, our funding has been restored for the Okanagan Regional Library.

[1:33:13] So I think that's a good win considering that obviously they heard us loud and clear,

[1:33:19] and we're back where we were, so whatever happens moving forward, that's obviously going to be for the next board to decide, but it's a good way to kind of finish this board term.

[1:33:30] That's it.

[1:33:35] Councillor Munn.

[1:33:36] Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

[1:33:37] Again, we'll just touch on the wildfire.

[1:33:39] I just want to thank all the staff opening up the emergency center.

[1:33:43] It was, as Kelly had said, it was quite eye-opening to watch the goings on that night.

[1:33:52] Also to you Mr. Mayor for coming back off your vacation off the island coming back and dealing with situation I commend you for that it's not not easy when you have to deal with the general public when they have no idea what it takes to keep everybody save it it was emergency services did a fine job I ran to RCMP officers at the roadblocks doing a fine job everybody came together there's only so much you

[1:34:21] you can do and I think kudos to everybody who's involved and especially your staff, I went

[1:34:27] over from Elk's Lodge over to Cal Tire Place and they were flying, they had it up, all

[1:34:32] the volunteers were in place so it was well done. So, congratulations to everybody and again,

[1:34:39] my heart's go out to all those people who lost their homes out there.

[1:34:47] Councillor Garene.

[1:34:48] Thanks, Mr. Mayor. Can I just ask a question of Councillor Garene's, did other libraries

[1:34:55] get their funding restored or just just just just ours the list was long of the

[1:34:59] fund of the libraries. Yeah it was it was called major libraries when they

[1:35:04] announced it and we were considered a major library.

[1:35:12] Okay well that's straight

[1:35:13] work well then and then the other thing I forgot to mention is I I'm acting

[1:35:18] mayor next month in October but I'm going to be out of town from the 19th of the

[1:35:22] 31st so I need a sub for that period as acting mayor and my friend Teresa has

[1:35:28] kindly offered to do that for me. So I think we need a motion to make that official.

[1:35:36] Okay, seconded council guy, all in favour? Motion is carried.

[1:35:45] Okay, yeah, journey's

[1:35:48] that you did. Oh, good. Thank you for that.

[1:35:56] All right, mayor's report in for like 20th of July

[1:36:04] seems a long time ago. So that week I spent a couple of times with creative and water staff

[1:36:14] talking to agricultural operators. One night we were in cold stream hall and we had

[1:36:20] at 95 ag operators.

[1:36:23] This is the discussing the impacts of state's rewater restrictions.

[1:36:29] And I had discussions that next few days fairly extensively

[1:36:34] with some individual ag operators in the city of Vernon.

[1:36:40] And that was the beginning of discussions

[1:36:42] of what we could do with treated wastewater.

[1:36:45] I know that our staff became involved.

[1:36:47] I know that it involved a number of discussions in late July, and then I went on my holidays.

[1:36:56] I too attended the rail trail completion because I was around, like Councillor Monde, when those first decisions were made to create the rail trail.

[1:37:04] And it was really neat to see the rail trail completed through the late country.

[1:37:11] And that will have a substantial impact on the city of Vernon.

[1:37:13] And that one just be very, very important, of course, already, you know.

[1:37:18] And as Councillor Monde indicated, I had had a four-week holiday plan that after a week

[1:37:23] I was back because of the fires, and I do appreciate the emergency operations people and people

[1:37:29] who had dropped it, everything, and filed into our EOC and our ESS on Saturday, close to

[1:37:36] the August long weekend, and just quite amazing to see the work that was done.

[1:37:42] So thank you for everybody who did the emergency support services and also our emergency operations center, so much appreciated.

[1:37:51] I'm looking over to Mr. Poole, obviously those on Saturday afternoon, Saturday morning, suddenly realizing that we were going to be in something very significant and did the precautionary thing, which was to get our ESS organized in case it was called and was in a few hours it was called.

[1:38:11] So much appreciated for that.

[1:38:15] When I, as people will know, I was here most days

[1:38:20] with providing updates, connecting with the OC and our ESS

[1:38:25] and then talk to our regular basis with Chief Wilson

[1:38:29] for those who don't know.

[1:38:32] Chief Wilson did call me just in that late afternoon

[1:38:37] and he was in his truck and he was leaving the reserve

[1:38:40] and he was calling a computer evacuation and I pushed him through to Kevin Poole and

[1:38:47] then he phoned me once he got to West Kelowna on the Saturday night.

[1:38:51] So he and I have spoke many, many times since then.

[1:38:56] We've had contact with each other every few days and getting updates.

[1:39:00] I want to thank his staff who got caught in the center.

[1:39:04] They had fireable fins and their EOC was then trapped.

[1:39:08] So I want to really give my heart's glow to Colleen Martian and the whole AOC over in IR-1.

[1:39:18] So after that we'll sort of tone down a little bit.

[1:39:22] I did attend on the 25th August 25th the celebration of the Bill's Place expansion launch

[1:39:29] with my with with misheard and that was a really exciting thing.

[1:39:36] Great proposed addition to Bill's place.

[1:39:40] How many beds 36 edition?

[1:39:43] 36.

[1:39:44] Yes, so just a very, very important time with a substantial seed donation

[1:39:51] from the Ford Family Foundation.

[1:39:53] So do watch that.

[1:39:56] That will be a significant addition to that facility

[1:39:59] and a great thing for greater burden.

[1:40:03] We then, myself and Mr.

[1:40:05] immediately went to with the GROS,

[1:40:08] went to the ALC construction staff barbecue.

[1:40:13] Just as a thank you to all the construction staff

[1:40:16] at noon on the 25th, great barbecue, good food

[1:40:19] and also a chance to tour the facility again.

[1:40:22] So that was a worthwhile, and the next day, deep conversations with Minister Neal, with

[1:40:31] Minister Popham, with Minister Davidson's office, also Minister Kelly Greene's office,

[1:40:40] all related to trying to get the approval for the use of treated effluent for agriculture.

[1:40:49] culture. So over a three or four or five day process, I think I was in calls with them

[1:40:56] four or five times. I just want to thank Mr. Rice and his staff, Mr. Erd, for quickly

[1:41:03] turning that one around and being absolutely ready, the moment that we were given the

[1:41:08] go ahead and the official piece of paper to allow us to connect those two pipes. So thanks

[1:41:14] for getting it shovel ready and open and parts there

[1:41:18] and the whole system that then rolled very quickly.

[1:41:22] So thank you all.

[1:41:23] I also was in meeting with Minister Parmar,

[1:41:27] for us with Miss Hurd and Chief Wilson

[1:41:31] and Colleen Martian about the North Aberdeen Plateau

[1:41:37] and the response of BC wildfire

[1:41:39] to both the fires on the west side.

[1:41:43] And then recently I was involved with a meeting with Minister Niel with RD&O regarding possible

[1:41:52] water sources as we go forward with the expected route to last through 2027.

[1:42:02] So long discussion, chaired by Bob Fleming obviously, GVW and myself.

[1:42:11] And then the next day I was again on a call with Minister Neil regarding the Aberdeen Plateau with Chief Wilson and Mayor Ireland.

[1:42:22] The three of us are there representing the work being done on the North Aberdeen Plateau.

[1:42:29] So that is my update.

[1:42:37] Thank you for bearing with me on that. Councillor Gough.

[1:42:41] If I might add a quick comment about water to what you said, it will be a G-VAC tomorrow.

[1:42:51] There's a report in the regular G-VAC meeting about the drought itself and the drought response and the results.

[1:42:58] And it turns out that creative running water ended up managing the situation very well.

[1:43:08] residential use dropped by 60 percent. The target was 50 and overall in the distribution area,

[1:43:16] which is a burning cold stream in most of BNC, usage dropped 60 percent. And then on the

[1:43:23] ag side, the media kept talking about a 70 percent reduction, but in fact the actual use over the

[1:43:34] season was down 33% from normal, the difference between what's the allocation and what's actually

[1:43:45] used and people reported that the allocation was reduced by 70 and that may be true, but since most

[1:43:52] farmers only use roughly half of what they're allocated, the actual water use was down 33%. So great

[1:43:59] Everyone in water actually did a good job of spreading the pain of the shortage around

[1:44:04] fairly and equally and keeping us out of stage 4.

[1:44:08] Now, as you said, Mr. Mayor, we're still very, very low in terms of reservoirs and

[1:44:14] cowlake and the upper reservoirs, and with the Super El Nino strengthening and coming through

[1:44:21] fall in winter 27, it's more than likely that we're going to see a warm dry winter.

[1:44:27] And so we've really got to take some action to prepare for this, for seeing the same problem dealing with the same problem next year.

[1:44:41] And the water utility operators are recommending we stay and are going to recommend tomorrow with you back that we stay in stage three.

[1:44:50] Yes.

[1:44:55] Yes.

[1:45:00] Finish that up. There has been some misinformation about water sources that GVW has access to, and I just want to take a moment to correct the record. GVW has access to some, obviously to the

[1:45:15] Dutral Plateau and Cal Lake.

[1:45:18] They also have access to some deep water wells

[1:45:20] in the cold stream valley.

[1:45:22] And once they put everyone on stage three,

[1:45:28] they began to use those deep water wells.

[1:45:31] So people are saying, why didn't you drill any wells

[1:45:33] in the cold stream valley?

[1:45:34] Well, the answer is, they already

[1:45:36] was well drilled in the cold stream valley in the 1960s.

[1:45:40] And they were brought on stream.

[1:45:42] They come with them.

[1:45:43] they come some difficulties with water chemistry and require some different treatment and different

[1:45:49] management, but if you've been out in Lavington, you will see signs saying you're now on this

[1:45:55] well, you're now, and of course somewhere else you'll find out you're now on this well. So,

[1:46:01] great Vernon Water did access all three of their sources, and in 2027, it looks like they'll have

[1:46:09] access token on the lake through the the canoe beach intake pipe. So in 2027 it looks like

[1:46:20] they'll access to four sources. And it's important for the public to know that that

[1:46:25] creative room water applied through with friend to get access token on the lake in 2019.

[1:46:36] and it took six and a half years to get approval from the ministry to move

[1:46:41] water licenses from BX Creek to Okragan Lake. So, when people indicate well why

[1:46:47] didn't you get access to Okragan Lake, the answer is six and a half years ago we

[1:46:52] asked for it and promptly six and a half years later we got it. So, for those who

[1:46:59] feel like it's been a long time, it has been a long time and we looks like by

[1:47:04] 27 will access. We also have access to an additional source, and its temporary water sources, Mr.

[1:47:11] Rice, maybe can give us an update, which is our treated effluent. So we'll have access to

[1:47:17] yet another source in 2027 that we historically didn't. So Mr. Rice, is that still a temporary

[1:47:23] permit or where are we at in terms of that?

[1:47:26] Thank you, Your Worship. So the authorization supply reclaimed water into the Goose Lake

[1:47:30] irrigation system was for a one-year period in 2026 and it comes due in December.

[1:47:37] We are making another application shortly to extend that authorization to the end of

[1:47:43] next year.

[1:47:44] And then the hope is that should Council approve us proceeding with the amendment to

[1:47:49] the liquid waste management plan next year, it would be built in permanently into that plan

[1:47:54] and we'd have our operating certificate modified.

[1:47:56] So we don't expect that the province will give us a much pushback on the extension of the authorization.

[1:48:04] Obviously, it's really important. So that's currently where we're sitting right now.

[1:48:09] So I think it's just really important for people to understand that the Great Vroom Water has been at this for a long time.

[1:48:15] And we will have access probably in 2027 if we can probably give this permit to five different sources.

[1:48:23] and so good work is being ahead with the concern of the water in 2027.

[1:48:34] All right, we'll move now to correspondence and I see Councillor Garrison's lights on.

[1:48:40] Councillor Garrison. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just, I know that I was the one that requested this

[1:48:46] letter to be deferred, but I would like to defer it again to the September 28th meeting.

[1:48:51] And the reason why I am recommending the deferral is I had met with the DVA, and I'm doing

[1:48:59] this on behalf of Council Requiring because, of course, he's not here today.

[1:49:04] Part of the discussion that we had, although it was quite a limited discussion, the comment

[1:49:10] that you had made with regards to their funding and whether or not they would be doing matching,

[1:49:17] They would like to be able to take that to the board and they're having a board meeting

[1:49:21] on September 15th, so just after this one. So if Council is okay, if we re-defer this

[1:49:29] back to the September 28th and then we would have an update from the DVA through Council

[1:49:34] acquiring as he is there liaison to that information.

[1:49:39] Okay, move to from,

[1:49:43] all in favor, motion carried.

[1:49:47] Okay, good, thank you.

[1:49:49] All right, looking at this rather correspondence, I'd like to move that we do a letter of support

[1:49:57] to Science Center, answer a guy, any comments, all in favor, motion carried.

[1:50:07] There's minutes that are here just making you aware and seeing there's no further

[1:50:13] business. I will, as you're in the meeting.

[1:50:20] Literally, you'll shut her down.

[1:50:21] Thank

[1:50:29] you very much.

Regular Council Meeting

Agenda

Transcript