THUNDER BAY – The chair of the city's beautification committee said they were blindsided by administration's recommendation to axe advisory committees as part of its governance review.
Stephen Margarit, clean, green and beautiful committee chair, said he was shocked to learn that the committee was one of several city staff recommendations to be dissolved as part of the city's governance review.
“It was a bit of a shock to the members of our committee because our next meeting would be on the 25th, so that would be after the ratification vote," said Margarit in his deputation to council Monday.
Krista Power, director of legislative services, provided a first reading of the governance review to city council at the Monday meeting. The first reading was for council's information only. Council will be set to vote on the recommendations at their June 23 meeting.
If the governance review is passed on June 23, Power said she plans to begin transition meetings for the dissolved committees.
Power noted that the dissolution of these committees would be “in construct only.” All 10 advisory committees' work will still live on in some capacity, either through a task force or a working group.
“There have been requests for committees to move to a less colonial-like structure, removing the requirements for quorum, allowing decisions to be made by consensus, and involving all who choose to engage to participate,” Power said.
She said advisory committees are required to follow city council's procedural bylaw, which can be a barrier for members of the public.
Moving to a less formal structure, citizens would inform council through “consultation with a standing committee and or public consultation through a variety of channels,” Power said.
"I did call and email all the members of the committee, and how it was written when it came out on Wednesday, when the report was released, it just said dissolution,” said Margarit.
Margarit told council he would have liked to have a meeting before staff brought forward its governance review to get his committee members up to speed and start transitioning the committee work to something less formal.
“If council does decide to accept this motion, I think one of the things that we'd like to see is who would be taking this work forward. I think we're a very involved committee. I've happened to sit on three committees over the years, and I would say we have monthly meetings; we're very busy each month,” Margarit said.
“There are a number of times a year where we're deciding on projects. We're deciding on grant applications. I don't think that could be done by simply handing out surveys to the public. I do think it would take a task force or a working group, and we would just want that we do have some consistency so you do have that institutional knowledge going forward.”
Margarit said the clean, green and beautiful committee recently received a budget of $220,000 from council to incentivize the private and public sectors to enhance the look and feel of Thunder Bay through public art, beautification, heritage, and environmental greening initiatives.
These initiatives include various grant funding to local businesses, not-for-profits, and organizations for public art installations, as well as local high schools to make “their schools cleaner, greener, and more beautiful,” Margarit said.
“Dissolution of the recommended committees does not mean the end of the work for clean, green and beautiful, anti-racism, earthcare, or others. There are many frameworks and opportunities to engage with the community in these subject areas,” Power said.
For example, Power said the anti-racism and equity committee could become a subset of the community safety and well-being committee. As a working group, there might be a greater opportunity for citizens to connect with the city “without the constraints of quorum, appointments, notice of meetings, and all items being moved by resolution.”
Furthermore, she said that clean, green and beautiful could function as a review team that reviews all art submissions for the public art committee, which is not a committee of council.
“The goal here is to involve more community members and to meet folks where they are. Perhaps citizens will fill out a survey, participate in a town hall, but may not have the time to participate in monthly meetings,” Power said.
At-large Coun. Rajni Agarwal, who sits on the clean, green and beautiful committee, asked if city staff had any conversations with advisory committees about why some of these committees could not meet quorum.
Power said the clerk's office handles the development of the committee agenda and meetings. When there is a meeting scheduled where a committee does not meet quorum, her office will try and find alternative dates to hold the meeting.
She also noted that a lack of citizen interest in committee work is a trend occurring throughout Ontario.
“The pandemic changed many of our lives in the sense of what is available to us in our time that is free to us to be able to volunteer. And our folks choose to volunteer in different ways. When we completed the survey with the public, one of the things that was evident from those results was that more members noted that they would be more willing to attend a focus group or to fill out a survey than they would be to attend a committee,” Power said.
The city put out a public survey on the proposed changes to its governance structure in March. The results have not yet been published.
Agarwal followed up on her question by asking about the transition of committee work on the staff.
“How do we continue that engagement as robust as it is from the different perspectives that we're getting at the committee level work right now?” Agarwal asked.
Power said that “not every committee in the city of Thunder Bay needs to be a council advisory committee.”
“We are hearing from some individuals through the survey and also through individual connections with committee members that they would like to see an opportunity for meetings to be more nimble, more fluid, co-chairs' ability to build by consensus,” Power said.
