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HomeMy Public PortalAboutCOW A 2014-09-18 1 MUNICIPALITY OF THE DISTRICT OF CHESTER COMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE Thursday, September 18, 2014 – 8:45 a.m. AGENDA 1. MEETING CALLED TO ORDER. 2. MINUTES OF PREVIOUS MEETING: 2.1 Committee of the Whole – September 4, 2014. 3. MATTERS ARISING. 4. CAO REPORT: 4.1 CAO Report (to follow) 5. CORRESPONDENCE: 5.1 Grant Request – The B.O.R.C. Project (appointment at 9:00 a.m. with David Brun). 5.2 Grant Request - All Nova Scotia Green Christmas Trees Co-op Limited (appointment at 9:30 a.m. with Devry Russell). 5.3 Grant Request – The Society for the District 1 Community Centre (re submitted application with additional information). 5.4 Invitation from Mahone Island Conservation Association dated September 15, 2014 regarding 2014 Gala Dinner & Auction Tickets. 5. NEW BUSINESS. 6. ADJOURNMENT. APPOINTMENTS ARRANGED 9:00 a.m. David Brun, B.O.R.C. Project regarding grant request (see item 5.1) 9:30 a.m. Devry Russell, Director/Board Member of All Nova Scotia Green Christmas Trees Co-op Limited regarding grant request (see item 5.2) In Camera following regular session under Section 22 of the MGA if required DATE: TO: FROM: DEPARTMENT: SUBJECT: MUNICIPALITY OF THE DISTRICT OF CHESTER MEMO September 18, 2014 Committee of the Whole Erin Beaudin Office of the CAO and Municipal Clerk CAO Report 1. Maintain a high level of fiscal responsibility; Staff have submitted all financial reports required by the Province for the 2013-14 fiscal year. 2. Continually improve public satisfaction with municipal services; The external audit fieldwork for our ISO Certification has taken place and the draft report of the findings will be in hand this week. It is expected that certification will take place in early October. Staff will be presenting this project as a best practice at the AMANS Conference in Digby in October; The Municipality has been working with the new route supervisor for GE's All Trucking. The addition of this individual has been extremely beneficial. Our calls and complaints have been reduced significantly based on his direct involvement with the collection on a daily basis; We are going to do a re-evaluation of the format for day camps. Typically we offer three hour programs and we had some success but we also cancelled some programs due to low registration. We want to make sure we are offering programs that meet the needs of families in the community. 3. Ensure sufficient infrastructure is available to best serve our residents and businesses; Cell 3A - It is estimated that the project will be approximately 10% over budget. Over expenditures are associated with variances in tender quantities (i.e. excavation of unsuitable material and rock, design change in berm and underdrain, valving and the existing cell 2 cap). The project is going very well, and should be completed by Oct 10th, 2014; Anvil Park - The drainage system, sidewalk, rock wall and bridge have all been repaired or replaced, and the focus is now on improving the esthetics of the Park. It should be noted that there was significant undermining of the sidewalk adjacent to the drainage issue, therefore fixing the drainage issue resulted in avoiding a sidewalk collapse; Pump station and sewer main cleaning/videoing is taking place in the month of September. Based on lessons learned from last year, residents have been notified prior to the work being completed; The Chester Basin wharf assessment has been completed and we are awaiting the report; Aspotogan Wharf repairs, as per last year's assessment report, have been scheduled for September 2014; Former Gold River School renovations - 90 % design has been completed and a report on costing is pending from the Community Development Department and is scheduled to be in front of Council next week; The Zoe Valle Library roof replacement will be tendered in September; Staff have nearly completed the repair of all manholes in Western Shore that require repair this year 50 manholes) and staff will be moving onto Chester manholes soon; Our new truck was tendered and ordered and should be here in September 2014; We have followed up with residents regarding the new sewer charge method. We have received approximately 100 phone calls and inquiries as a result and have been responding accordingly; We tendered contracts for sludge removal, sewer cleaning and videoing, sidewalk and road winter maintenance; We are in the process of tendering the truck and vehicle inspection and repair and surveying contracts; The odour issue at the Chester Treatment plant has been resolved; The Bluenose Coast wayfinding signs have been installed, along with associated picnic tables; We have processed 14 sewer connection or disconnection permits this year; Trails - we have installed bridge signs, trail signage and completed brush cutting in Hubbards. 4. Strengthen and support environmental, cultural, and social resources; We had a really good summer staff team this year and they organized some great events and activities for the community. There were about 30 participants in both the skateboard and scooter Competition (they came from all over Nova Scotia). The August Sizzler at Bayswater Beach was a huge success even though it had to be postponed twice due to poor weather conditions. The Movie Night at Graves Island had about 80 attendees and the Teddy Bears Picnic at Lordly Park had about 20 kids; Picnic in the Park" was offered for the second year and there was tremendous community support and good attendance (there was a nice article in the August 20 issue of the South Shore Breaker). This was also the second year for the "Lightnings' Strike" Kayak program and it was once again filled to the max with eager young paddlers. 124 seniors attended the Seniors Picnic at the Barn; A 3 km section of trail from the Hubbards trail head to Graves Road is just about completed. It is hoped that the Walker Cut slope repair project will be completed this Fall as well as an additional 3 km of resurfacing in Western Shore; The Destination trail work has continued over the summer. The name selected is the "Rum Runners Trail" which has great tourist appeal and link to some local history. The logo is almost finalized and the next phase is signage design and installation and website creation; The bush cutting on the New Ross trail started on Friday, September 5 in partnership with the New Ross Regional Development Society. The trail is now more open and easier to navigate, especially at the entrance to the trail where there was significant growth; Norm Collins, Crosswalk Safety Advocate (crosswalksafety.ca), made a presentation to Council on a Crosswalk Safety Program. The idea is to have small flags available on each side of the crosswalk and when you cross you take a flag with you to make yourself more visible to oncoming traffic. Council liked the idea and approved $1000 for the Active Living Coordinator to work with Norm and the community to implement the program at our major crosswalks in the Municipality. We have initiated several conversations with potential community partners and now have an inventory of flags; A second round of facility access funding was made available to Lunenburg Queens through NS Health Wellness. The intent is to try and increase the number ofpeople visiting major sport and recreation facilities in the Province. Two direct benefits for the Municipality of Chester is some funding towards a drop-in curling time at the Chester Club as well as some funding to help support transportation to our facilities. In addition, there are still some skate passes for the rink available from this past Winter and the New Ross Family Resource Centre is using some funds for orientation to their fitness centre; Data entry for South Shore Connect continued over the Summer with only a few gap areas remaining. Recreation Department staff will receive training to assist with the ongoing maintenance of the site and to be the local support. Two "South Shore Connectors", Marika Nicolov and Turker Mertens, were hired for the Summer to travel the South Shore and document (photos, videos and blog) their adventures and all the great recreation opportunities in the region. Some of their trip highlights are available on southshoreconnect.ca and the remaining details will be integrated into the site prior to the official launch later this Fall; Over the summer months we received donations from the Chester Oldies Hockey Group, Hottest Night of the Year (proceeds split between PRO Kids and Chester Juniors Racers/ Sailors), New Ross School BBQ, Casual Days Donation from the Municipality and Memorial donations in memory of Spencer Houghton. Our PRO Kids Coordinator is processing a lot of applications as Fall is typically our busiest season for PRO Kids requests with many activities starting up for the year; The call for members for the new Citizen Planning Advisory Committee has gone out. We have had an announcement run in both the Progress Bulletin and the South Shore Breaker. It has also run in the September/ October newsletter and is posted on the website. The deadline for applications is September 24. As mentioned to Council last week, Sean Gillis has joined Community Development as a Planner. He has been working on the work plan, scoping and branding for the plan review process. The plan review has been branded as reVISION - Some Community Assembly Required reVISION - 4! O//////O//O/////O///////////O/O/O/0000000al a n Review Some Community Assembly Required S. Continually reinforce the positive image of the Municipality through leadership in public engagement and communication We are in the process of working on changes to our website structure as part of our re -design; Jennifer did CTV Morning Live twice; Staff have created a welcome folder and base for a "touristy" postcard for use by the Municipality and the Chamber of Commerce. There is still work to do, but the template has been seen by all; The latest Newsletter is about to go out; Staff assisted the New Ross Regional Development Society with an RFQ for website design. We also took part in shortlisting, evaluating, and selecting a designer; We designed and sent an insert for the tax bill summarizing our budget; Staff wrote and published a press release re VIC funding and our partnership with the Chamber; Staff corresponded a few times with Town of Lunenburg's Engineer regarding the clear bag program residential engagement timeline and implementation; Twitter followers - 510; Facebook likes - 272; website - 2,288 users in one month. Top five pages viewed: recreation, employment, general contact/department information, calendar, and Agendas/Minutes. 6. Promote conditions conducive to fostering economic prosperity. Village Business Core Water Project o We have determined a few cost scenarios to discuss with potential users of the system; o Councillor Armstrong is assisting Marianne in reaching out to the businesses and residents within the proposed service area. BRE: Marianne continues to meet with local businesses; First Impressions Project: The signs are almost complete. We have received many positive comments on the signs installed in the Village of Chester. We are planning to install the Hubbards signs this week and then will move on to coordinate the installation of the benches and bike posts; Haven Event: The Haven event, organized as a partnership with the Chester Municipal Chamber, Haven and the Municipality, was a great success. Over 300 attended the September 13th event and approximately $3000 was raised for the Chester District School Breakfast Program. Events Lunenburg: We continue to meet to create this new group. We have made a submission to secure the bid for NS Music Week 2016 and 2017 and are meeting with the event organizers to pitch hosting in Lunenburg. Agriculture: We continue to work with the Climate Data Study. We are using this information to plan a spring 2015 event in partnership with MODL and Queens to encourage new entrants to the area; Forestry: We are working with a local business who is at the early stage of a potential community project; Community Profile: We are developing an information package that can be used both in print and electronically for business attraction; Business Conference: We are working with the Chamber to plan a business conference for November 2014. We are using BRE information to select topics of interest to the business community; Industrial /Business Park RFP: This project is still pending funding approval from NSERDT. 7. Ongoing operational updates Bruce Forest has been working with Region 6 on a response to the Province's call for comments on proposed changes to the Solid Waste Act. The Municipality will also be working on a formal response; The community was saddened by the news of a death on our trail on September 1. Fourteen year old Spencer Houghton was killed in an ATV accident on the Chester Connection Trail in Chester Basin. Our thoughts and prayers are with the family at this difficult time; The Municipality of Chester is the host organization for the South Shore Regional Physical Activity Coordinator. The former RPAC, Andre Bouchard, resigned in August and took a position with the Town of Kentville to be closer to his family in the Valley. The hiring process is underway to hopefully fill the vacancy by early October; The Municipal Building painting is near completion; All Community Development Staff participated in a mandatory Laserfiche training session. The planning division staff will also receiving AMANS records management training from Dan Pittman. In addition, staff has developed a file management process that has been documented and is in the process of implementation. All of this will allow us to be in a position to ensure we are in a position to comply with ISO requirements; Tara Maguire and Sean Gillis will be attending a citizen engagement workshop sponsored by UNSM and Engage Nova Scotia. The workshop promises to help participants learn about public engagement at the municipal level (why it's important, when you ought to do it, how to do it and who can help); Once again, Dalhousie University's Management Without Borders class has opted to work with the Municipality. The students will be working with Community Development staff to develop a water resources and environmentally sensitive area protection plan for the MODC. The project originates from the ISCP, and subsequently, the Strategic Plan. The work will also support reVISION and will be used as part of the background documentation and in policy development; Fire Presentation activities are underway with the Fire Departments and other response agencies. Fire Prevention week is October 5-11. All Councillors are invited to the kick-off event, a Meet and Greet at Chester Shore Mall on October 5 from 11am-2pm; Safety is Everyone's Business. Staff's commitment to our Safety Policy and Program, reporting hazards and incidents for corrective and preventative action, and most importantly working safely everyday really counts! As of September 1st, we have recorded over 42,000 work hours since our last lost time accident. Most Departments are now having safety discussions and training at their regular staff meetings. This is a great indicator that more people are getting involved each day; FAC is finalizing the By -Laws for several departments, with a primary focus on Western Shore; Work continues on the proposed EAP program for fire fighters; We have published a fire commission reference binder to assist new commissioners. The binder is also in the process of being set up as a web -based document for easy access; The Fire Service Coordinator is working with his peers across the Province to share information and best practices. They are also working toward common resolutions for fire services issues at the Provincial Level. They are setting up the third fire service coordinators meeting in conjunction with FSANS. There are 10 municipalities, and with the inclusion of the Provincial Fire Marshall, there will be 11 participants.