Mayor’s Address to Halton Hills Chamber of Commerce Annual Mayor’s Luncheon

Madam President and Members of the Halton Hills Chamber of Commerce, Members of Council, invited guests and ladies and gentleman.

It is hard to believe that a year has passed since I last appeared before the Chamber to deliver this “State Of The Town” address. It has been a very busy time.

The new Town Council 2010-2014 has been in office for a year and in my opinion, has made significant progress on the work they intend to do during this 4-year term. Before getting into detail on Council’s efforts to date, let me express my gratitude to the Halton Hills Chamber of Commerce for once again allowing me to address the business community and the residents of the Town.

As always, Town Council appreciates the opportunity it has to work with the Chamber to strengthen the role of business in the Town. Business is a great contributor to the Town’s quality of life through the provision of jobs, economic activity and support to many community causes. This year 30 new business entrepreneurs took the plunge and invested in Halton Hills.

I also wish to thank my Town Council for their ongoing support and guidance and to that end may I please take a moment to introduce the Members that are here:

Ann Lawlor, Joan Robson, Clark Somerville, Bryan Lewis, Mike O'Leary, Jane Fogal, Dave Kentner, Bob Inglis (regrets), Jon Hurst, Moya Johnson

Members of Council thank you very much for the excellent work you have done in the year past and for your help in “Moving the Town’s Agenda” forward. I would also like to thank Town Staff for their fine service in making this a great Town to live and work in and for Staff’s support of Council in addressing concerns, questions and complaints.

Last year I had indicated that the “years ahead” would be marked by terrific opportunities and really tough challenges. That has sure been the case.

Particularly the “really tough challenges” part.

When doing a “State of the Town” report, one must indicate what has been achieved in the year past as well as set out some of the expectations for the year ahead.

a)Major Council Initiatives
Council had many initiatives over the last year; there were three particular major initiatives that I wish to mention as I begin the year in review.

First it was councils bold and some may say courageous initiative in adding a special dedicated levy to the Town tax bill in 2011; additional tax toward the expansion of the Georgetown Hospital to enable an increase of the size and layout of the Emergency Department and for the housing of the CT Scanner and for a better layout and patient friendly diagnostic imaging service. The Town was told that significant government funding was needed and a Town capital contribution could be very persuasive in getting the Province to make a capital contribution that would enable the project to proceed along with the funds that the hospital itself can provide by major fundraising by the Georgetown Hospital Foundation and the Hospital Auxiliary. The Town’s levy will contribute $2.68 million.

On behalf of Council and the Town, I became a “pest” with the Minister of Health and together with the fruits of the local MPP Ted Arnott, and the local Liberal Candidate in the elections, Councillor Moya Johnson was able to obtain a commitment of $2.6 million towards this much needed hospital expansion. I mention this initiative because Council provided for this special Grant even though hospital funding is not within the Town’s core mandate. However Council saw this great need in the community and decided to play a role in providing funds and then in persuading the Minister of Health that the Ministry should come through with funds as well so that the hospital expansion can proceed. We got our money and this was NO SLAM DUNK as we competed with over 80 + hospital projects in Ontario. If we didn’t put our money where our mouth is we may have had to wait 9-10 years for funding.

The second Council initiative was to fight the GTA West Corridor Transportation Strategy that included 4 -3 highway.

This new proposal corridor referred to “Alternative 4-3”, myself and Council took a strong stand against that alternative as far as “slicing across the entire agricultural and rural fabric of Halton Hills” indicated that it should not be put in place. No benefit to HH.

After many letters from myself along with a Halton Hills and Halton Region resolution to adamantly oppose this 4-3 superhighway, plus 9,500 postcards sent to Minister Wynne as well as 500 lawn signs the Minister of Transportation announced that the strategy would be put on hold and that a further analysis investigation done with respect to the corridor including the Town’s position that the need at the western end could be satisfied by the expansion of the 401 corridor without the need to have brand new corridor across the breath of the rural and agriculture area of Halton Hills. We would fight this on issue NOT on emotion but on reasonable facts. We hired consultants that have proved the 401 can be widened.

Met with the Minister Chiarelli, I expressed our concerns the land use impacts, i.e. residential, farm, cultural, heritage and natural heritage system. I told the Minister that not only is the Town of Halton Hills adamantly opposed but so are Halton Region and Milton by resolution of council. That we will continue to fight if need be but we are here to come up with a solution. The Minister proposed a two stage process. The key message is that he will seriously re-consider the options. This is huge for us. He will Focus on specific routes. We have proved the 401 can be widened using consultants that are employed by the Ministry in other parts of Ontario Windsor and Essex. He will have “sober second thought” with respect to that strategy before moving forward on that matter again.

He is committed to meet with me again in 6 months. It helps that he is a former Mayor. This is the quickest response to an issue in my time as Mayor by any Minister. He knows how upset we are with the 4 -3 proposal. His people will now contact our people and go over the findings or our consultant’s reports on the widening of the 401 which incidentally will not impact one building presently built on the 401.

The third major initiative by Council during the last year was the decision by Town Council to decommission the Memorial Arena and seek redevelopment of the Memorial site as part of a land disposition strategy. While it is always a difficult decision to get rid of a significant part of the Town’s history, Council made this courageous decision knowing that the refurbishment of the Memorial Area is just too expensive for the Town to undertake and that the site itself was needed to help with the funding of new facilities like the new arenas.

GO update on the Acton Station. Third party agreement as Hide House is included. GO is committed to coming to Acton.

Moving now to the initiatives within the various service areas of the Town:

b)Economic Development

• Business Retention and Expansion is vitally important to our community . The Town continues to support industrial expansion by discounting the Development Charges, eliminating D/Cs for all expansions, reducing development fees by 50% and in some cases using the Manufacturers Expansion Fund to the pay some of the development fees.

• What is not generally understood about attracting new development to the 401 Corridor is that the Town is not a landowner by rather a very interested third party. We do not set the prices, the terms of the deal or the motivation of the buyers and sellers but we do play an important role.

• We help bring the parties together, make sure that the zoning and services are in place and offer limited financial support by amortizing development charges. When an announcement is made it is the culmination of many months of behind the scene work by Council and staff. And while we did not get the Target Warehouse, the developers of the site First Gulf recognized the long term value of the property and have formally purchased the land.

• First Gulf along with their financial partner are now actively promoting this location knowing that the zoning is in place and that Steeles Ave will be reconstructed next year due in part to the efforts of Halton Hills. While we would love to get every proposal that comes to the Town of Halton Hills the market is extremely competitive and we do everything possible to put “our best foot forward” each and every time.

• Shopping locally is important to Halton Hills and the Shop-Local campaign of which I have been a part has increased the awareness of keeping the dollars in town and I thank the Chamber for being such an ardent supporter.

• In spite of the economic challenges locally, provincially, nationally and globally, Halton Hills remains a desirable place to work and live and I will continue to promote our business community any chance I get.

Recreation and Parks

Youth
• Council was formally recognized at Queens Park in the Fall of 2010 for our community achieving Youth Friendly Status in 2010. Council undertook a Youth Needs Study in 2011 with support of key stakeholders in the Community. The MYAC priority for 2012 is to work with the business community to engage them in Youth Friendly strategies.

Seniors
• Council adopted a Seniors Space Needs Strategy in 2010 which supports the need for the expansion of the Acton Seniors Recreation Centre and the construction of a Seniors Centre as part of the proposed Phase 2 Gellert Community Centre Expansion. In 2011 the Centres’ Boards of Directors joined forces and developed a Joint Capital Campaign to support the construction costs.

Arenas – 369 hours of ice time booked out of town from Acton and Georgetown

• The Town’s Arena Development Program is making excellent progress under the direction of the Arena Steering Committee. The Construction Managers for the Project – Melloul Balmey Construction Ltd- have worked successfully with the Town on a number of past projects, including the Acton Arena, Mold-Masters SportsPlex Rink B addition, the Acton Library, and the Georgetown Public Library/ Cultural Centre renovations that is presently underway.

• The architect and engineering services for the Mold-Masters SportsPlex Twin Rink Expansion is being handled by MacLennan Jaunkalns Miller Architects – who successfully designed arenas in Woolwich, Aurora, North Kawartha, Innisfil, as well as the Milton Leisure Centre.

• The design and engineering work on the new Twin Pad is now underway with a target to break ground by June of 2012. The work will continue through the next year in order to be complete and ready for use in the fall of 2013.
Parks and Open Space

• On the capital development side, Trafalgar Sports Park now has a total of 11 soccer fields (3 lit), a major lit ball diamond.

• Hungry Hollow trails are still popular. A new pedestrian bridge over Silver Creek is currently being installed and will link the Dawson neighbourhood to Miller.

• Studies are underway for Tolton Park in Limehouse to determine the extent of remediation required to rehabilitate the former salvage yard site. Public meetings have been held to solicit community input.

Infrastructure Services

• Edith Street Parking lot – Over 70 spaces to serve the Georgetown Downtown Area was built using an environmentally conscious design consisting of permeable pavers, LED lighting and provision for future car charging stations – 60 % Federal money.

Other initiatives in Infrastructure Services include:
• Working with MTO for improvements on Highway 7 between Georgetown and Acton;

Fire Services
• Construction on the expansion and renovation of the Acton fire station was completed in 2011. This included a Heritage Room and Fitness Room.
• Recently, the Fire Department unveiled the “Home Safe Home” Courtesy Fire Safe Inspection Program” as part of this years Fire Prevention Week.
o Early reports indicate that our trial program was well received by the affected residents.
• There was also the hiring of two new full time firefighters as we attempt to increase the complement of full time staff in conjunction with our dedicated part-time firefighter staff.

Corporate Services
• Council approved a Long Range Financial Plan to 2021 that was completed in May of this year. The Long Range Financial Plan is a comprehensive financial plan that contains statements of strategies, principles and policies to guide Council in its long term financial decision making.

• A Citizen Survey was conducted by telephone in October. The survey indicated overall satisfaction with the Town and Town services and it will be presented to the Town Council on December 12th. The survey will be used as a performance measurement tool as it will compare the survey results done in 2011 with the results of the 2005 survey.

• Council and Staff are also currently undertaking a comprehensive review of the Business Licensing By-law as I promised last year. The intent of the review is to see what is currently working and whether it is beneficial to continue to license certain types of business classes. We have also looked at what other municipalities in the surrounding areas are licensing or not licensing and why. The big question is whether the license control measures reduce or eliminate potential health and safety risks to our residents.

Planning, Development and Sustainability

To accomplish this, we have made significant progress in sustainability in implementing the Halton Hills Green Plan. The Green Plan is a practical document and provides a blueprint for taking actions that demonstrate leadership on environmental protection and enhancement. We have already taken action on about 91% of the Green Plan’s 70 recommendations. In 2011, just a few of our proudest accomplishments have included being

• Recognition of our initiatives with numerous awards, including those from Credit Valley Conservation, Halton Conservation and Metrolinx. Halton Hills’ leadership on sustainability is being noticed well beyond our borders.

• Recently, for example, our initiatives were featured in two Canadian magazines that have a combined circulation of about 1.8 million readers. This is a significant achievement!

• Advancement of our Community Sustainability Strategy. Through this very unique community-led initiative, we have listened to the hopes and dreams of our residents for a more sustainable future. Our Sustainability Advisory Committee volunteers have successfully engaged about 1,200 residents in the “Imagine Halton Hills Survey” alone.

• Approval of a ‘sustainability lens’ that is applied to various Town decisions in order to make sure that Council considers the environmental, economic, social and cultural implications. Halton Hills is a leader in this area.

• Implementation of the award-winning Green Development Checklist to elevate the environmental performance of new residential development through greater water and energy efficiency. Today, about 800 homes are already being planned to achieve this higher ‘made-in Halton Hills’ standard.

• Support of local agriculture through the Halton Fresh Food Box program, through which Town staff have already purchased over 6,000 pounds of fresh produce.

Other Planning and Development matters there have been:

• Success in obtaining additional water servicing allocation of 1,200 Single Detached Equivalent (SDE) units of water from Halton Region for new growth in Halton Hills.

Library Services
• The new Acton Branch Library was built on time and on budget, officially opened to great acclaim in 2011. The Acton Branch Library has seen an astounding increase in use. Year-to-date, the borrowing of items has increased 133%! And it’s not just the inside of the Library that’s proving to be very popular. Thanks to a generous donation from Holcim/Dufferin Aggregates, we were able to build a lovely terraced green on the site of the old Library. The new Acton Branch Library has been an unqualified success, and we expect it to be a source of civic pride for many years to come.

• The Georgetown Branch Library is under re-construction. It should re-open in late 2012. Like the new Acton Branch Library, the new Georgetown Branch Library will triple in size, be fully accessible, and offer a wider range of collections and services including additional Internet stations, study rooms, and larger reading areas and program spaces. It too will be a very ‘green’ library, with geothermal heating/cooling, and other features that conserve energy and water.

As to 2012 and Beyond
Your Town Council has also been very active in establishing the Town’s direction for the future. Town Council has done this by updating the Strategic Plan for the Town. The plan has been reviewed that and reaffirmed the Vision for the Town.

COMMUNITY VISION TO 2031
Halton Hills is a vibrant and distinctive small Town in the Greater Golden Horseshoe
• characterized by its spectacular countryside, natural heritage system and cultural heritage;
• enriched by its unique blend of urban and rural interconnected communities and neighbourhoods; and
• supported by its prosperous employment areas.

The Mission was reconfirmed and that is providing community leadership on issues of concern and delivering a broad range of public services in equally important strategic directions. The Council reaffirmed the original 8 strategic directions and added a ninth.

Those nine strategic directions are:
a) To Foster a Prosperous Economy
b) To Preserve, Protect and Enhance our Environment
c) To Preserve, Protect and Enhance Agriculture
d) To Preserve, Protect and Enhance our Countryside
e) To Foster a Healthy Community
f) To Preserve Protect and Promote our Distinctive History
g) To Achieve Sustainable Growth
h) To Provide Sustainable Infrastructure and
i) To Provide Responsive, Effective Municipal Government

The Council then reviewed the strategic actions to 2031 that had been developed to make progress with respect to the nine strategic directions and adopted a “Top Ten” list for this particular term of Council to 2014.

Those Ten Strategic Actions for this term of Council are;

1. Excellent Municipal Service Delivery
2. Communications Resource and Strategy
3. 401 Corridor Employment Area Development
4. Acton Quarry After Use
5. Sustainability
6. Georgetown Future Residential Area Planning (Secondary Plan)
7. Growth Financing
8. Economic Development Strategy
9. Community Improvement Plan Implementation
10. Specialized Transit

Each of those ten Strategic Actions from which this Council is to concentrate on during this term has many components which time will only permit made to address a certain number of those components.

Municipal Service Delivery System

The “Bread and Butter” and “Meat and Potatoes” of any Municipal Council is the delivery of its municipal services. The expectation is that those services will be delivered in an effective, efficient and economical manner. In the upcoming year the highlights of that municipal service delivery system will be to try and provide municipal service delivery in keeping with the projected long term financial plan at an increase of approximately 5.5% in the Town Levy this year. The overall, and I emphasize the overall municipal tax levy including ALL municipal services that are delivered locally, regionally and through education will be at approximately the rate of inflation; - 2.5%. This is being accomplished without service cuts. Unlike the turmoil we read everyday in Toronto.

As part of the municipal service delivery this coming year, there will be the commencement of construction of the twin pad arena at Mold-Masters and the completion of construction of the Halton Hills Main Branch Library and Cultural Centre in downtown Georgetown, both of which I referred to earlier. As well there will be Road construction, Bridge replacement, Storm Sewer reconstruction, sidewalks, trails, playgrounds, increased aquatic and fitness programs, new firefighters, equipment replacement and new secondary plans as part of the upcoming service delivery budgets.

The continuing challenge for Halton Hills Council however, is to provide an effective service delivery in the face of increased growth despite the need to be economical and despite continuing unfunded service mandates from the Province.

Communications Resource and Strategy

Last year I spoke to the increasing expectation of the community for greater community engagement in the proposals for the planning of the new areas of the community and for determining municipal services and standards for the community. The way to achieve that increased community engagement is through the use of the broader communication tools now available through the Social Media in addition to the traditional media such as the Independent and Freepress, The New Tanner, Cogeco and the Town’s website. The explosion with respect to the use of Social Media tools and their more sophisticated use in an integrated fashion begs the question as to when the Town itself will become involved in major social media use in order to better inform and engage its citizens. Facebook, Twitter, Flicker, YouTube, Blogs, Survey Monkey, Go to Meeting amongst many others, all offer great opportunities to the Town if the Town can only take advantage of them.

The way to do that is to create a professional marketing and communications dedicated to greater accountability, transparency and public engagement. Whether Council deems this to be affordable remains to be seen. However it has been made the number two strategic action to be addressed by Council during this Council term.

401 Corridor Employment Area Development

The Third Strategic Action of Council this term is the need to stimulate more development in the 401 corridor employment area. To that end, Council hopes to review the existing secondary plan. Greater development in the 401 corridor will require expedited extension of Regional water and wastewater services to that corridor. It will also require partnerships with the private sector in the showcasing of that area.

Many of you will have heard of the two exciting proposals for high end outlet malls from Premium Outlets and Tanger Outlets of the United States. Those projects are seeking planning approval now and it is hoped that Halton Hills will see at least one if not both of these Outlet Malls as Gateway Destination projects coming to fruition in Halton Hills in the next two years.

Acton Quarry After Use

The Fourth Strategic Action is related to the Acton Quarry. There is a recognition by this Council that subject to the science which will determine whether technically the Acton Quarry Expansion can be done in an environmentally responsible manner, there could be opportunities from such an expansion, should it occur in terms of the long term after use of the site once aggregate quarrying is completed. To that end agreements will have to be negotiated with Holcim, the owner of the Acton Quarry, to achieve those longer term benefits. Maybe even get the gravel trucks out of Georgetown.

Sustainability

The Fifth Strategic Action is Sustainability. I have previously spoken to the creation of a Town lead, Community Owned Integrated Community Sustainability Strategy. That exercise is underway and hopefully will be completed in 2012.

One of the major initiatives with respect to sustainability that I will bring to Council is a recommendation for the creation of a Community Energy Initiative.

In progressive municipalities there is a recognition that a reliable, sustainable energy supply is and will continue to be a key ingredient in the long term competitiveness and prosperity of the municipality.

I am presently researching those Community Energy Plans and Initiatives in order to make a proposal to Council as to how we might proceed with that Strategic Action in Halton Hills and to do so in conjunction with our own Halton Hills Community Energy Corporation.

Georgetown Future Residential Area Planning (Secondary Plan)
The Sixth Strategic Action relates to the planning for the new Georgetown Urban area that has been added by the Regional and Local Official Plans to 2031. This is the 1000 acres.

There is a need to begin a major planning exercise to create the secondary plan that will guide the development of those near urban areas.

Council is united in expecting that the future requires a different approach to the development of those new urban lands.

There will be a greater need for a community designed to increase community building with community gathering places, community gardens, a community that is walkable and cyclable and a community that uses state of the art sustainable development guidelines.

Growth Financing
The Seventh Strategic Action relates to growth financing. For over 35 years there has been an expectation that new residential growth should pay for itself. In the first instance municipalities in the GTA used lot levies and in many cases were very successful in making growth not only pay for itself but also to help retrofit existing infrastructure.

Then the Province came along and decided to regulate lot levies by passing the Development Charges Act. However, the Province reduced the size of lot levies by excluding certain infrastructure and reducing the amount that could be charged by way of development charges related to other infrastructure. The Province also mandated that past standards for infrastructure be used as opposed to state of the art sustainable infrastructure standards at the date of development. Town Council wishes to advocate to the Province to reexamine the Development Charges Act and address its deficiencies. So that the principal of growth “paying for itself” gets restored.

Economic Development Strategy
Another Strategic Action is the development and implementation of a new Economic Development Strategy. The present Economic Development Strategy for the Town is out of date and requires a rewrite. Town Council is hopeful of developing that new Economic Development Strategy during the year 2012.

Community Improvement Plan Implementation
The ninth strategic action relates to the promoting of new business attraction and existing business expansion through the use of the “Community Improvement Plan”. In the past I have spoken to the Chamber and indicated that Council had adopted a new Community Improvement Plan that was very broad and had significant tools available to help with new business attraction and existing business expansion in some of the more challenging areas of the Town; namely the downtowns, existing business parks in Acton and Georgetown, the Guelph Street Corridor and Intensification and Brownfields areas.

The Town has been stalled in implementing the Community Improvement Plan by the Planning process now underway at the Region otherwise known as ROPA 38 which now has ministerial approval and likely OMB appeals. It is extremely important that both the Region and the Town come together in implementing the tools of a Community Improvement Plan so as to maximize the new investment available.

Specialized Transit
The final Strategic Action chosen by this Council to concentrate on for this term is a potential increase in the specialized transit services the Town offers. Presently we provide the transit service called Activan for persons with disabilities and for seniors. The proposal is to expand that for youth to enable youth (under the age of 16) to better attend various social activities and facilities on their own rather then being dependant on their parents or others to drive them.
So those are the TEN areas that Council will be concentrating on in 2012 and indeed through-out its term. As you can see all of the 10 provide significant challenges as well as opportunities for this Council in advancing the Town Vision. I hear your stomachs growling.

Once again, I would like to thank the Chamber and the guests today. You have been an excellent listening audience. You can see the work list and it is important that expectations are kept real.

Wishing you, on behalf of Council a Merry Christmas and a Prosperous New Year.