Speaking Municipally

Mack Male:
What else is renew? This week, council examined the 10-year financial outlook for the city. Spoiler alert, we have no money.

Stephanie Swensrude:
Plus, we look at changes to the way council approves new suburbs.

Mack:
Hi, I'm Mack.

Stephanie:
I'm Stephanie.

Mack:
And we're…

Both:
Speaking Municipally.

Mack:
Welcome back to Speaking Municipally, Episode 341. Big news everyone, we are not talking about snow clearing this week. Hooray.

Stephanie:
Yay. Oh no We just talked about it by just saying we're not talking about it.

Mack:
Oh no. Okay, no more. No more. Stephanie, I feel like we've had more than usual number of conversations together recently. You were our co-host for the most recent edition of Taproot Exchange, which is our members only live stream that we've been doing. If you're interested in that exclusive content, you should become a member of Taproot Edmonton. This last week, we had Carrie Hotton-MacDonald who is of course in charge of ETS and we talked to her about a whole bunch of stuff. But one of the things you mentioned was that your ARC card is slowly running out and…

Stephanie:
Mm-hmm. It's done now.

Mack:
It's done now.

Stephanie:
It's done now, unfortunately.

Mack:
Okay, and so you might be like me and just be tapping the phone or the credit card then, and you were sad about this.

Stephanie:
Yes, because I was having a little scrapbooking night with my friends and I found this sticker, now video viewers of the podcast, it's this sticker that perfectly fits on the ARC card C, and I just yassified my ARC card a little bit. And it's so funny because I didn't My one friend, I noticed she posted on her story that she has also yassified her ARC card, so it's this trend that people are blinging it out, so I genuinely might like reload my ARC card because it's just so cute.

Mack:
Well, it's a keepsake at least, right?

Stephanie:
Yes, true.

Mack:
You can, you could like carry it around I suppose without actually using it.

Stephanie:
Or I can store it on my shelf back there that has my bus, my little bus cutout up there, so…

Mack:
Yeah.

Stephanie:
Yeah, my little transit memorial…

Mack:
Memorial.

Stephanie:
Station.

Mack:
Yeah. Back when I was a kid, Stephanie, we would do…

Stephanie:
Did they have those back then?

Mack:
I remember we'd do scavenger hunts and people would always put on the scavenger hunt like, you know, like a fun Edmonton thing, go around the city and find stuff. And they would always put, "Find 10 or 12 monthly ETS bus passes," because people would keep them, right? They'd save those little…

Stephanie:
Oh.

Mack:
Paper cards. And I don't know why, like I guess people are pack rats or whatever. But that's kind of gone away now, and it's like, it reminded me of that when you said you were switching away from the ARC card like I have. It's like one more little less transit reminder on a day-to-day basis, right? So…

Stephanie:
Yeah. I randomly found a bus transfer from 2015 or something in an old purse and I just like kind of treasure it, because like, yeah, it's an artifact of a bygone era. You know…

Mack:
Yeah.

Stephanie:
One of those everyday things that you just don't think about. Yeah.

Mack:
But it was a fun conversation with Carrie Hotton-MacDonald and you're probably going to help us out I think on the next Taproot Exchange as well, or at least an upcoming one. So maybe we can…

Stephanie:
Yes.

Mack:
Give a little preview to the Speaking Municipally listeners?

Stephanie:
Yes, exactly. So on February 6th, the plan is to hold a Taproot Exchange that day, and given that the next Tuesday at Urban Planning Committee, council is going to be discussing changes to the zoning bylaw, I thought why not have a little point/counterpoint, hear from all sides of the story. And, so we will be inviting on someone from Grow Together Edmonton and someone from Edmonton Neighbourhoods United, and we'll have a very friendly and civilized conversation, the four of us, about zoning, infill and all that fun stuff. So, if you're not a member yet, you should become one so you can come and watch and, it's gonna be a great conversation I think.

Mack:
Ah, I'm so looking forward to that. That's gonna be great.

Stephanie:
Yeah. Me too.

Mack:
Well, we have an episode to do here before we get to all of that though, and, to kick things off here, we have an ad for you.

Stephanie:
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Mack:
And if you subscribe to The Pulse, which you all should, that story is in your inbox this morning. Okay Stephanie, we have two meaty items for the…

Stephanie:
Yes.

Mack:
Podcast this week which I'm excited about and let's get into that. So the first one is the tenure outlook for capital and operating budgets. So, administration trying to look into the crystal ball to predict a little bit about what the next decade might look like. And then something that seems kind of disconnected is the terms of reference, but these things are very connected.

Stephanie:
They are.

Mack:
So why don't you give us first just the TLDR, what's the…

Stephanie:
Yeah.

Mack:
What's the overview and then we can get into it.

Stephanie:
Yes. So big conversation, very long, but very illuminating. So on the capital budget side, administration is recommending that for the four-year budget that's coming up that council will build and debate on over the course of this year, administration is recommending that council focus on renewal, not growth. So renewal means replacing and repairing our existing assets like buses, building, roads, instead of expanding the asset inventory by building new stuff. In the next 10 years, the city has about $11 billion available to spend on both renewal and growth, and, that leaves a funding shortfall of about $10 billion. And even if all available capital funding were directed to renewal, it would only be about 39% of the ideal renewal spending. So not great. But beginning in 2029, administration will begin collecting money for a dedicated renewal fund through property taxes and that's expected to help.

Mack:
If my math is correct, isn't 2029 after this next four-year budget cycle?

Stephanie:
I it's at, it's towards the end…

Mack:
Yeah.

Stephanie:
Because first they first they're gonna, as far as I know, they're going to, use that tax levy to replenish the financial stabilization reserve or the rainy day fund, and then in 2029 they're gonna start collecting for the renewal.

Mack:
Interesting, okay.

Stephanie:
Yeah.

Mack:
So this 11 billion to spend plus shortfall of 10 billion, that's because we have grown so much, we need new stuff, and our existing assets need so much replacement.

Stephanie:
Yeah.

Mack:
Is that a fair characterization of what they're telling council?

Stephanie:
Yeah, and, you know, the, it's going back to talking about the Taproot Exchange, Carrie Hotton-McDonald said something pretty, like, honest, which is that she's embarrassed by the age of our bus fleet, for example. Like, some of the buses have been on the road for 10 years longer than they should've been.

Mack:
And it's not a vanity thing, it's not just like, "We need new buses." It's that they cost more to maintain, they're not as efficient, they break down. Like, there's lots of knock-on effects of having infrastructure that is not in a quality that we expect, right?

Stephanie:
Yeah, totally. Yeah.

Mack:
Okay, well that's about capital, but there's always a connection to the operating budget, right? And so the most direct connection between the two budgets is that we take on debt to build capital, we have to service the debt, we have to pay off the debt over time, so there's debt servicing costs. There's other connections as well. Of course when you buy a bus, as, we were talking to Carrie about, you need people to maintain the bus and operate the bus and all the things that go along with that piece of infrastructure. So what about for the operating budget, what is administration projecting over the next 10 years?

Stephanie:
Right, so admin forecasts that property taxes will increase somewhere in the realm of 3.7% to 5.6% each year over the next 10 years. The sooner years will be the bigger increases and it's expected to taper off. Honestly, that, this one in particular, I'm like, "How do you know?" I don't know. And then based on listening to the conversation, it seems like administration is, like, really thinking that there's gonna be some discussions about service cuts for this, upcoming budget.

Mack:
Well, the idea of 3.7 to 5.6% per year for the next decade I'm sure is going to land like a lead balloon with quite a lot of people, right? I mean, I don't think it's ever realistic that we get back to, you know, a 0% tax increase, and I think the time that council did do that was pretty exceptional and probably set a poor expectation for future years. Like, at least you've gotta keep up with inflation and population growth and I think that case can be made pretty firmly. 3.7 to 5.6, you know, these percentage increases per year are probably higher than inflation and population growth, right? And so there is some catch-up that needs to happen, but if we're just trying to, you know, stay where we're at, then I can see how critics of property tax increases are gonna look at that and say, "Well, why is it so much higher?" Right? Maybe what administration is doing here is, to your point, not actually looking at the crystal ball and having some educated guess, I'm sure they have an educated guess, but it could also just be, well, if we set this as the expectation, people are less disappointed when the increases come in a little bit lower, right? And so from that point of view, maybe they should be saying the range is higher than 5.6, right, given the increases we've seen in recent years. Service cuts…

Stephanie:
Yeah.

Mack:
Could be a conversation. What are you hearing about what administration expects there?

Stephanie:
I mean, and another thing that also ties into the capital budget is that if we don't buy growth buses, which we, like, basically cannot do we being the city, if the city does not buy growth buses, that results in less service. That's a service cut.

Mack:
Right.

Stephanie:
Even though like, you know, and also maintaining spending with a growing city and a growing population will result in service cuts because if you have the same amount of money spread over more people and spread over more physical area, that's a service cut. We're already having service cuts in many places.

Mack:
I think that's a really good point. We don't actually need to say, "We are canceling that program or that service" for it to be a cut. We could just choose not to invest in keeping up with growth or just be, unable to invest in keeping up with growth and, in effect, get a service cut. I think that's a really interesting point.

Stephanie:
Yeah, I'm, there wasn't any talk on, like, real literal examples of service cuts, like for example, they didn't say something like, " to reach a better property tax increase, you need to cut this many hours of transit service." There wasn't anything like that, but I think it was…

Mack:
Right.

Stephanie:
Just kind of like brace council for doing this.

Mack:
It's sort of setting the foundation for those conversations to happen, yeah.

Stephanie:
Typically.

Mack:
Okay, well usually when we get these kinds of outlooks, these projections, there's a long document and it's got a lot of information and council will read through that. But then they get the chance to ask questions, right? So did they have an opportunity to ask administration anything about this and anything stand out to you?

Stephanie:
Yeah, definitely. There were a couple of motions made about, all this information. So, like, again, what this was for was just to set the stage, but, like, council obviously did have the chance to make some motions. So Coun. Ashley Salvador asked administration to provide a report on increasing the tax levy for that dedicated renewal fund to narrow the gap further. This is an option that, administration said, "Hey, we can try this out." And Coun. Salvador was like, "Yes, let's do that." And it, and it passed, so council's on board with potentially doing that. That'll be decided in the, budget deliberations later this year. She also requested a report outlining how many buses are needed to maintain current transit service levels to the year 2030 and the service impacts of not meeting those minimum requirements. So what's gonna happen if we don't replace the buses?

Mack:
I wonder if she's a listener of Taproot Exchange 'cause, you know, she could have listened to that conversation and Carrie set it up, "Here's the ball, go and hit it," right? Getting that information back in a report is the perfect kind of on-ramp to have the conversation about growth in the bus fleet and the impact of that is the indirect service cut that might come if we don't purchase those buses, so that's pretty interesting.

Stephanie:
Yeah.

Mack:
Presumably that motion also passed?

Stephanie:
Yeah. Yeah.

Mack:
Yeah. Okay.

Stephanie:
And then the last one was, Coun. Erin Rutherford asked for a report about how the city reviews developer contributed assets. So, the way that I understand this is that, you know, sometimes in a new neighborhood, the developer would build, for example, a cul-de-sac which is very expensive for the city to maintain, and also it, you know, it only technically serves the five or six households that are around the cul-de-sac. So, she wants to know why are we accepting this, and this, goes into what we're gonna talk about next.

Mack:
Any answer to that? Did they, did they have a reason?

Stephanie:
She asked for a This is what will be in the memo that will, go to It won't go to, it won't go to Council or committee. It'll be released sometime in the coming months, and I will certainly be taking a look at that and bringing it to you readers, or listeners.

Mack:
Yeah, I mean, there are certainly guidelines that the city has in place for certain things and developers have to match that, but I'm not aware if there's a guideline that says when you build a new neighborhood you should have a cul-de-sac right?

Stephanie:
Yeah.

Mack:
And if we've learned that is actually really expensive to maintain, maybe it's a fair question to ask if we should not be building any more cul-de-sacs right?

Stephanie:
Yeah.

Mack:
Like, that is a great way to think about it, right? We've got this relationship between the city and developers to get things going, but once it's there, the city's gotta maintain it for the long term. And if it's way more expensive to maintain, or we could make it more efficient, that sounds like a smart conversation.

Stephanie:
Well, Mack, you know this of course, but I'll also explain it for the listeners, but if today a construction worker pours down a cul-de-sac Like, my sister lives way out in Edgemont and the city is developing around her still. If in Edgemont today a construction worker is pouring down cement, that cul-de-sac was planned, like, maybe up to 20 years ago.

Mack:
Right.

Stephanie:
So, the Council of past years has been the, they've been the ones approving the designs for these neighborhoods.

Mack:
Yeah, and so that we You know, the decisions we make today are not gonna start to impact what gets built tomorrow, but they will over the long term, and over the course of city plan as we continue to grow toward those population targets, that's when it starts to have an impact.

Stephanie:
Yeah.

Mack:
Yeah.

Stephanie:
Exactly. And, you know, this segues perfectly into the second conversation that I said they weren't technically linked and cross-referenced but they are very related. So, please do not fall…

Mack:
This is the terms of reference thing, right?

Stephanie:
Yes. Please do not fall asleep when you're listening to this. I promise you this is a very important thing, and like, I know our listeners will be interested in this, but it does sound extremely dry at first. So, they talked, the City Council talked about authorizing neighborhood structure plans. Woo! Basically, have you ever wondered how a new suburb gets created and who gives the green light? Like I said, there's an, there's houses going up in Edgemont that were planned 20 years ago. So, when the city annexes land, it just sits there, you know, farmers keep farming or whatever goes on there keeps going on there, until the owner of that land comes forward and asks Council to authorize the creation of a statutory plan, not to approve the plan itself, but to authorize them to even start to work on one. So if Council says yes, the developer goes away and then creates the plan which lays out where residential, commercial, institutional, and recreational development will be located, how essential municipal services like water, sewer systems, arterial and collector roads, schools, parks, and fire protection will be provided. They also identify how development will be staged over time and it sets density targets, and there's two types of, statutory plans in Edmonton. There's the area structure plan, which is for, it's kind of like the umbrella over five or six neighborhoods typically. Like, for example, there's the Windermere Structure Plan and then within there's a couple of other ones. Recently the Kendall Neighborhood Structure Plan got approved. So, the neighborhood structure plan is for that smaller neighborhood. First area structure plan, then neighborhood structure plan. And then these plans need to be the final plan needs to be approved at a public hearing. So the way it goes is they annex the land, they ask for authorization to create a statutory plan, then they create it, and then it goes to a public hearing, and then after that essentially construction can start. Like, it's not that simple, but that's the simple way of saying it. Go ahead if you have something to say.

Mack:
And then this is why you sometimes see these plans referenced, in future public hearings when development changes are coming forward and the developer is saying, "This is in alignment with the neighborhood structure plan," or sometimes they'll bring a rezoning application forward and they have to amend all three things. They have to amend…

Stephanie:
Yeah.

Mack:
You know, that particular site, but also the neighborhood structure plan and the area structure plan because, you know, the change they're looking for materially affects what was originally approved for those statutory plans.

Stephanie:
Yeah, exactly. So, what the subject of discussion at Council this week was the authorizing of the creation of a statutory plan, and it is basically one of the only ways that Council can gatekeep suburban development, so to speak.

Mack:
Right.

Stephanie:
You know, a lot of councillors, you've heard them say, "We need to stop sprawl," well this is maybe the, one of the only ways that they can do so, right?

Mack:
And it's a pretty blunt instrument, right? It's like just yes or no to moving forward on these plans, but, you know, there's been a lot of discussion about this, all of the land that we had annexed previously these urban growth areas, priority growth areas, developers, you know, I remember Kaylain Anderson, from Build Edmonton Metro coming to Council saying, "Look, we're in a housing crunch. We need to be developing this land," and then there's the counterargument to that which is the complete, neighborhoods discussion, the idea that we shouldn't enable development in these surrounding future growth areas until we've substantially built up, the existing approved ones, and this is where the substantial completion standard conversation, came in. And we had a conversation about that last year, and I know Tapper did some reporting about that. But, you know, it is a bit of a blunt thing. It's not like we can do a little bit here and a little bit there. It is either we are approving these to go forward and then we can kinda do all of it, or we're not.

Stephanie:
What has changed recently is, this was talked about last week at Council, or at committee, and then this week Council talked about it, 'cause that's typically how things work is they go to committee first and then Council. And it made my ears perk up a little bit, because I'm a massive dork. But Council Anne Stevenson noted that this request for authorization didn't have as much information as she'd noticed in the past.

Mack:
Right.

Stephanie:
And then she noticed, or she learned that the terms of reference for these statutory plans had recently changed. So, the way I understand it is that before, May of last year, developers were required to provide five pieces of information in their request for authorization, and that's what information or, that's what infrastructure exists and what infrastructure is scheduled to be constructed, one. Two, current population capacity. Three, availability and timing of supportive city infrastructure, and I believe that would be parks, rec centers, fire station. Four, the relationship of the proposed neighborhood to transit. And five, significant environmental impacts. And those are the terms of reference. And what has changed is that the developers still have to provide this, but not until later in the process, and this is what'this is what the issue is.

Mack:
Those all sound like important things to know if we're going to approve a new neighborhood and, you know, allow construction to go forward. So, why was this required ahead of time before and not now? Like, why make that change?

Stephanie:
You know, that change is something that I will be asking the city about. (sighs) there was yeah, like I said, there was a long conversation both last week and this week about Council kind of asking, like, "Why are we not getting this information?" And I don't wanna put words in anyone's mouth unless I've been kind of told it directly, but it did sort of seem like an attempt to maybe cut red tape. But the thing is that So I spoke with Council Anne Stevenson, and she sort she said that there's a risk that if they approve the like, if they authorize the creation of the statutory plan and then it comes back and it has these five pieces of information, but then they realize that they shouldn't have approved it because they have those five pieces of information…

Mack:
Right.

Stephanie:
That's not good for anybody.

Mack:
Right.

Stephanie:
Does that make sense?

Mack:
Yeah, 'cause then you have to redo that work or we have to figure out how to fix that challenge or whatever. It's better to have that information thought through up front. I imagine there's probably an argument to be made here that just getting that information together isn't always gonna be a perfect predictor of what's gonna happen either. I mean, conditions…

Stephanie:
Yeah.

Mack:
Change. The way that we develop these neighborhoods takes quite a bit of time. Like, a lot can happen over the time that development unfolds, right? But, it does certainly seem like a sensible thing to do to have as much information as possible when you go into it, when you're gonna give that authorization. So you'you said this was it came up in the conversation with the Kettle Lakes neighborhood structure plan in the area that is known as, Deh Coto. So what did they decide to do specifically then with that plan?

Stephanie:
Okay. So, it got into a bunch of, like, procedural mess a little bit, but that's okay. I listened to it all so I can come here and explain it to you. So Council Stevenson moved to authorize creation of the plan but with two kind of conditions, that they add in a touch point at Urban Planning Committee before it comes to the public hearing and that the plan has to at least have some information about attempts for city costs to not exceed city revenue. So an attempt to make the neighborhood cost-neutral.

Mack:
That's really interesting because we know and have known for a long time that neighborhoods, new neighborhoods do not pay for themselves. Like there's I've blogged about this for more than a decade, right? There's lots of previous city reports where they've done this analysis and they found that the cost of a neighborhood over time, like it doesn't pay for itself. That is clearly not the reason that we approve neighborhoods, right? So…

Stephanie:
Yeah.

Mack:
Very interesting that Council Stevenson would try to, make that a condition of this approval.

Stephanie:
Yeah, and then during the discussion of this motion in particular, honestly things were a little bit tense between admin and Council because admin was saying we would need to do amendments to like policies, like maybe the city plan, maybe the district policy, to require neighborhoods to be financially sustainable. And Council was like, "What do you mean we'd have-?" Like, "how is that not already in the city plan, that we're a financially stable city?" You know?

Mack:
Right.

Stephanie:
And it again, it got pretty bogged down in kind of like procedural policy details, but what ended up happening was Coun. Karen Principe, moved to amend the motion to remove those two conditions, so take out the touch point and take out the requirement to provide information on the financial sustainability of the neighborhood. And that passed narrowly, seven to six. Then all of a sudden, the motion was just to authorize the creation of the plan and, then Stevenson was like, "Well now I have to vote against my own motion because I don't wanna, approve it, or I don't wanna authorize it if it doesn't have that information," but then it did end up passing. So Kettle Lakes neighborhood structure plan will be dropping, At the end of the day, that is what happened, but it was a super interesting conversation about like how new suburbs get created.

Mack:
And will be dropping without any conditions, that Coun. Stevenson tried to bring in. So now they still have to bring this information back is our understanding, but…

Stephanie:
Yes.

Mack:
It's not gonna materially change whether or not they can go forward with their plan the developers?

Stephanie:
Yeah, as far, as far as I understand, yeah.

Mack:
Interesting. Okay. Well, thank you for that update. That does sound like something that is worth digging into because, like I said, I feel like it's been pretty well-known in this city that new neighborhoods do not pay for themselves, and so this is not just a political question around do we like sprawl or not and where do we want, you know,people to live? It's also a financially sustained it's also a financial sustainability question, right? And so how did, how did that connection come at council? Like did people really latch onto that? I mean, they're talking about this 10-year outlook for money, and then they're talking about a neighborhood that is gonna cost money in the long run.

Stephanie:
Yeah, totally. Like, I think council was really dealing with that tension. The, again, I sensed some frustration because in the morning, the administration is saying, "We cannot do any growth projects."

Mack:
Right.

Stephanie:
And then the afternoon, they say, "We're not gonna require this information, on like financial sustainability," at the beginning of the process. And like, what's a bigger growth project than a new suburb? How many streets Like, I can't remember which councillor, but someone was saying, "If you're in a if you're in a billion dollar hole-" "… stop digging. Stop-"…

Mack:
Right.

Stephanie:
"… adding roads." Like, that's such a, that's such a big part of our, of our renewal deficit is that we don't, is that roads, it's transportation, so it's moving people. It's roads, bridges, and transit.

Mack:
Yeah.

Stephanie:
And building Kettle Lakes way out beside 41st Ave Southwest, as opposed to encouraging more infill, like that is only going to make that gap worse. What, like why are we adding more roads to our asset inventory when we have such a big gap? And I just think that like, a lot of times with Edmontonians in general and a lot of times with city administration is like, "No, we can't do growth projects, but like, suburbs don't count obviously. Like, we're obviously we're still gonna do suburbs, but like don't do growth projects, but-"…

Mack:
Yeah.

Stephanie:
"… suburbs are fine. Duh."

Mack:
Right.

Stephanie:
You know what I mean?

Mack:
Right. Yeah. It's like we have all these people moving here. We need to build a place for them to live. But we're not gonna build the amenities and facilities they need once they are here to, you know, have a good quality of life. It, yeah, exactly. I mean, it is a great example of a, of a growth project. Okay, so you said you talked to Coun. Stevenson about this.

Stephanie:
Yeah, so…

Mack:
What else did you hear from her?

Stephanie:
So she spoke a little this disconnect that I'm explaining about how, you know, there's the financial side and the land use side, she spoke a little bit about this, so play the clip.

Anne Stevenson:
These are really intertwined conversations. I know that we've typically sort of looked at planning and land use, you know, with one lens over here and then sort of our budget and financial pressures on the other side. But these truly go hand in hand, and we need to start having those integrated conversations.

Stephanie:
Yeah. It just, I don't know, as someone who has watched the Not Just Bikes, videos about if you know, you know, just about how suburbs are not gonna pay for themselves and they…

Mack:
Yeah.

Stephanie:
They create a financially insolvent city, it's just, oh, like makes me sigh when I, when I, when I hear these conversations.

Mack:
I mean, these things all, are all very connected. It makes sense that we should have a more connected conversation, right? So all the things that we've been talking about, you know, kinda framed it a little bit as like council's last chance to say no to suburban development. You would think, I suppose, that the development industry would be happy about this because they don't have to, you know, clear these hurdles in order to move forward. But I see in your notes that maybe that's not the case.

Stephanie:
Yeah, so I think that Build, so Build Edmonton is the they represent developers in the City of Edmonton or the Edmonton region, and they don't seem 100% happy about this either.

Mack:
Interesting.

Stephanie:
They sent a letter to council last week after Urban Planning Committee had been like, "Hold on, hold on. We need more information about this." So this was before the authorization was approved this week. So last week they said, you know, they, yeah, they don't seem super happy about this either, and they said, "Planning authorization must occur in alignment with city plan and the approved area structure plan. The delay of, you know, waiting one week until council undermines the significant time, effort, and financial investment that has been put toward planning and public discourse to date. The discussion questioning whether well-planned growth is necessary at Urban Planning Committee was concerning and signifies a deep disconnect with the context of growth in Edmonton and the region over the last several years." But Coun. Stevenson had a, well, this was her take on the, on like the industry reaction to this.

Anne Stevenson:
Yeah. So you know, a really important part of the planning process is certainty and due process. So when we are authorizing someone to go away and spend considerable money and considerable time, on developing a neighborhood structure plan, I think it's only fair, that authorization, that green light, be informed by some of the considerations that will be on our mind when we're at the point of approving a final plan. Without that step, my worry is that we get to the approval of a final plan and, you know, maybe there are some of those unanswered questions and it derails that process. I think that adds more uncertainty, to the process in a way that's unhelpful for all parties.

Stephanie:
Yeah, so…

Mack:
We hear, we hear that a lot, right? People want certainty, you know, at every step of the process. That's how you can plan effectively, you know, for your investment, so it sounds, yeah, maybe they're not, both unhappy about the same aspects of it, but this sounds like both council and the developers-… and the development industry would be happy if there was certainty, and so they're both kinda seeking the same thing.

Stephanie:
Yeah, totally. So I will be speaking to kind of the third party in this discussion, administration, as soon as soon as I can, and I'll bring back some more information about that next week on the podcast. But yeah, I think there's gonna be a lot more conversation, coming soon about these, like, plans and these things that seem super far away, right? Because this neighborhood structure plan, like I said, you approve it today and it might not it might not be built for 10 or 15 years. But then you're like, "Oh, it'it's been 10 or 15 years now."

Mack:
Yeah.

Stephanie:
Oh, okay. The years start coming and they don't stop coming. You know what I'm saying?

Mack:
That's right.

Stephanie:
They And then, you know, and then in another 10, 15, 30 years, it's like, "Oh, I have to replace I have to replace all the roads." And that's a lot of money. So yeah, it'for me, a fascinating conversation about, sprawl and financials and, yeah. It was a very good week for me.

Mack:
Very nerdy.

Stephanie:
Yes.

Mack:
A very nerdy week.

Stephanie:
Yeah.

Mack:
I like when I don't know, the NSPs sometimes have this, but definitely the ASPs you can get in there and you can see the, you know, the diagrams and the pictures they've drawn about how it's gonna look, and, you know, if you ever played, like, SimCity or any of these kinda games, right? It totally scratches that same itch, right?

Stephanie:
I know. I love City Skylines, like that, it's like kind of the 2020s version of SimCity, yeah.

Mack:
Yeah. Oh, there I go, aging myself again.

Stephanie:
Sorry. Sorry.

Mack:
Okay. Well, thank you, Stephanie. That's, very, enlightening, and yes, we look forward to future reporting from you on this, - this big and growing issue. Well, Stephanie, what else is on your radar? I know this was a fun nerdy week for you.

Stephanie:
No.

Mack:
But probably there's other stuff that you're paying attention to as well.

Stephanie:
There's always more nerdy stuff, and that's what's so fun about being a municipal politics reporter. So on Friday, the day that this episode comes out, we're gonna post our next edition of Your Turn, which is, you know, our letting you guys all know about the public engagement opportunities. And the designs for neighborhood renewal in Weequintwin have dropped, so go and take a look at the designs. There's some controversy, some spicy stuff happening. Don't really think anyone is gonna be really happy with it, and we'll talk more about it next week because public feedback is open until February 8th. There is an in-person session on January 31st, so if you are someone who cycles in and around Weequintwin, go let your voice be heard, and, but yeah take a look because, again, like I said, it's some interesting choices.

Mack:
I'm very interested in this one. Obviously, I've been paying attention to this for a while, because of, you know, school and all the cycling, walking to and from that I do. And I've definitely seen firsthand a lot of the challenges that people in the neighborhood of Weequintwin are experiencing, and, some of the pressures and things. So I'm very eager to dig in. I opened up the, design booklet that they've posted, and we'll have it in the show notes, and there's a long document. There's a lot of detail to get into there, so…

Stephanie:
I know.

Mack:
I'm sure it'll be a pretty interesting discussion when we get into that.

Stephanie:
Yeah. They literally have, like, "We will remove this tree and then we will plant this tree right here." spoiler alert, there's gonna be quite a few trees cut down, so, keep an eye out for that.

Mack:
Yeah. Okay. Well, I look forward to that conversation next week, and to, Your Turn, which is in The Pulse every Friday to give you a sense of what's coming up that you might wanna share your voice about. Well, Stephanie, that's our show for this week. That was a big, meaty one. Thank you for helping us break that all down, and, look forward to having you help us do that again next week…

Stephanie:
Yes.

Mack:
Here on Speaking Municipally. Until then, I'm Mack.

Stephanie:
I'm Stephanie.

Mack:
And we're…

Both:
Speaking Municipally.