Increased heritage investment approved by City Council

[newsposter]

Updated December 2011. See bottom post.
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Updated October 7, item tabled to Nov. 14 meeting of City Council

Updated September 29 - see the bottom for item going to Council on October 3 2011
http://www.calgaryheritage.org/CHIForum/vi ... =2729#2729
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Updated May 16 with recommendations passed...
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Update April 25: The item has been re-scheduled to 1 pm on Monday may 2 in the Engineering Traditions Room of old City Hall
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Dear all,

On April 20 the Calgary Heritage Authority (CHA) will be presenting their 2010 annual report to City Council's Standing Policy Committee on Land Use, Planning and Transportation (SPC-LPT). As part of this, they are also presenting a report that recommends enhanced resources, mandate and new structure for the work of the Calgary Heritage Authority. Many members of the heritage community were consulted in the preparation of this long-anticipated report. The LPT Report is coming at a critical juncture to highlight these issues, with Council about to begin serious budget deliberations.

NEW: Link to the agenda for April 20. The heritage report is item 4.6: http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub ... ype=AGENDA

This is an opportunity for the city’s heritage community to celebrate and show appreciation for the CHA’s accomplishments last year, and to demonstrate support for the recommendations with our presence and/or letters. Please plan to attend, or arrange for a delegate from your organization to join us. The meeting is a 9:30 am start, although the place on the agenda will not be published until after 4 pm on April 15 (we will post the information on the CHI website at www.calgaryheritage.org). Everyone has an opportunity to speak for up to 5 minutes, so if you plan to read a letter aloud and make copies available to the LPT committee, please bring 35 copies. You can also send an email to all Council members at alderweb@calgary.ca and themayor@calgary.ca. If you do, please send a copy to Senior Heritage Planner Darryl Cariou at darryl.cariou@calgary.ca. (A copy to the Calgary Heritage Initiative, info@calgaryheritage.org, is also appreciated.)

If you decide to speak or write, here are some points which you might cover:
• The importance of heritage for you or your organization
• The vital role that CHA plays in all heritage matters
• The benefits of heritage as a cultural catalyst for sustainable communities
• The need to take heritage to the next level in Calgary. Some examples:
o The need to bring on additional resources to create a robust heritage planning team
o The need to create an effective, citizen led agency which has the mandate and authority to raise funds for investment in heritage projects, resources, incentives and programming
o The need for a heritage body more focused on getting buildings identified, researched and listed on the heritage inventory (in parallel to the new body noted above)
o The requirement to deliver on heritage principles outlined in the Municipal Development plan (Plan It Calgary) and the Calgary Heritage Strategy
o The growing demand for heritage planning services
o The increasing number of opportunities to support historic preservation (more developer, owner interest, new citizen groups forming i.e. CHI, HSCA setting up heritage committees, greater awareness of value of historic preservation within the City corporation, etc.)
o Citizens are doing there part to support historic preservation (CHI, Roundtable, Project Brewery, community heritage committees, etc.) and the City can do more in response

Be sure to pass on the message to your heritage committees, organizations, community association members, colleagues or anyone for whom heritage is important. Hope to see you there! If you are planning to attend, please send a note to me at marilynwilliams(at)shaw.ca so that we can stay in touch prior to the committee meeting and communicate any issues that might crop up, including any changes to the agenda. We will also be posting this information, with some relevant links to Plan It Calgary and the Calgary Heritage Strategy and the LPT Agenda when it comes out on the Calgary Heritage Initiative website at www.calgaryheritage.org.

Marilyn Williams for the Calgary Heritage Initiative

Link to the Calgary Heritage Strategy:
http://www.calgary.ca/DocGallery/bu/pla ... rategy.pdf

Link to the Municipal Development Plan (Plan It Calgary):
www.calgary.ca/mdp - see the pdf on the right, "MDP, 2009". Note section 2.3.3

[newsposter]

Due to a long agenda the committee was unable to hear the item regarding the CHA annual report on April 20. When a new hearing date is announced, we will post it here.

[newsposter]

The heritage item at Council Committee (see above) has been re-scheduled for Monday, May 2 at 1 pm in the Engineering Traditions Room of old City Hall..

Here is a link to the agenda:
http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub ... ype=AGENDA

[newsposter]

The recommendations to investigate heritage resources and budgets, etc. (in bold below) passed at Council's LPT committee. Next stop is the full City Council on May 16. The intent of the recommendations is to bring back proposals for Council to consider related to upcoming budgets and workplans.

Minutes of the comittee meeting are here:
http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub ... pe=MINUTES

Here is an excerpt of the draft minutes of the committee meeting, with some editing.

2.6
LPT2011-39, CALGARY HERITAGE AUTHORITY ANNUAL REPORT AND REVIEW

(Carmel Gatt presented for the Calgary Heritage Authority, with Senior Heritage Planner Darryl Cariou.)

SPEAKERS

1. Cynthia Klaassen

DISTRIBUTION

At the request of Ms. Klaassen, and with the concurrence of the Chair, the City Clerk distributed copies of the following:

· A letter from Ms. Klaassen, President Calgary Heritage Initiative Society (CHI), dated 2011 April 20; and

· A letter from Irena Karshenbaum, President, Montefiore Institute, dated 2011 April 20.

2. Marilyn Williams

DISTRIBUTION

At the request of Ms. Williams, and with the concurrence of the Chair, the City Clerk distributed copies of the following:

· An email from Ms. Williams to Council, dated 2011 April 18;

· An email from Ms. Williams to Council, dated 2011 April 19; and

· A letter from Lorne Simpson to The City of Calgary, dated 2011 April 18.

3. Rick Williams

DISTRIBUTION

At the request of Mr. Williams, and with the concurrence of the Chair, the City Clerk distributed copies of the following:

· A letter from Lorna Cordeiro and Carol Stokes, Co-chairs of the Hillhurst Sunnyside Community Association, dated 2011 April 18; and

· A letter from Bill Bakelaar, President of the Inglewood Community Association.

4. Laura Golebiowski

DISTRIBUTION

At the request of Ms. Golebiowski, and with the concurrence of the Chair, the City Clerk distributed copies of a letter from Ms. Golebiowski, dated 2011 May 02.

5. Bob van Wegen

6. Carrie Rubman


AMENDMENT, Moved by Alderman G-C. Carra, that the Administration Recommendations contained in Report LPT2011-39 be amended by adding a Recommendation 3 as follows:

"3. Direct Administration to include in the report coming back to the SPC on Land Use, Planning and Transportation, recommendations based on the guidance and information in the Calgary Heritage Authority Annual Report and Review summary findings, for increasing funding to Heritage Preservation in Calgary as part of the development of the 2012-2014 Business Planning and Budget Coordination Program.".

ROLL CALL VOTE

For:
G-C. Carra, D. Farrell, D. Hodges, R. Jones

Against:
S. Keating, J. Mar, A. Chabot

CARRIED


AS AMENDED, APPROVE, Moved by Alderman D. Farrell, that the Administration Recommendations contained in Report LPT2011-39 be approved, as amended, as follows:


That the SPC on Land Use, Planning and Transportation recommends that Council:


1. Receive the 2010 CHA Annual Report as information (Attachment 1); and

2. Refer the “Calgary Heritage Authority Review Summary Findings”(Attachment 2) to Administration for consideration with a report to the SPC on Land Use, Planning and Transportation no later than 2011 September 20; and

3. Direct Administration to include in the report coming back to the SPC on Land Use, Planning and Transportation, recommendations based on the guidance and information in the Calgary Heritage Authority Annual Report and Review summary findings, for increasing funding to Heritage Preservation in Calgary as part of the development of the 2012-2014 Business Planning and Budget Coordination Program.

CARRIED

[newsposter]

On May 16 City Council unanimously passed three recommendations coming out of the annual report of CHA and related items. This directs City Administration to come back with another report in September with heritage recommendations.

1. Receive the 2010 CHA Annual Report as information (Attachment 1); and

2. Refer the “Calgary Heritage Authority Review Summary Findings”(Attachment 2) to Administration for consideration with a report to the SPC on Land Use, Planning and Transportation no later than 2011 September 20; and

3. Direct Administration to include in the report coming back to the SPC on Land Use, Planning and Transportation, recommendations based on the guidance and information in the Calgary Heritage Authority Annual Report and Review summary findings, for increasing funding to Heritage Preservation in Calgary as part of the development of the 2012-2014 Business Planning and Budget Coordination Program.

The report is item 7.2.2 on the May 16 2011 Agenda and Minutes, linked below:

http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub ... temid=4589

http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub ... temid=4589

[newsposter]

A report on increased heritage funding (see above for some of the backstory). came to Council's Land Use and Transportation Committee meeting on September 20, and will go to full Council on October 3. CHI president Cynthia Klaassen and several other CHI and CHA members spoke to the committee. Whatever is decided will be fed into Council's budget deliberations later this fall. (see above for some of the backstory).

Updated: Here is the video of the discussion at September 20 committee. Click on item 4.8 at the link:
http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub ... pe=MINUTES
It is item 10.3.6 on the October 3, 2011 Council agenda, linked below.

http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub ... ype=AGENDA

On September 20 the committee supported Administration's proposal to add $150 K to the heritage budget in 2013 and 2014. The committee added a further recommendation to allocate $150 in 2012 - this is important to maintain the "heritage momentum", particularly when 2012 is such an important historic and cultural year, featuring the centennial of many Calgary institutions including the Stampede (1912 is considered the peak of Calgary's first real boom).

Heritage stakeholders such as Calgary Heritage Authority and Calgary Heritage Initaitive spoke at Committee in support of the funding.

[newsposter]

Due to a very long agenda, the heritage funding item and several other items were tabled to the November 14 meeting of City Council. Link to agenda. Watch Council live today...

http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub ... ype=AGENDA

[newsposter]

Council voted to refer the following to next week's budget debate (not the exact motions - minutes not yet available), which starts on November 21.

Updated: Here is a link to the video of the Council discussion (click on item 6.5):
http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub ... pe=MINUTES

(1) $150K in one-time funding to support an increase in the heritage budget in 2012. 10 in favour, 4 opposed* (tentative - wait for the minutes for the final). The motion was a slight variation (getting the funds from Financial Sustainability Reserve rather than re-allocation within the planning dept. budget) on what was proposed by the LPT Committee in response to appeals from heritage stakeholders - to provide funding to keep up the momentum of the heritage effort in the 2012 culture/centennial year. Administration had originally proposed no increase in 2012, and $150K increases in 2013 and 2014.



(2) An increase in the base budget of $150/year in 2013, 2014. - Unanimously supported

(3) Direct Administration to continue investigating creative options for funding the heritage program in the long term. - Unanimously supported

There was also some discussion, including among those who were concerned about the additional 2012 money, on whether the model for supporting heritage should move towards a more "CADA**"-like model (i.e. an arms-length organization). Expect more discussion at budget as Ald. Keating was considering a motion related to this.

[newsposter]

Here is the official result of Nov. 14 Council, as described above. The heritage budget is early on the agenda at the beginning of the budget debate on Nov. 21. Click the link for Monday's agenda, including what's on the table related to heritage: http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub ... ype=AGENDA

REFERRED REPORT
LPT2011-86 INCREASING FUNDING TO HERITAGE PRESERVATION
Excerpt from the Minutes of the Regular Meeting of Council, held 2011 November 14:

“REFER, Moved by Alderman A. Chabot, Seconded by Alderman D. Hodges, that SPC on Land Use, Planning and Transportation Recommendation 1 contained in Report LPT2011-86 be adopted, after amendment, as follows: That the SPC on Land Use, Planning and Transportation recommends that Council refer:
1. a) a one time transfer of $150,000, from the Fiscal Stability Reserve, to the 2012- 2014 budget discussions;

ROLL CALL VOTE
For: G-C. Carra, A. Chabot, D. Colley-Urquhart, D. Farrell, D. Hodges, R. Jones, G. Lowe, G. MacLeod, B. Pincott, R. Pootmans, J. Stevenson
Against: N. Nenshi, P. Demong, S. Keating, J. Mar
CARRIED

REFER, Moved by Alderman A. Chabot, Seconded by Alderman D. Hodges, that the SPC on Land Use, Planning and Transportation Recommendation 1 contained in Report LPT2011-86 be adopted, after amendment, as follows: That the SPC on Land Use, Planning and Transportation recommends that Council refer:

1. b) and a $150,000 base budget increase beginning in 2013 to the 2012-2014 budget discussions; and
CARRIED

ADOPT, Moved by Alderman A. Chabot, Seconded by Alderman D. Hodges, that the SPC on Land Use, Planning and Transportation Recommendation 2 contained in Report LPT2011-86 be adopted, as follows: That the SPC on Land Use, Planning and Transportation recommends that Council:

2. Direct Administration to continue investigating creative options for funding the heritage program in the long term.
CARRIED

[newsposter]

See above posting for more re. heritage in the City Budget. You can post online comments about the budget all weekend, or contact City Councillors directly, and also speak at a public hearing on Monday.

http://ourcity-ourbudget-ourfuture.blog ... /ourfuture

[newsposter]

In their Nov. 2011 budget discussions, City Council voted to add $150K to the planning department's heritage budget in each of 2012, 2013 and 2014. Thank you City Council! Here is a link to the minutes of that meeting, which commenced on November 21. Video of the item not yet available. Videos of the previous Council and Committee discussions on this item have been posted above - look for ":!:"

http://agendaminutes.calgary.ca/sirepub ... pe=MINUTES