✅ Questions 13 through 16 Collingwood Mayoral Candidate Questionnaire | The Shulman Report
Questions 13 through 16 of the twenty-three put to the four candidates for mayor of Collingwood on 30 August. Three answered. Every answer below appears in full and unedited, in alphabetical order, with nothing added.
Mayor Yvonne Hamlin did not return a questionnaire. Where a candidate does not respond, that is reported plainly, without adjective. Her answers will be published in full if they arrive at any point before 26 October. She is not mentioned again in this post.
13. Contracting out municipal services
The question asked: Would you support contracting out services currently delivered in-house [yes / yes, where a business case supports it / no / undecided]. Which would you be prepared to contract out? Check all that apply. Others you would contract out. Services you would never contract out. Outline your platform. Say what test you would apply before contracting a service out, what you would do about the staff currently delivering it, and how service quality would be held to account once it sits with a contractor.
Jon Hillis
☒ Yes, where a business case supports it Would contract out: ☒ Transit and buses · ☒ Fleet maintenance Others you would contract out: None identified at this stage. Services you would never contract out: Core statutory governance and accountability functions should remain directly accountable to the municipality.
I am open to contracting work out when an apples-to-apples comparison shows better value or better service. Transit operations are already contracted, so checking transit means I am prepared to keep using contracted operators and competitively test that model rather than bring operations in-house. Fleet maintenance is another area I would be willing to test. In either case, I want the full comparison: cost, service quality, response time, capital needs, downtime, contract management, labour and transition costs. If a change affects existing staff, I would look at redeployment, vacancies and transition options before layoffs. Any contract needs clear service standards, regular reporting, consequences when those standards are missed and a way out if the model does not work. I would not outsource something simply to say we reduced head count.
Kathy Jeffery
☒ Yes, where a business case supports it Would contract out: ☒ Building inspection · ☒ By-law enforcement Others you would contract out: Collingwood already contracts out some snowplowing, the transit bus operators, fleet maintenance and waste collection is handled by the County. I.T. is extremely sensitive to a municipality so this would take some research and assurances as to protection of the municipalty’s digital assets. Services you would never contract out: Suppose IT would be the one, subject to research and feasibility.
The test would be efficiency and cost effectiveness.
Norm Sandberg
☒ Yes, where a business case supports it Would contract out: no boxes marked Others you would contract out: left blank. Services you would never contract out: left blank.
I do not begin with the assumption that municipal services are always best delivered by municipal employees—or that contracting them out automatically saves money.
As part of the organizational review, I would examine service delivery based on service quality, full lifecycle cost, accountability, available expertise, workload and operational risk.
Some services require permanent in-house knowledge and capacity. Others may be more efficiently delivered through qualified contractors, particularly where workloads fluctuate or specialized expertise is required. One current example is snow ploughing which is undertaken by municipal staff and private contractors.
Existing employees must be treated fairly and involved early where a significant change is being considered.
The objective is not privatization. It is efficient, effective and accountable municipal government. If contracting a service produces demonstrably better value without compromising service or accountability, we should consider it. If the business case does not support it, we should not.
14. Performance management
The question asked: This town’s present ability to measure and report service performance is [adequate / inadequate / I have not reviewed it]. Within the term, the Town should publish a scorecard of service standards against results [annually / quarterly / no]. Building a culture of performance measurement would require — check all that apply. Performance measurement should be owned by. Building this capability costs money and staff time; you would. Set out how you would build performance management into this town. Say what you would measure first, who answers for the numbers, and what happens when a measure shows a service is failing.
Jon Hillis
Present ability: ☒ Inadequate · Scorecard: ☒ Quarterly Would require: ☒ A small set of council-approved corporate measures · ☒ Service standards for each department · ☒ Benchmarking against comparable Ontario municipalities · ☒ Every major report stating the measure by which it will be judged · ☒ An annual public account of what was delivered against what was budgeted · ☒ Resident satisfaction surveyed on a fixed cycle Owned by: ☒ Council, through targets it sets and publishes · Funded by: ☒ Reallocate from within the existing budget
The Town already measures a lot. Where I think we are weak is giving residents one simple place to see whether services and major projects are actually meeting expectations. Council should set a small number of public targets, and the CAO should manage the work and explain significant misses. I would start with major-project costs and schedules, infrastructure delivery, planning turnaround times and response standards for core services. Put the results in one quarterly dashboard showing the target, the actual result and whether things are getting better or worse. If a service keeps missing its target, residents should see the reason, the fix and whether the fix worked. Most of this should come from information the Town already collects, so I would reallocate existing resources rather than build a new administrative department around measurement.
Kathy Jeffery
Present ability: ☒ Inadequate · Scorecard: ☒ Annually Would require: ☒ A small set of council-approved corporate measures · ☒ Service standards for each department · ☒ Every major report stating the measure by which it will be judged · ☒ An annual public account of what was delivered against what was budgeted · ☒ Resident satisfaction surveyed on a fixed cycle (benchmarking against comparable Ontario municipalities not marked) Owned by: ☒ Council, through targets it sets and publishes · ☒ The CAO, as an internal management system (two boxes marked) Funded by: ☒ Require it within current resources
A baseline is required or the Town Council/staff would not know what it is comparing to for improvement. Comparison to other communities is not always accurate or useful as there are many different levels of services.
I would be very interested in establishing an efficiency baseline for our departments (Toronto scored something very dismal in parks and recreation department). Hardworking staff and departments would be able to shine and lead by example and areas for productivity improvements would be revealed. Necessary to prove efficiency before adding more workers or approving overtime.
Quarterly risk management reports from all departments would be essential to avoid gaps in informing Council of pending risks – for example the water treatment plant miscalculations in water treatment capacity.
Norm Sandberg
Present ability: ☒ I have not reviewed it · Scorecard: ☒ Annually Would require: ☒ A small set of council-approved corporate measures · ☒ Service standards for each department · ☒ Benchmarking against comparable Ontario municipalities · ☒ An annual public account of what was delivered against what was budgeted Owned by: ☒ Council, through targets it sets and publishes · ☒ The CAO, as an internal management system (two boxes marked) Funded by: ☒ Reallocate from within the existing budget
I have not reviewed the Town’s existing performance-management system closely enough to fairly characterize it as adequate or inadequate. I do, however, believe Council should establish clear expectations and measurable outcomes, with the CAO responsible for managing the organization and reporting results. Individual performance objectives for staff should be developed based upon the overall corporate performance measures and Council objectives.
Public reporting should focus on meaningful corporate measures such as financial performance, major capital projects, infrastructure condition and municipal service standards. This report should also include comparators to similar sized municipalities. It should support continuous improvement, not publicly evaluate individual employees or create a culture of blame.
An annual public report, supported by more frequent internal management reporting where appropriate, should be sufficient without creating another layer of bureaucracy. Significant financial or project issues should be reported to Council when they arise.
The objective is a strong team, clear accountability and better municipal service—not measurement for measurement’s sake.
15. The wastewater treatment plant
The question asked: The Town should commit to a wastewater plant decision — site, scope and financing — by [2027 / 2028 / 2029–2030 / not in this term]. Outline your platform for new wastewater infrastructure: the Environmental Assessment, the site, how it is financed — rates, levy, debenture, development charges or a regional partner — and what happens to development approvals until capacity exists.
Jon Hillis
☒ 2028
I want the Town to make the wastewater plant site, scope and financing decision by 2028. The Water and Wastewater Master Servicing Plan is already underway, and the plant-specific Class Environmental Assessment is a separate process now being procured. We should not pretend the preferred site or treatment solution is known before that work is done. The point is to use the work already underway to get to a Council decision in this term, subject to the required approvals, instead of passing the same question to the next Council. The financing plan needs to separate growth-related costs from the share that benefits existing users and show the mix of development charges, wastewater rates, long-term debt, approved grants and any regional partner. Development should keep moving where confirmed or funded servicing capacity exists, rather than using a blanket moratorium.
Kathy Jeffery
☒ 2029–2030
The timeline of 2029 – 2030 is if the Town of Collingwood decided to proceed without an MSC in the provincial model. Time is required for public information sessions in the normal course.
A decision to proceed with the Provincial MSC should be much sooner if Province is really serious.
Norm Sandberg
☒ 2029–2030
Collingwood cannot wait for wastewater capacity to become a crisis before making the necessary decisions.
I would move the required environmental assessment and technical work forward early in the term and expect it to proceed without unnecessary delay. A proper EA may take 24–30 months. Council should make the major decisions on the preferred long-term treatment solution, site and scope when that work is complete—not prejudge the outcome to meet an arbitrary political deadline.
Financing should recognize who benefits: existing ratepayers fund their fair share of renewal and existing-system needs; growth funds its fair share of growth-related capacity; appropriate long-term debt can spread costs over the useful life of the infrastructure; and senior-government funding should be aggressively pursued.
Capacity can help sequence growth, but ultimately it is a physical constraint. Good planning means acting well before we reach it.
Infrastructure Before Crisis.
16. The water plant, the development charges, and the debt
The question asked: If development charges do not cover Collingwood’s $44.4M share, it should be funded by [a debenture on the water and wastewater rate base / the tax levy / deferring other capital / I dispute the premise]. Outline your platform. State the figure you believe represents the town’s real water and wastewater obligation, and what you will tell ratepayers about their bill between now and 2030.
Jon Hillis
☒ A debenture on the water and wastewater rate base
What we know today is that Collingwood’s identified share of the water-treatment expansion is about $44.4 million. What we do not yet have is one verified all-in number for all future water and wastewater capital. If development-charge collections are short when the Town has to pay its share, I would use a debenture on the water and wastewater rate base as the main backstop while continuing to collect eligible development charges for the growth-related portion. That could affect rates, and I will not pretend otherwise. Until we know how much has to be borrowed, the term of the debt and how much future development charges will recover, I cannot responsibly give residents a percentage. Before any debenture is approved, Council should publish the 2027-2030 rate impact, repayment term and expected development-charge recovery. I would not move the shortfall onto the general tax levy first.
Kathy Jeffery
☒ A debenture on the water and wastewater rate base
I wouldn’t hesitate a guess, but I know it will be more substantial the further we get into the future. The current rates are as predicted in the Hemson Report and I don’texpect a change in the increases already set in that document.
Norm Sandberg
☒ A debenture on the water and wastewater rate base
Collingwood’s current net municipal share of the water treatment plant expansion is approximately $44.4 million after allocated grant funding, of which approximately $41.1 million is development-charge eligible.
Development charges should fund the growth-related share. If collections are insufficient when construction costs must be paid, appropriate long-term debt supported by the water rate base can bridge the timing difference. Also to be considered is the net benefit to existing users for having an upgraded facility who should cover that cost.
That is not inherently bad debt. This is a long-lived asset serving residents and future growth over many years. Properly structured debt allows costs to be shared over the generations receiving the benefit.
I would not shift water-system costs onto the general property-tax levy simply to make water rates appear lower.
Council needs a transparent multi-year financial plan showing development-charge revenue, reserves, debt, senior-government funding and resulting rate impacts.
The objective is responsible, affordable and transparent financing.
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