September 30, 1998
To:Corporate Services Committee
From:City Clerk
Subject:Status Report on the Council Legislative Process Review
Purpose:
The purpose of this report is to provide an update on the City Clerk's legislative process review which responds to a
number of issues raised by Council Members, staff and the public. This report is submitted to Corporate Services
Committee for information, and to the Special Committee to Review the Final Report on the Toronto Transition Team to
be considered with the CAO's report on governance structure. This report outlines the steps underway to review and
evaluate the legislative process and identifies some short, medium and long term initiatives under consideration.
Financial Implications:
There are no immediate financial implications.
Recommendation:
It is recommended that the Corporate Services Committee receive this report for information and forward a copy to the
October 16, 1998 meeting of the Special Committee to Review the Final Report on the Toronto Transition Team for its
information and consideration in conjunction with the CAO's report on governance structure.
Background:
The legislative process begins with staff authoring a report through to Council's ultimate disposition on a matter and staff
implementation. The volume and content of documents produced for meetings, the Council's procedural system, and
access to Council documents are some of the issues which have been brought to the City Clerk's attention. The majority of
concerns have been focused specifically on City Council meetings.
The Clerk's review is an iterative process. As the review continues this fall, further reports will be brought forward with
recommendations for system improvements.
Comments:
All seven former municipalities had in place process and documentation systems which made sense to their respective
circumstances and suited their former Councils' ways of conducting business. Each had its own strengths and
shortcomings. The current Council process was designed to support Council during its transition period. Our requirements
are unlike any experienced by the former municipalities in terms of the workload processed through Council. The scale
and complexity of issues, the size of the council and the number of its committees, require comparators resembling a
provincial legislature rather than a municipal council. With the benefit of several months of experience with this
transitional system, the legislative process review permits the opportunity to develop a new Council business system
which is innovative, draws on the strengths of the former systems, and suits the demands of the new Council. Every aspect
of the Council business cycle is subject to review and change, if it can be demonstrated to add value to the legislative
process.
The key issues are discussed below, followed by a description of staff's review method and some actions currently under
consideration.
Current Council Business Cycle:
Council business cycle fall into three categories:
(a)Documentation,
(b)Committee and Council Meetings, and
(c)Clerk's Secretariat Functions.
Documentation issues relate to the documents that support the legislative process and the documents that result from it.
These include staff reports, communications from the public, Standing Committee and Community Council agendas,
reports and minutes, Council agendas and minutes, and staff communications. Concerns raised include:
-the necessity for certain documents,
-the complexity and format of documents,
-the sheer volume of paper, and
-the clarity of language in documents.
During the course of our review, trade-offs concerning documentation have also been identified. For example, the demand
for fewer and briefer documents is countered with a request for more customized and comprehensive reports. The critical
documents in the Council business cycle are the matters that are before Committee and Council (agendas) and their
subsequent disposition (actions). It is imperative that information be succinct, understandable and accessible.
Committee and Council meeting issues include matters that relate to and arise during the meetings of Standing
Committees, Community Councils and City Council. This includes:
-the rules governing the Council process, and
-the striking of the annual Council schedule.
The frequent practice of Council waiving the Procedural By-law requirements to bring matters directly to Council instead
of through the Committee process, is a concern in that issues have not been reviewed by Committee or staff in advance of
Council consideration. In regard to Committee responsibilities, it is not always clear which Committees have carriage for
certain matters or what the reporting relationship is amongst them. Issues concerning overlapping responsibilities will be
addressed within the context of the review on governance structure by the Chief Administrative Officer. Concerns have
also been raised that funnelling the work of 13-15 days of Standing Committees and Community Councils meetings each
month into three days of City Council meetings is unworkable. The City Clerk will be reporting to the next Striking
Committee meeting on options for the 1999 meeting schedule.
Clerk's Secretariat Function issues address the processes that Secretariat staff undertake to organize, support and record
the proceedings of Committee and Council. Typical tasks include the composition, compilation, production and
distribution of agendas, reports, minutes and communications (including postings to the City's Internet site). Issues
include:
-the timeliness of agenda production and distribution to Council Members, and
-the accessibility of Standing Committee and Community Council reports and City Council actions to staff and the
public.
Late agendas for Council meetings generally result from the very limited turn around time between Standing Committee,
Community Council and Council meetings. During a very short time period, Committee reports to Council must be
prepared, large volumes of material must be incorporated into agendas and reports, and lead time is required for printing
and distributing the documents. The current demands on Secretariat staff on turnaround times to support the existing
legislative process are extraordinary and unsustainable over the long term.
Notwithstanding these concerns, documentation, meeting and process changes can improve the legislative process.
Successful change also requires the willingness and cooperation of all the parties involved to make the process work.
In addition to these specific areas of concern, larger contextual issues that impact the legislative process must also be
considered, including governance structure and technology issues. Any changes to the governance structure, including the
number of Committees and the functional responsibilities and relationships between Committees and City Council, can
impact the Council process. The CAO's staff is reviewing the governance structure for a future report to the Special
Committee to Review the Final Report on the Toronto Transition Team. Clerk's staff is working in consultation with the
CAO's staff to ensure the findings and recommendations from the governance structure review can be implemented
through the legislative process review. It is recommended that this report be forwarded to the Special Committee for its
information when considering the CAO's report on governance structure. The short term initiatives currently under
consideration by City Clerk's (see Attachment No. 1) are administrative in nature and would be adaptable to whatever
governance structure changes are made by Council.
Computer technology issues are also important to the Clerk's review. A greater reliance on computer technology for
preparing, distributing and accessing Council documents can improve the legislative process. Two major issues need to be
addressed. First, the variety of application software (e.g., word-processing) in use across the Corporation and the absence
of appropriate corporate application standards for text and non-text-based information contributes to delays in preparing
agendas and reports. Second, the distributed functional units of the Secretariat (serving Community Councils, Standing
Committees and Council) do not have access to a single dedicated work space environment for creating, storing and
accessing all legislative process documents. Developing appropriate computer application standards and work sharing
networks to support the business of Council should help to reduce the delays in getting documents prepared and
distributed in a timely manner and could also enhance accessibility to Council documents (via the Internet or other
means). The move to Toronto City Hall will provide an opportunity to physically consolidate the secretariat staff and
better respond to workload demands as a cohesive team.
Clerk's Review Approach:
The objectives of the City Clerk's review are to:
(a)enhance support to Council Members;
(b)enhance the productivity of Corporate staff;
(c)maximize accessibility to agendas and actions of Committee and Council; and
(d)optimize the Secretariat's functions to serve Council, the public and the Corporation.
Staff are examining the detail of the legislative process in order to identify improvements. The basic process steps include:
(a)Pre-Committee Meeting Process (from staff report drafting to Committee meeting)
(b)Committee Meeting Process
(c)Post-Committee Meeting Process
(d)Pre-Council Meeting Process (agenda preparation to Council meeting)
(e)Council Meeting Process
(f)Post-Council Process
For each process step, key tasks are being reviewed to identify issues and opportunities as they relate to: (i) documentation
issues, (ii) meeting issues (applicable only to process steps (b) and (e)), and (iii) Secretariat functional issues. City Clerk's
staff are consulting with a cross-section of Council Members, Secretariat staff, corporate staff and the public to discuss the
issues and possible solutions to improve the Council legislative process. Based on this analysis, options are being
developed for each process step for evaluation against the four project objectives set out above.
Based on the work completed to-date, a number of initiatives for immediate testing and further study have been identified
for action during: (i) the short term, between now and the end of this year, (ii) the medium term, for implementation in the
new year after moving into the refurbished Council Chambers in City Hall, and (iii) the long term, subject to more
in-depth study. Some specific initiatives are outlined in Attachment No. 1 to this report and are categorized according to
their ability to address: documentation matters, meeting issues and Secretariat functional matters. The focus of these
initiatives is to enhance access to critical documents in a timely manner, reduce the reliance on hard copy documentation
and reproduction of documents several times during the Council process, and maximize the use of technology where
warranted. Clerk's staff will be reporting back through the Corporate Services Committee during the next several months
as the testing of initiatives and review tasks are completed, conclusions are drawn and options are developed. A number of
initiatives depend on the outcome of the CAO's governance structure review and will be brought forward for Council's
consideration after the governance structure is resolved.
Clerk's Secretariat staff will be responsible for implementing the majority of initiatives identified during this review
process. This will necessitate changes to internal practices and was one of the reasons behind the redesign of the
Secretariat Unit as part of the City Clerk's re-organization. Depending on the types of changes introduced, staff training
issues will need to be addressed to accommodate changing practices.
Conclusions:
City Clerk's is working to improve the Council process to enhance Council's and the Corporation's productivity,
maximize accessibility to the legislative process and optimize the Secretariat's functions to fulfil the demands placed on it.
The outcome will be a legislative process that is more transparent, convenient and understandable to Members, corporate
staff and the public. Staff will continue to consult with Members on their concerns, ideas and possible solutions. The
review to-date has identified some areas for action and further review. Further reports from staff recommending specific
legislative process improvements will be presented to Committee and Council as the review proceeds.
Contact Name:
Jeffrey A. Abrams, Director, Secretariat, Printing and Distribution
392-8670 jabrams@city.toronto.on.ca
Peter Fay, Senior Policy and Planning Analyst
392-8668 pfay@city.toronto.on.ca
Novina Wong
City Clerk
J. Abrams/PF
Attachment
L:\ANN\LEGPROC.RPT
Attachment No. 1
Italicized actions denote further Council approval required.
