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Sewer systems, a New West stadium space, and frameworks for funding

Sewer systems, a New West stadium space, and frameworks for funding

These topics were discussed at the Monday, Sept. 11 council workshop

Ria Renouf
September 11, 2023

Some of the seating you can find at the Stadium at Queen’s Park. Ria Renouf

Sewers in New West

As outlined by staff on Monday afternoon, two-thirds of the city’s sewers are in fair, good, or very good condition, but the rest of the city’s systems are in need of some TLC. The team responsible for the sewer and drainage asset management plan are looking for some changes to the way they do their work to keep track of sewer works-related conditions, along with other methods by which to add more funding to mitigate the city’s costs on this.

Above: a chart by city staff based on a recent look at the local sewer systems. City of New Westminster.

These changes include:

Adding some process changes and enhancements to support service level indicator tracking
Make the asset data gathering more accurate so that better planning and costing can be done
Develop strategies for long-term funding and to build reserves

Regarding New West's sewer situation, the current projected financial need is at $8.2M a year based on the five-year capital need. The updated current replacement value plan has gone from $750M to $918M (over a multi-year period).
— Ria Renouf 🍩 (@riarenouf)
9:31 PM • Sep 11, 2023

This all went ahead and was approved without opposition.

Queen’s Park

This is a relatively older space that has parts reaching end of life. That, combined with the change in how these spaces are being used, were recently studied. Some of the highlights include:

Deteriorating wooden elements
Exposed rebar
From time-to-time, pooling rainwater on the floor

Based on discussions with the users of the stadium, there is a two-part ask here: fixing and/or replacing the seats, and having no more than 500 permanent seats. That being said, there would need to be more planning being done—including how to fix and/or replace the seats, considering the potential costs.

The estimate is that there about ten events each year where more than 200 people are sitting in the grandstand.
This is kind of sad: "the proportion of population and watching ball is declining." Hearing this is a trend that isn't just in New West, but right across the country.
— Ria Renouf 🍩 (@riarenouf)
10:21 PM • Sep 11, 2023

Climate Action Reserve Fund

This part of the workshop looked at how best in the future to figure out how to earmark money in the Climate Action Reserve Fund. The city is working with KPMG, an accounting and auditing firm, to come up with best practices which are still very much in the early stages—the opening slides for this presentation noted it could take about two years to come up with a road map. That being said, work started in June.

To be clear, what's happening at the workshop right now is establishing a framework for the future when it comes to establishing what would qualify for the Climate Action Reserve Fund. Here's an example re: the train of thought for decision-making.
— Ria Renouf 🍩 (@riarenouf)
10:57 PM • Sep 11, 2023

Mayor and council had quite a bit of feedback related to some of the other aspects that might not necessarily have been thought of. This process is expected to go for a couple of years.

-Nakagawa: pass/fail model doesn't necessarily account for some of the secondary/tertiary impacts, the issue of people who are most impacted by climate change to be less likely to interact/give feedback to the city
— Ria Renouf 🍩 (@riarenouf)
11:04 PM • Sep 11, 2023

The team also noted that this framework wasn’t necessarily for fulsome public review, but rather for the citizens’ assembly group.

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