The Town of Innisfil has taken a different approach to spending the one-time Modernization Grant handed out by the province.
When the Ontario government was engaged in a Regional Governance review in 2019, exploring possible amalgamations and shared services, it provided modernization grants to 405 small and rural municipalities.
Although the province decided, after consultation, not to pursue amalgamation, it did encourage the municipalities to use the funding to explore shared service agreements, undertake service delivery reviews, look into IT solutions, and make capital investments in key projects to improve efficiency.
Some municipalities have used the money for standard planning studies, or even to offset taxes.
Innisfil Council, in its June 24 virtual meeting, approved a recommendation of staff: to use the full $676,935 to explore a new Shared Services Model, and a COVID-19 Echo Project. The Echo project seeks to use new technologies and service delivery models to help mitigate the “echoing” economic impact of COVID-19, in the short, mid and long-term.
The overall goal is simple, the staff report noted: “Finding smarter, more efficient ways to spend money while respecting taxpayer dollars.”
Innisfil has already introduced a “culture of collaboration, cross-functionality and creative problem-solving,” through its One Town, One Team model.
Not only the Town of Innisfil, but municipal corporations InnServices (sewer and water) and InnPower (electrical utility), and the independent boards of the South Simcoe Police Service and Innisfil ideaLAB & Library have been working together on a shared goal: “To serve the public by affordably and tangibly improving the lives of our residents,” the report noted.
Some examples include the sharing of a single fire chief, between Bradford West Gwillimbury and Innisfil, and the servicing of both police and utility vehicles by the Town Operations Fleet Department.
The Shared Service Exploration will involve looking beyond One Town, One Team, to also consider sharing services with the County of Simcoe, and the South Simcoe Municipalities (Adjala-Tosorontio, Essa, New Tecumseth and BWG).
Both the Shared Services Exploration and the COVID-19 Echo project would look towards finding efficiencies – finding cost savings and avoiding costs through sharing talent and skills, streamlining processes, and new IT solutions.
It will be needed, if Innisfil is to meet its goals of a zero percent tax increase in 2021, and 1 percent increase in 2022.
The staff report recommended spending the full grant on the two projects - $185,000 for outside technical and other expertise; $235,000 for new technology (both hardware and software); $189,242 for internal costs (e.g., staff time), and a 10 percent contingencies fund.
“The ‘One Town, One Team’ has become our model,” said Mayor Lynn Dollin, suggesting that the time has come to expand that to “One Town, One Team, One customer – there’s one taxpayer.”
Council voted in favour of the proposals.
“It’ll be great to put that money to use,” said Dollin.
