Enbridge franchise agreement and gifts rules for councillors

Mayor and Councillors, Mayor and Councillors, Mayor and Councillors, Mayor and Councillors, for those online, if you could just put your screens on just before we start. Thank you. Okay. All right, we'll move ahead. Thank you so much. I'd like to call the Council meeting to order. It's Tuesday, November 26th at 5.30. And right off the top, we are looking to move into a closed meeting. Before I do that, any disclosure of pecuniary interest, any general nature thereof for the items in closed? Okay, I've got two. I'll go Crawon and Downer. The item regarding QB 241 negotiations, I have a family member who's a member. Thank you and I might hear a ditto from Councillor Downer.Whisper

Yes, the same family member who's in local 973. I've already put it in the registry. Yep, thank you so much. And so to move into closed, we have the bargaining mandate report Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 241 and 973. We also have a second one November 2024 public appointments for the Elliott Community Board of Trustees. In sticking with the Elliott one that's section 2392B of the Municipal Act regarding personal matters about an identifiable individual including municipal or local board employees. And on the other one, on the bargaining mandate, it's Section 239 of the Municipal Act regarding labour relations or employee negotiations. So with that, may I have someone just move to go into closed at least? Alt and Claussen? Is anyone against that? Hearing and seeing none, we will move into closed and then when we're done, we'll come back out for a high level summary as usual. Thank you very much.Whisper

Thank you. Thank you.Whisper

Okay, for those of my colleagues online, if you would like to jump on, that would be great. Just earlier, we went into a closed session, and this is just a summary in regards to that. The first one was a bargaining mandate report for the Canadian Union of Public Employees, Local 241 and 973, and Council did receive information on those items, and we did give direction to our staff in regards to that. Now I just want to verbally say out loud, like I've done before, both Councillor Caron and Councillor Downer moved that they had a conflict in the public session and I just want to openly confirm that they did not participate in anything in regards to that item in the closed. The second one was in regards to public appointments specifically for the Elliott Community Board of Trustees and we did receiveWhisper

information and we made direction for that which we are now coming out into open to do here for everyone and I'm going to ask a Councillor O'Rourke if she wouldn't mind just bringing forward that direction for us. Absolutely. That Joanne Hoenettle and Lisa Woolley be appointed to the Elliott Community Board of Trustees for a three-year term ending November 26, 2027, or until such time as a successor is appointed. Councillor Bousatillo second. Thank you. Anything on that item? Hearing and seeing none. I'll call the vote. Anyone against? Nobody that's unanimous. Thank you so much. With that, that's the summary for our closed session. And again now for moving into the rest of our agenda. I was wondering if anyone, everyone could please rise if you're able so that we can recognize our national anthem.Whisper

Thank you. Thank you. Great, thank you.Whisper

And just to continue with our agenda, if we could have a moment of silent reflection. Thank you. territorial acknowledgement as we gather let us take time to reflect on our privilege to live and work here in Guelph a city built over rich indigenous histories were guests here and we were should we should reflect upon the responsibility to care for this land and the people who live here today and the generations to come for actions today can move us towards reconciliation we should take pause and make those decisions with intention and gratitude this place we call Guelph has served as traditional lands in a place of refuge for many peoples over time, but more specifically the Anahuanarak and the Haudenosaunee. This land is held as the treaty lands and territory with the Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation, and Guelph lies directly adjacent to the Haldeman track, which is part of a long-established traditional hunting grounds for the Six Nations of the Grand River. Many First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples who have come from across Turtle Island call Guelph home today. Well, thank you for that. And is there any disclosure of pecuniary interest or any generalWhisper

nature thereof for the items in front of us tonight? Hearing and seeing none, it is my pleasure to move to a community presentation for Nathan Skoufis. And there he is. His next person is Mike Tyson he's going up against and I bet you he'd win. So I got a lot to say here about Nathan other than a great business owner in town, a great mentor to many and gives back to the community a lot. But Nathan specifically and why he's here tonight claimed gold at the World Championships held in Las Vegas, Nevada among martial artists from around the world, representing different styles, karate, kickboxing, taekwondo, and more. And he was the lone Canadian athlete to claim or place at the World Championships in the adult male fighting division at the World Championships this year. Now, not to be outdone, this is his 25th world title because he began at the age of four.Whisper

He's a lifetime resident of this area. He's a member of Team Canada and a sixth degree black belt. I will not be messing with you ever. Nathan has claimed international medals for Canada from a wide range of sanctioning sport bodies, including world titles for individual fighting, continuous fighting, mixed team fighting, male team fighting, and the all weight grand championship. As I mentioned, he's a small business owner here in town with the Guelph Family Martial Arts. both for Guelph and fitness kickboxing. He works with students and those from age 3 all the way up to 75 plus. And Nathan utilizes martial arts as a vehicle to facilitate personal growth and development and a variety of essential life skills, including respect, perseverance, discipline, confidence, self control, stress coping strategies and many more. He's also worked with students with a variety of learning challenges, including anxiety, ADHD, fear, and on the autistic spectrum as well, and many more. So with that, on behalf of Council and the entire community, Nathan, thank you for representingWhisper

not only Canada, but for our city as well in receiving that medal. And it's my honor to meet you down here to give you the city medal. It's also gold looking as well. But yeah, you'll receive that. And again, on behalf of the city, let's give Nathan a huge round of applause.Whisper

Thank you. Thank you.Whisper

Okay, thank you again. As we move right along in the agenda, the next one is a report to Council regarding the code of conduct. Oh, the minutes, I'm sorry, would you be willing to move the minutes seconded moved by Council boosted till seconded by Councillor Alt that the minutes of the open Council meeting on the 8th of October and the 29th and the 30th of 2024 and at the Committee of the Whole meeting on October the 1st 2024 be confirmed as recorded and without being read. Anything on those minutes? Okay I'll call the vote is anyone against? Hearing and seeing none that's unanimous. Okay I'm sorry for real this time. We are going to the report to Council on read the code of conduct, gifts and benefits. There is going to be a presentation by the Integrity Commissioner. John Mascarin is here. John, I can see you. Can you just test your audio? Can you hear me, Mr. Mayor?Whisper

Barely. Let's see if it's something on our end. Could you try again, John? Yes, sure. Can you hear me now? Yes. Yeah, that's really good. You're coming through clear. So I was going to give a preamble, but I don't think I will. I think probably you'll take care of it. So, John, I turn it over to you. Okay. Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor. Good evening, Mr. Mayor and members of Council. I'm here tonight to speak to item 8.1 on the agenda. It's a report that I've prepared. Let me tell you, your code of conduct has something rather unusual in it. I haven't seen this in other codes of conduct. It's certainly not in the codes that I have drafted. There's a provision in your code of conduct that indicates if the integrity commissioner is giving advice to a member of council and discovers in the giving of the advice that there has been a contravention, the integrity commissioner is to report to council. And let me say, Council, that's why I'm here tonight. The report you have in front of you, it's not an incredibly detailed report, and I'llWhisper

try to be as brief as I can this evening, and I'll leave myself available for questions. Mayor Guthrie reached out to me on November the 7th, as he's done occasionally during the term of Council, for written advice that we are allowed to provide to members of Council. Guthrie disclosed to me that he had been made aware of an article in the Vancouver Sun, and he attached a copy of the article, which recounted an ethics commissioner report from the city of New Westminster in BC. In that particular instance, the ethics commissioner was investigating a complaint that the mayor of New Westminster had accepted gifts and benefits in contravention of the community charter, which is akin to the Municipal Act in B.C., and the Code of Conduct for the city. What did the mayor do in New Westminster? He accepted travel accommodation, sorry, travel, accommodation, and meals from an entity known as the Global Covenant of MayorsWhisper

in attending a local climate action summit in Dubai in December of 2023. Mayor Guthrie forthrightly disclosed to me that he had attended the same conference and asked me for advice as to whether he had breached anything in the code of conduct for the city of Guelph. I said to him, I will read the report from the ethics commissioner and I will get back to you. I provided my written advice to the mayor on November the 9th. So that was two days after he had requested it. The mayor fully disclosed to me that he had attended the conference. In fact, I recently found out that he also posted on social media. He did not hide the fact that he was attending the conference. He also indicated to me that he is part of the Global Covenant of Mayors, GCOM, the Canadian cohort, and he is a director of the North American Board of Directors of GCOM.Whisper

And I took that in. I requested that the mayor provide me with some additional clarification. I asked if council was aware of his appointment, if council had endorsed it, if council had supported it, if council had appointed him to be appointed. The mayor, again, I thought in full and frank discussion indicated to me that he did not believe any of that was the case, but that he joined this organization because it's an organization of mayors. The same instance that happened in New Westminster. I reviewed the report of the Ethics Commissioner in New Westminster, and her conclusion was that the accommodation, the travel expenses, and the meals, but not the conference attendance per se, the conference attendance fee, were all personal benefits to the Mayor of New Westminster.Whisper

In reviewing the provisions of the Code of Conduct of the City of Guelph, I came to the exact same conclusion, and I indicated to Mayor Guthrie in a written response that while the statutory and other framework in BC was different from Ontario, the same essential rules applied. And therefore, I indicated to the mayor that I could not come to any other conclusion but that I believe that he had contravened the code of conduct. Shortly after I wrote my written advice to the mayor on November the 9th, I was made aware that a code of conduct complaint had been filed against the mayor. I disclosed this to the mayor, not the actual complaint, but the fact that one had been filed. And I wrote to the complainant indicating that I had already commenced on a report as I was required to do under the provisions of the Code of Conduct of the City of Guelph.Whisper

So members of council, what you have in front of you tonight is not an investigative report. It is a report based on the advice that I gave to Mayor Guthrie and the disclosure that he made to me and my conclusions. My conclusions at the bottom are that the mayor did in receiving the hospitality that was offered by GCOM, paid for by GCOM, was in excess of what I thought was appropriate and it appeared to me to be a gift and benefit. I also indicated to him, because he had told me that he was about to attend another summit, another conference put on by GCOM in Brazil, I indicated to him that I did not think it was appropriate for him to do so, and I indicated to him that he should make a public disclosure of the fact. On the Monday, sorry, on the Tuesday, the Monday was Remembrance Day.Whisper

On the Tuesday, I understood and senior staff have confirmed that the mayor did disclose to senior staff that he had received the advice that he was canceling his trip to Brazil and that he made disclosure of the fact that I had indicated that there was a breach of the code of conduct. So the mayor followed my advice to the team. I also provided recommendations to the mayor that if he wanted to, and I wasn't sure when he was going to Brazil or when he had planned to go to Brazil, but I indicated to him that if he still wanted to, there were several options available to him, and I suggested them to him. Tonight on the agenda, I understand that the mayor is seeking to move forward with one of the options that I had provided to him in my recommendations, in my advice. So, counsel, my report is as it's set out. I'm happy to take questions. My conclusions are that I believe that the mayor is in contravention of the code.Whisper

I believe that the mayor acted inadvertently. I believe he acted always in good faith, and he was attempting to serve the better interests of the municipality, but may have just been misled in what he could accept from GCOM, which was the accommodation, hospitality, and travel expenses. The mayor accepted my report. In fact, I did write to the mayor and gave him an opportunity to review the report. And he said, I accept the report and I have no further comments to make. I believe the mayor has taken remedial steps by disclosing, publicly disclosing the advice that I have given him or the substance of the advice by canceling his trip and by making efforts to move forward with the matter. So on the basis of all of that, I am not recommending that there be any penalty that is to be imposed on the mayor. My ultimate conclusion is that the mayor came to me forthrightly, asked me for advice, listened to my advice, accepted my advice, and in fact, followed my advice.Whisper

If he accepted the gifts and benefits, I believe he did so in good faith and inadvertently, and I am not recommending any form of penalty, nor am I recommending any remedial measures or corrective actions to be put in place. So, Mr. Mayor, members of council, that is my report. Again, it speaks for itself, but I will take any questions that any members or you, Mr. Mayor, may have. Thank you. I am not. I guess it's that good. There's no questions. So, John, thank you. I jokingly say this every time. I don't like to see you. I don't like to hear from you. But in this case, I appreciate it and I think council appreciates the clarity and the public does too. And that's your job. So for that, we appreciate it and I'll bring it back to council at this time. Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, John. Council, we have a recommendation in front of us just to receive the report. Claussen and Gibson, is there anything further?Whisper

Hearing and seeing none, I'll call the vote on receiving. Anyone against receiving? None, that's unanimous. Thank you so much. Moving right along on to the next one that's in relation to this one is the Code of Conduct amendment in relation to what we just heard so that we can look to rectify this issue. I will just like to, if you don't mind, take a moment, but before I do, I would need a mover and a seconder at least for. Guller and Richardson. Okay, thank you. I'm not looking over you. Thank you. And if you could just give me a moment, I would like to read this out loud. In relation to the integrity commissioner report in which I self reported, I respectfully submit a resolution to Council for consideration to remedy the code of conduct and these changes, if approved, will become applicable to all members of Council. The resolution has been crafted with input from the integrity commissioner and the city of Guelph clerks department. In specific reference to the Global Covenant of Mayors, in 2018, Guelph City Council unanimouslyWhisper

approved Guelph, becoming a signatory to this globally recognized organization. And in 2022, the Federation of Canadian Municipalities, of which Guelph is a member, contacted me directly to ask if they could submit my name through them as the Secretariat to be considered as a position for the North American representative on the GCOM Board of Directors, and I was unanimously approved to join. Since that time, I have represented the GCOM values and goals while also representing the City of Guelph as mayor. I have attended several events to speak on the work our city is doing and advocate for the inclusion of cities within higher orders of government policies. My presence along GCOM has already secured $50,000 US towards the creation of a new Youth Climate Action Fund, which has been successfully launched and supported by young people across our city. In fact, I think some of the delegates here tonight are speaking from some of the money where that has gone. I am now currently working in the final stages of trying to secure $100,000 US for a secondWhisper

round of grants for our youth in the city for climate change action. These connections have also led to successful training provided for City of Guelph staff through partnerships with ICLEI, C40 Cities and GCOM, enabling the opportunity to strengthen the impacts of our own Climate Change and Energy Office. From a government relations perspective, I have continued to promote Guelph innovation, sustainable infrastructure projects, energy initiatives to upper levels of government, And I continue to advocate for greater municipal resources and supports for environmental projects and champion applications for funding for climate change initiatives. So this motion before us is to ensure that this matter can be resolved so that the important work on behalf of the City of Guelph and our partnerships with FCM, ICLEI, the Cities for Climate Protection Network and GCOM can continue to proceed. And it's also consistent with the Council and Mayor expense policy regarding education programs and attendance at events. So with that, the motion as it stands today is that section 5 of the code of conduct for council and local boards be amended to include an exemption for food, lodging, transportation, and entertainment provided by third partyWhisper

organizations for attendance at events which are targeted to a municipal government audience and when the total benefit exceeds 300 that requires reporting in the city council and local board's gift disclosure within 30 days. There also is a letter from the CEO of the Federation of the Canadian Municipalities also backing this and validating my position through FCM, which they are still the secretariat for that position through to GCOM. And so I appreciate the CEO of FCM providing that letter to Council as well. With that, is there anything further on this item. Councillor O'Rourke. Councillor O' Thanks, Mayor Guthrie. So I understand that you crafted that motion with the integrity commissioner, but I find it's much too broad because it would apply to anybody on council and local boards and then people could accept and then just come back and report it. So I have an amendment to move that adds after the words government audience, it addsWhisper

with the prior approval of city council when the benefit exceeds $300 and that way, you know, frankly, I didn't recall that we hadn't approved your participation on on the global covenant of mayors. So if one of us was in that position or a board was a member of a local board was in that position, you could come to council, explain the appointment, explain what it was, and then with full transparency that council could then approve that. So I I have an amendment to propose to your first clause and then just so that the transparency is there as you are still a member of the global covenant of mayors, there's a second clause that would then allow you to continue that work. Great. Is there a seconder for it? Okay. Richardson is a seconder. Okay. And is there anything on that? Okay. Councillor Gawler. Through your worship to the mover. Thank you for suggesting this, Councillor O'Rourke. I am concerned about the, that this would become cumbersome if people are going to events. Would, by this wording, they would have to come to a meeting of council every time they're going to go to an event whereWhisper

they're being come for more than $300? It just seems that we would have a lot of requests having to come to council that way. So, through you, Mary Guthrie, I don't think there would be that many instances, because For the most part, we're all going to AMO or FCM and so the type of travel and accommodation, maybe the number is wrong. I just picked the same number that is the disclosure requirement, but I don't know that it's very frequent that people are paying for travel and accommodation for a member of council or of a local board to attend. So that was the language. Without that clause of approving council, anyone could accept anything to any conference under the you know municipal government audience so so I found the original motion way too broad and that this creates some at least some reflection and then some transparency okay okay well thank you for that I appreciate it seeing as the original motion still requires a report to be made 30 days I will not be supporting the additional motion and I am concerned about making on-the-fly changes to something that was developed by the integrity commissioner when we have it vetted those changes by other people. Thank you. Alton and Gibson.Whisper

Thank you very much, Mayor Guthrie. It's similar to Councillor Gawler. In reading the original motion that was put forward and then motion one which is essentiallyWhisper

a replacement for that, and then Motion 2, which is really an action of counsel, not a replacement, it strikes me that the original motion provides us with the security that anybody on council is not inadvertently contravening the code of conduct. I have some problems with number two because I think that in fact the original motion provide allows for you or whatever mayor to be a member of the global covenant of mayors, regardless. So I'd say that in some senses, number two is actually redundant. So I will continue to support the original motion and not the two that have been moved as amendments. Okay, thank you. And Gibson, you question for the mover. I like the intent of the motion coming to council for approval. Creates an agenda item, creates potential for delegations, creates the potential for politicization. Am I off base in thinking that or would it just be a receipt? Like, if it's a council vote, it seems to me that it would become an agenda item and therefore we could

be spending hours at council debating whether or not the mayor goes to Sweden for a climate change conference. Can you help me understand that a little bit, please. Sure. So through you, Mayor Guthrie, Councillor Gibson, the thought behind it is that without that clause of approval of counsel, anyone could accept any benefit that would apply to this clause, could be anything, and then just has to come back and report it after the fact. So I find that a little weak, frankly. And to my recollection, when we have a councillor who wants to serve on the board of amo, we have a motion of counsel to say, yeah, we support that. So it's with that intention. It's not to belabor the point. If everybody's comfortable with the original recommendation, so be it. I just felt that the original language was very permissive. I don't disagree. I think there's. You've identified like a bit of a governance gap that I think we could probably look to close in the future. I'm a little nervous about bringing it to council for approval in a public forum.

I just, I fear the politicization of that decision making. But I do agree with you that there probably should be some more accountability there. I'm thinking maybe I'm not going to support your motion, but I'm thinking maybe in future meetings when it comes to governance, we can, and we'll look to create some wording around that. Thank you. Thank you. I got Karan and then I have Downer. And then I see you, Katon, as well. Yeah, through you, Mr. Mayor. I don't think that this amendment is actually about this situation at all. It's about good governance. And there is a gap for me as well. I don't think that. I have no issue with Global Covenant of Mayors or Mayor Guthrie's participation in that group. I think it has benefits to the city and if this were to come to council, I think we would all unanimously support the mayor for participating in that organization. This is about future councils and we don't know what other future opportunities and conferences and we could have a Global Covenant of Climate Deniers conference. We don't know what the future holds. This is a long term addition to enhance our code of conduct for potential

situations that do not include what's happening today. Thank you. Downer then, Kate. So just through you, Mayor, the one thing I do want to point out is that AMO and FCM are different in that the municipality pays for the expenses of the. When I was on the AIMO board, it was the municipality that paid for my accommodation and things like that. So it's a lot different than an outside organization that is funding this. So, you know, I tend to want to leave it alone. I Mean, it might be something we want to tweak when we. When we look at the code of conduct again in a review and think about that. But I'm happy with the original motion and not adding anything in at the this point. Okay, thank you. And last is Kate. Thank you. Through you, Mr. Mayor. I'm kind of along the same lines as Councillor O and Councillor Khan in that, like, I don't have any issues with the current circumstance that we had just discussed in Integrity Report, but it's more about the potential for inappropriate use

that I would have concerns about. So what would be the timeline for a review if we didn't pass this motion now through you, Mr. Mayor? There's a governance review going before city council in March of next year that includes a code of conduct review. Okay. So I'm going to support the amendment now, but just in light it, like, if it doesn't pass, then I'm comfortable with the next timeline being reviewed in March. Okay, thank you. So I'll just. I'll call the vote. And just before I call the vote, I would just say that I did. I did craft this kind of in conjunction with the IC and with clerks as well. And the way I view it is that it's about equalization for everyone. Like, all members have the same kind of process. It's not even about me as the mayor. But, you know, I think there's some boundaries around it because of the disclosure anyways, by default. And I would suggest that we

stick to the original so that it's equal for all. And then in March, we can always review it then if we had to. But, yeah, this would definitely, you know, it would give me the ability anyways to catch me within this to continue with. With GCom, because there is. There is work that I'm doing on there in regards to the city as well. So I'm not going to support that. But I'll call the vote then, though. So those against the amendment, please raise your hand. So, Gawler, Clausen, Alt, Busatil, Guthrie, Downer, Chu, Gibson, Billings. Okay, so that does fail. So we're back to the original motion. Is there anything else that needs to be said before we call the vote on the original motion? Nothing. I'd like to say more, but I just won't. So I'll call the vote. Is anyone against? Okay. And that's unanimous. Thank you so much, everyone. Let us continue. We are at the municipal franchise agreement with Enbridge Gas, Inc. We have a few delegations and.

Let me get my glasses on. Indigo Are you here? Yes, come on down. Indigo Moran is here from the Youth Climate Anxiety and Action.

Welcome. Thanks for coming again. Appreciate it. And yeah, the microphone's been turned green for you there. So by the way, everyone has up to five minutes, just so you know. And then you'll hear the chime at the four minute and 30 second mark which gives you the 30 second warning. Okay. Don't let it get to five minutes because then the microphone gets turned off. Okay. And then stick around just in case there's any follow up questions. Okay? Okay. Over to you whenever you're ready. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, city councillors, staff and fellow community members. My name is Indigo Moran and I am full of righteous indignation. On October 31, residents of an encampment in St. George's Square were told to leave. Eviction notices were placed on their shelters, giving them a deadline of November 13th. On that day, officials moved in to take residents belongings to storage without their consent before even 10:30 in the morning. These people weren't making money by being there. They weren't indirectly taxing people and weren't producing excessive amounts of greenhouse gases. They were just living there, exercising their right to exist

in a public space as people who have been ostracized and shut out from other places that they may have tried to live. They were trying to find community and a semi permanent location to be. Yet they were policed, questioned, shunned and eventually evicted in spite of the winter being one of the hardest seasons for unhoused people, in spite of two premature deaths happening just a couple of days prior to this eviction. By contrast, Enbridge is having major successes right Now. They made 1.3 billion in only the third quarter. This year they're expecting to finish 2024 with earnings between 17.7 and 8.3 billion, all while importing mostly fracked gas, according to Environmental Defense Canada for their pipelines and emitting abysmal amounts of methane gas, according to UNIFOR workers in Queen's Park. Enbridge also ignores leaks in their pipelines for weeks, allowing gas to escape. And they're planning to stop compliance testing their infrastructure as frequently as they are supposed. What is so fundamentally wrong with our society that we restrict police and punish people just trying to survive in public spaces, yet look the other way when a

polluting company makes millions from our community through a hidden subsidy. Why are we through refusing to address this contradiction, refusing spaces to people who have almost nothing and giving money and land to a billion dollar corporation by charging them nothing but property taxes? Perhaps I and others would be less concerned if $15 million weren't being cut mostly from environmental programs next year. Or maybe I wouldn't think it was realistic to change our energy consumption if this were pre2023 and we didn't know that heat pumps are 13% cheaper than natural gas. Or if I didn't know, sadly, that 83% of extreme weather events in the last 20 years have either been caused or exacerbated by climate change. Or if the youth mental health crisis weren't worsened by climate change, with 49% of youth expressing extreme concern over the state of our climate. Or even if our healthcare system wasn't becoming increasingly privatized. Or if climate doom scrolling and political misinformation weren't so rampant in an increasingly digital world. But none of those things are the case. This is 2024 and we're witnessing

the climate crisis event effects on weather events and human health. We see it through news publications and stories from people we know. I've witnessed the impacts of all of this on youth mental health firsthand. And we know that it is possible, practical and affordable to do better than we are doing. We cannot treat the housing crisis, healthcare accessibility, mental health, emergency and the climate crisis as isolated separate events. We must acknowledge the connections between these issues and work to fix them. You can start today by ending the subsidization of this fossil gas giant. Put that $9 million back in our community and not the pockets of a multi billion dollar corporation. Support Councillor Curran's motion once more and show the people living in Guelph today that you care. Thank you. Thank you so much. Is there any questions as a follow up hearing and seeing? None. Thank you very much. Thank you. Okay, Murray Costello and I think Patrick McMahon is maybe coming down together. Yes,

thank you both for coming. And again, no more than five minutes. If you can share the five minutes if you want, or whatever you wish, but whatever it is, it's no more than five minutes and I'll turn it over to you whenever you're ready. Go right ahead. Okay, thank you. Good evening, your worship, Mayor Guthrie, council and city staff, thank you for the opportunity to share some information on Enbridge. More specifically the model franchise agreement that we're requesting, well, approval for. My name is Murray Costello. I'm the director of Southeast region operations. I have accountabilities for the maintenance, construction, operation of our natural gas system here in this area. Joining me this Evening is Patrick McMahon, our technical manager, regulatory affairs, taking a look at Enbridge. Here in Ontario we provide dependable energy to 3.9 million customers. We are innovating and adapting our business model to accelerate the transition to a net zero emission future, focusing our efforts in three areas. Using less through conservation so programs for residential business, industrial customers. Transitioning to renewable gases. So think of renewable natural gas. Think of hydrogen advancing clean technologies for transportation, building heat and industrial processes such as cng, rng, hybrid heating, geothermal and carbon capture.

Corporately, if I look back to 2002, Enbridge was an early adopter investing in renewable energy in both wind and solar. Since 2002, we've invested $10 billion across North America and offshore. Currently we have wind farms in Concord and Dorian Richtown and solar farms in Sarnia, Tilbury and Amherstburg. When I take a look at the city of Guelph here, We've been serving natural gas to the city of Guelph since 1955. We are very proud to serve in industrial commercial residential customers of 48,000. We're a proud community partner pleased to have supported a number of initiatives in 2024 such as Wyndham House Children's Foundation, Guelph and Wellington School, Hopewell Children's Home Incorporated and Lakeside Hope House. I know that it came up the concept about relocation costs and I did go back and take a look over the last 10 years and there has been $11 million that Enbridge has invested in relocation programs here within the city of Guelph. Not one of those projects in the past 10 years required a contribution from the city of Guelph. So I know that there is talk about allocating and that can happen for pipe, that's post 1981.

But I would look over the last 10 years, there's not the one project in the city of Guelph. Something I am proud about is the downtown Guelph revitalization project and working very closely with staff to work through that. So we did invest or we are investing this year $2.6 million this year to upgrade our system to move it out of the way to get out of the way for utility conflicts. Yes, there is an upside to our company is that we do have an upgraded system going into 2025. We'll invest another $2.5 million, no contribution from the city to update that infrastructure in the downtown, support the downtime revitalization. I know there's been the concept of subsidization come up and I did want to talk about property taxes. So across Ontario we do pay. In 2023 there was $124 million paid in property taxes. In Guelph, it would be slightly over $1 million that we did contribute to the city of Guelph. So we do pay taxes for every meter of pipe that we do have in the ground. On the municipal franchise agreement, it's been in place since January 2000. If we look at how it was started, it was between amo, the Ontario Energy Board and the gas utilities at that time.

This current agreement does expire if I go to 5-16-20. The model franchise agreement was put in place to create a level playing field across Ontario. So we did not have one community subsidizing another community. It was an efficient model agreement created to create that equality across the province. The OAB does direct the franchise agreement to be based on the small agreement unless there's compelling reasons to deviate from it. When I look across Ontario Today, there is 342 of those agreements. I think there's only one minor deviation due to some certain geographic changes. When we look at the model agreement, yes, it's a 20 years agreement. There is a clause in there. So if changes do happen, they're approved by the OAB. They would be incorporated in on the seventh anniversary and the 14th anniversary of that agreement. Signing the franchise agreement doesn't force people to use natural gas. It creates that framework under which we would operate. So in closing, let me say we're committed to lowering emissions while meeting the energy demands of our customers. We aim to keep energy costs in check and anticipate our customers energy needs for tomorrow

and develop new energy solutions as the energy evolution continues to unfold. We absolutely do need to maintain the reliability and the safety of the distribution network that we have in place today. Hence why we are requesting the renewal of the current model franchise agreement here in Guelph. Great, thank you very much. Is there any questions for this delegate? Councillor Karan, please. Great. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, through you and thanks for presenting this evening. You did mention that the history of the, of the model franchise agreement goes back 20 years. Yes, but you also acknowledge that the energy landscape has completely changed in the last 20 years. So would you agree, you know, without going into details about how a model franchise agreement could be changed, but wouldn't you agree that in a. Wouldn't you agree that a model franchise agreement that was developed 20 years ago when there's been a complete evolution of energy systems across Canada might be up for a little bit of work and change and updating, given that the energy landscape includes an entire renewable sector

and transformation and the costs to municipalities have increased over time as well, Tiana, sure. Through you, Mr. Mayor, Pat McMahon here. The model franchise agreement actually originated back in 1987 and it was updated through request, through email that wanted to make updates to the model franchise agreement. So it's basically terms and conditions related to our operations within the municipality. It doesn't necessarily account for changes in energy frameworks or technology that might occur. It was actually written on purpose generically to address how we should operate within municipalities and leave it up to discussions with the municipalities on specifics on road work and follow up with staff at municipalities. So it doesn't actually contain a lot about framework or any changes in the energy regime in the, in the province. And the Ontario Energy Board hasn't been persuaded to change the model franchise agreement, mainly because they haven't had a lot

of complaints about the model franchise agreement from municipalities or amor. It was a negotiated document led primarily by AMO in the day and with the gas utilities. So it was kind of negotiation at the time. And that's while the changes, some municipalities have suggested changes to the model franchise agreement, most of it is different conditions or refinements to reporting to the municipalities or municipal franchise fees and things like that. And the Interior Energy Board just has not agreed with making changes to the model franchise agreement because of the impact across the province if you try to make one off changes for one municipality when 300 plus other municipalities would be impacted as well. Thank you. And is there any other questions at this time? Okay, I have one. I'm just, I'm curious. So I. We often are hearing lately, especially from those that are sort of advocating for kind of some of these positions, that other

provinces have completely different sort of setups that the utility, similar utility in a different province would be paying, you know, money to the municipality for the right of use of their roadways or, or you know, other agreements. Whereas in Ontario it's different. Do you, can you reflect on that for us? Like, why is it, do you think that Ontario is different than many of the other provinces where they, they have a different setup? I'm just curious if you have researched that. Why, why is it different? Well, thank you, Mr. Mayor. The other regimes. We'll talk for instance to Alberta where they do allow franchise fees to be collected through ATCO Gas. The difficulty they have there is the rate driver impact of these fees and the municipal franchise fees. In Alberta we're talking hundreds of millions. For instance, the city of Edmonton probably gets 70 million. Calgary gets maybe 80 million from ATCO Gas on an annual basis. So those costs are actually recovered from the rate pairs of Atco Gas.

So. Right. So the rates will go up to recover those costs. And what they've determined is that instead of municipalities collecting revenue to pay for services through property taxes and other assessments, they're collecting it through Atco Gas. And so it's the same taxpayer acting as a gas ratepayer that's actually paying those fees. Okay. Thank you. All right. Oh, I see. I see a hand. I see a hand. Counselor Billings. So through your worship. Okay. Given what you just said, you're aware of the recommendation in front of us and council would like to see you being charged fees for the use of public property. However, clause 3C would like to see an agreement which will ensure future charges for use of municipal property is not passed on to the Guelph customers of the gas distribution company. So when I read that, I think it sounds politically good but not realistic. So I wanted you to comment on that. And given what you just said, is it not the likelihood that

these fees would be passed on to the ratepayers through you? Mr. Mayor? The proposed legislation is to try to make changes to the regulation that doesn't allow these fees to be charged to utilities like Enbridge Gas. And to get the municipal franchise agreement changed, we would have to make an application to the Ontario Energy Board to accept clauses addressing this proposed legislation. And from our experience, the Interior Energy Board would not even recognize speculative legislation. So they wouldn't act on speculative legislation. They act on legislation or directions from the minister, but anything speculative they do not act on. So they wouldn't do anything with a recommendation to add clauses talking about proposed legislation as far as recovery of municipal franchise fees if they were ever passed as

accepted. Ontario Energy Board has a practice, as Mr. Costello said earlier, to approve the recovery of permit fees or other costs that are incurred by Enbridge Gas to provide service through rates. So they would be. Ontario Energy Board in all likelihood would allow recovery of prudently incurred franchise fees through the rates charged to the ratepayers and the citizens of the city of Guelph. So it's not something we would not recommend to change the board's long standing policy of recovering costs and rates because the benefit rates follow the benefits. So if the taxpayers of the city of Guelph are benefiting from a franchise fee, that's who should be paying for the benefit. And so that's the longstanding policy of the Ontario Energy Board. And that's what we would continue to pursue. Thank you for that. Thanks. Councillor Billings. Over to Councilor Ault. Please. Thank you very much. Mayor Guthrie. Through you to the delegates. I apologize. I don't know why my thing is dinging. I got it on silent.

That was my wife. The question that I have for you didn't come up until I heard a couple of the other councillors ask questions. I'm struggling with an issue of transparency and equity. One of the things that strikes me about this that's good, whether the costs are passed on to the consumers or not, is that there's a very clear transparency, that this is part of the cost of using natural gas, which I think is important. I do believe in transparency. The other one is equity. It strikes me as well that consumers and residents of Guelph or any other community who are not using gas, but are perhaps using electricity or maybe in the odd case, completely off the grid, are actually being charged through our taxes inadvertently for Enbridge, essentially using city property. Am I correct in that? So I'll take through Mayor to Councilor Alton. No, I wouldn't see it that way. I'd say go back to the fact that we are paying a million dollars to the city of Guelph in property taxes for every meter of pipe. I'm sorry, just one second. I'll give you your time.

To those in the audience, I would appreciate the respect that we gave you as much as you should give the respect to the next delegates that are speaking right now. Is that fair? Because we do it for you. It is. So thank you very much. Back to you. Thank you. So we do pay property taxes for each meter of pipe that we do have in the ground. We are passive. We are not looking for a lot of the services that the municipality that prepares. We do believe that natural gas has been an economic driver for this community and many other communities across Ontario. With regards to the transparency issue with my hydro, I see the distribution fees from Electra. I see everything up front. What I'm wondering is, because some of this is actually not within the fees that I see from my natural gas, is there a transparency issue here as well? And again, apologies for my phone. I've actually got it on. Do not disturb through

you, Mr. Mayor. If you could just clarify what you mean by what you're not seeing on the bill from Enbridge? Yes, I believe that there is a. Essentially a transportation fee as a consequence of the lines in Guelph's. Within Guelph's land. We'll put it that way. And consequently, I don't see 100% of the cost in my gas bill because I do use gas Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I've completely got the whole equation backwards through you, Mr. Mayor. The rates are designed to recover the total revenue of carbon of Enbridge Gas. And we charge uniform rates to anyone that uses it in the city of Guelph. And the costs are allocated among the different classes of customers on a system basis. So there may be. It's uniform rates, but recovering all the costs that we incur. So all the costs that we incur are recovered through the rates. It's not itemized. You don't see a line item that says property taxes or

things like that. They're all rolled up into O and M costs or capital related costs and rolled into the revenue requirement. Then the revenue requirements is divided by the cubic meters that we sell to come up with an average rate for a distribution charge or a transportation charge. So that's. That's how it's divided out. You don't see an individual line item. You'll see it for taxes, carbon tax, or hst, but you won't see individual cost items. They're rolled up in aggregate. And then the Ontario Energy Board determines what the rate structure will be on how those costs are put in aggregate. And those are the fees that we end up putting on the bill. Okay. Perhaps the carbon tax should be part of the aggregate. The issue that I then have though is do, and I'll put it a different way, do taxpayers in Guelph who are not using natural gas at all, do they experience any cost as a consequence of lines within Guelph? Just a simple yes or no. Really. No. Okay, thanks. That's all I needed to know. Thank you.

Yeah, just turn off your. Your mic there. Looks like I got one more from Councilor Gibson. Thank you. Through you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you very much for coming to delegate today. I just wanted to give you an opportunity. There's been a lot of talk about Enbridge revenue and the jump it's taken in the last few years. And I tried to bring some transparency to this, but I was just wondering if you could elaborate a little bit on revenue and how that's related to your collection of the federal carbon tax and what that's meant to. Not profits, but revenues for Enbridge. I know that it's broken down a little bit on your website, but if you could just take a minute to help us understand that. How do I start in? So through mayor to Councillor Gibson. So just maybe a couple of comments on Enbridge overall and I have heard some figures from the last meeting and this meeting. Enbridge is North America's largest energy infrastructure company. If you look, we're probably half in Canada, half in the United States. If you look at the gas distribution side total, we might be a quarter of that pie. If you look at us here in Ontario, you might have to take that again in half. So you need to put that into perspective when you're talking about Enbridge Overall and

you're talking about the parent company and some of the financial numbers that people are referencing, they're referencing the overall piece versus what is. What's happening here in Ontario. So I thought I'd just give that for a bit of context from the overall company perspective and maybe you can talk a bit about the other piece. Yeah. So the franchise agreement we're talking about is the regulated distribution utility here in Ontario. And we are regulated by the Ontario Energy Board and they restrict what our profit will be at any one time. The federal carbon tax is an in and out. Like it's. It just gets put on the bill. We recovered, we submit it. We don't earn anything on that. The return is capped at a certain amount. If we happen to earn in any particular year a little bit more than that, we have to share it with the ratepayers and give them. If we had a super efficient year and save money somewhere and bumped up our return beyond a certain threshold above our regulated return, we would end up sharing the benefit with the ratepayers. So when you're talking about revenues and returns

for the regulated utility, it is very regulated and restricted as to how much we can actually earn. So the numbers that are often mentioned when you talking about a billion dollars or whatever, that, as Mr. Costello was saying, is the total corporation, North American corporation, not the regulated Ontario utility. Thank you. And one last question. As a regulated company, you're regulated in terms of your rate of return. The way you grow your business then, therefore would be to increase your customer base, not necessarily increasing pricing on your rate pairs. Is that correct? Similar to any kind of energy distribution company that's regulated right through you, Mr. Mayor. The Ontario Energy Board regulates where we can be spending money on assets and expanding our system. We have requirements at the Ontario Energy Board to provide them with proposed projects for system expansion and what have you, they determine whether a system expansion is in the public interest. And we'll only move forward with projects like that to expand our system

if the Ontario Energy Board approves it in advance.

Okay. Is that good? Council question. Okay, great. Hey, thanks for coming. We really appreciate it. And in your perspective, so thank you for Your presentation. Thank you. Thank you again. Okay, next up we have Henry Morin. And is it. Is it Kyrus? Am I saying that right? Thank you, Jairus. Sorry. Valeria from the Youth Climate Anxiety in action coming up to the microphone next.

Welcome to you both. Appreciate it. And you're good. You just got to share your time too. Yep. Perfect. Okay, well, you can start whenever you're ready. Thank you.

Good evening, everyone. My name is Violet. Valeria. Sorry. It's both nice and utterly nerve wracking to be back here again, but thank you for having me or us and giving us the time to speak in front of you all. Change in consequence, whether positive or negative, there will never be a change if there's no consequence today, I am asking you to be on the side of change that leads to a positive consequence so that the youth of today and tomorrow will have a fighting chance in this amazing town that in the 16 years of my life, I have come to love and call my home. If Guelph continues to subsidize Umberidge and let them get away from the problems that they have caused on our dime, I fear that when it's time for me to start my own family, unfortunately, this will no longer be the place to do so.

And that really upsets me because I like living here. It's a fun place. Now, I understand that company, that Enbridge is a company and their main goal is to make money, but they are causing too many problems environmentally and within our community. And I also understand that change is hard, especially a change that will, or especially a big change that will after 20 years of pretty much being the norm. But that's what makes change so rewarding. The feeling of doing something that gives a positive impact is a great feeling. But hey, the easy way or the easy option would just to do nothing. But that isn't overly rewarding and

just doesn't leave any good feelings.

Um, well, I hope that you all lead us down the path of a positive change. And thank you for letting me speak and giving me your ears for three minutes. Hello, everyone. My name is Henry Moran and I am still a kid. And even though I'm still a kid, I've come to delegate here today because the climate crisis is a major problem that affects my generation. When I grow up, I don't want to have to worry about whether the air I'm breathing, the water I'm drinking, or the food I'm eating is clean or not. But I may have to because of the events going on right now. By subsidizing Enbridge, you're giving money to a company that may be part of making those nightmares a reality. Did you know that natural gas is one of Ontario's worst climate change contributors? It is responsible for a whole third of Ontario's greenhouse gas emissions. That may not sound like a lot, but consider that Ontario had 157 megatons of carbon emissions back in 2022.

That means companies like Enbridge are responsible for around 53 megatons of carbon emissions themselves. Are you sure you want to keep giving money to a company? By deteriorating our air quality and relating that to what I said earlier. Adolescents around my age are going into depression and becoming incredibly anxious worrying about the future. Do you think we want to live in a world where we have to feel like we're overheating in both the summer and the winter? These problems are part of why 16% or more of adolescents are going into depression all around the world. And just like me, I'm guessing you aren't happy to hear those numbers. So you see, because we are giving money to the people indirectly causing mental illnesses in young people all around the world who are the future, might I add. We are just helping further the extent of the climate crisis. I'm not saying everything would be changed if we stopped subsidizing Enbridge, but it would help. Thank you for your time and thank you both for your presentation. Thanks for coming down. Again, Let me see if there's a question as a follow up. There isn't, but again, thank you very much for coming. Okay,

let's see here. Who's next? Gabby Gallopush is going to join us by video from the Clean Air Partnership. There. Can you hear me? Okay. Yes, we can both see you and hear you. And thank you very much for joining us. You have up to five minutes. Okay, And I'll let you. Let you go. And you. We'll. Hopefully you don't get to the five minutes because I don't want your mic to get cut off. Okay, thank you so much. Well, good evening, mayor, council members, staff and residents. And thank you for allowing me the time just to speak on your busy agenda. My name is Gabby Kalapush and I'm the Clean Air. I work at the Clean Air Partnership and wanted to speak to Clean Air Partnership support for the city of Guelph hopeful leadership in addressing an unfair fossil fuel subsidy forced upon municipalities in Ontario. Clean Air Partnership is a charitable environmental organization whose modus operandi is to work with municipalities and their partners to make progress on the significant gap between climate commitments and climate action implementation in one of many examples of how life is not fair, it is the truth that municipal budgets are extremely vulnerable to significant costs from climate change,

especially as it relates to the risk of infrastructure or residents resulting from extreme weather. Municipal budgets are also extremely limited in their revenue sources, with property taxes being their only or main recourse for revenue generation. This is a significant challenge for municipal budgets, as I'm sure you all know, and how we are how are we going to secure the needed resources to invest in the climate commitments and respond to the costs related to the impacts of extreme weather and climate change? It's a question that we're all asking ourselves. It is also true that over 95% of Guelph's greenhouse gas emissions comes from the use of fossil fuels. I get that the franchise agreement is not an exciting thing to dig into, but how utilities use the municipal right of way and shining light on the very unequal playing field between how Ontario's fossil fuel system is paid for, how low carbon energy systems are paid for and how our electricity is paid for is one of the key critical things we need to address to create a level playing field on energy choices for ontarians. It continually amazes me that we make low carbon energy systems compete on their own against a fossil fuel system that receives significant fossil fuel subsidies.

Be these fossil fuel subsidies from taxation relief or subsidizing all infrastructure costs off the provincial fossil fuel rate base, or not having to pay their carbon price for electricity generated via fossil fuels. All these are examples of fossil fuel subsidies that Enbridge, which is a private company, benefits from. Provincial rules now allowing municipalities to charge Enbridge for use of the right of way for pipelines is an example of a fossil fuel subsidy that is forced upon municipalities. Municipalities need to draw attention to these issues to get this on the provincial agenda. The province certainly won't address these issues without municipalities asking them to. Municipalities also need to address their limited revenue tools for their climate commitments implementation. Municipalities in other provinces can charge utilities for use of the right of way for their infrastructure, so why not Ontario municipalities? In addition, being able to charge Enbridge will help level the playing field between fossil fuel and low carbon energy utilities. The fossil fuel subsidy forced upon Ontario municipalities doesn't end at the free use of the municipal right of way mutual Enbridge also has the given given has been given the authority to abandon its infrastructure in the municipal right away.

And while this may not have reared its head as yet a problem, but as we move away from fossil fuels in the Energy transition, this will start to become a municipal issue. Why should they have the right to abandon their infrastructure and leave it to municipalities to deal with? I'm very confused by that. Municipal leadership in calling out these unfair practices being forced upon municipalities is critical to driving provincial engagement on this topic. Change won't happen without municipal leadership. And unless municipalities like Guelph care a whole awful lot, Ontario's energy system is not going to ensure a more level playing field between our fossil fuel system of the past and the low carbon energy systems of the future and present. Ontario Canada needs to be a participant in that low energy transformation and removing fossil fuel subsidies such as free access to the right of way and the right to abandon infrastructure as part of that needed change. These subsidies are not fair. It's really not. Thank you so much for your time and I'd be loved to answer any questions that you may have. Thank you Gabby for your presentation. We appreciate that. And let me see if there's any follow up for you. Councillor Alt has a question for you. Thank you Mayor Guthrie. I now see where I got my confused understanding through you.

To the delegate, I was wondering if you could outline what is Bill 160 and what is its apparent impact on new housing development costs. Thank you so much. And through the chair. Bill 165 was a bill passed by the Province of Ontario after the Ontario Energy Board ruled that Enbridge should not be making the rate base subsidize the cost of new infrastructure in particular to low rise development. So this is really geared towards how the fossil fuel infrastructure cost costs are paid for to new developments. And what the Ontario Energy Board said is that it's not fair for the Ontario rate base to subsidize these infrastructure costs in this it should be there, should be the cost being put on to development should pay for the cost of development. It's very much similar along the lines of most development charges in that approach that it should infrastructure costs should be allocated to those that are in create the infrastructure cost in the first place and it should be added to the development costs as a whole and that the rate they should not subsidize that. So what ended up happening is the Province of Ontario passed Bill 165 to maintain that fossil fuel subsidy in new developments. And right now we

have it where you know, we have to pay for electricity allocations, but we don't have to pay for fossil fuel infrastructure costs being brought to new development. It creates an unequal playing field between electricity, how electricity system is costed out and how the fossil fuel system is costed out. One last question, Mayor Kathryn so then my original understanding that non gas consumers are actually subsidizing gas lines into subdivisions, is that correct? They non gas users would not be subsidizing the cost of new infrastructure, new fossil fuel infrastructure for new developments, because they're not an Enbridge customer. But all Enbridge customers are subsidizing the costs associated with bringing the fossil fuel infrastructure to new developments. One of the big concerns that the Ontario Energy Board kind of raises is the risk of stranded assets. And one of the key kind of issues for why this does increase the risk of stranded assets is because, for example, it takes approximately 40 years. Let's use that as an example for the the rate base user, the customer, to pay back the rate

base for that infrastructure investment. However, if you're bringing new development, new infrastructure to a new development and they're on the fossil fuel, we know that they're going to be on fossil fuels for at least 15 years while their fossil fuel furnace is functioning. However, when their next kind of, when that fossil fuel furnace comes to its end of life, there is a good likelihood that that customer will actually move over to a heat pump and then that way move or move themselves for the Enbridge as an Enbridge customer, in which case the overall rate base would be the one who has to subsidize that infrastructure cost. Enbridge is guaranteed, I think it's a 9% rate of return on all of their investments. And then they make additional profits by selling fossil fuels to Enbridge Ontario's Enbridge system. So there's the Enbridge Canadian company, but then there's the Enbridge Ontario company. Enbridge Canada Company makes its money off the sale of fossil fuels and Enbridge Ontario company makes its money off the bringing, paying, getting delivery, getting, recouping the cost of the infrastructure. And if we have the risk of stranded assets, it increases the risk that those who can't leave the fossil fuel system are going to be creating are going

to be unfairly burdened with stranded asset costs that have to be recouped because Enbridge is guaranteed its 9% rate of return. Thank you. I've learned something today. Oh, Councillor Karan, please. Thank you. And thank you for an excellent presentation. And one of the things that you highlighted that was significant for me is that change is coming. It's the end of the carbon economy. We're moving to a low carbon economy or no carbon economy and that the transition to heat pumps needs to be incentivized and creating the Level playing field is a way to make that happen. We heard in the presentation earlier, and I don't know if you were listening online, but we heard in the earlier presentation from Enbridge that they are investing millions into conservation and new technologies. And it was my understanding that the Canada Greener Homes initiative is actually the delivery. Enbridge is only the delivery agent for a federal program. So the reason it is relevant here is if we want to incentivize by having the OEB change the

way we municipalities can gain revenue and incentivize low energy economy, we have to acknowledge that these grants aren't being delivered by our fossil gas suppliers. They're coming from public tax dollars. Can you shed some light on that structure? Yeah, I should actually mention that Enbridge actually was delivering the Greener Homes. I will give Enbridge credit. They did a better job of delivering the Greener homes from a customer perspective than Greener Homes was doing. So I will give them credit. They streamlined the process, they made it a better experience for people participating in the Greener Homes program. They were simply the administrators of it. I'm sure they made a certain amount of money as administering the program on behalf of Greener Homes, but I will give them a shout out for that. They did do improvement in terms of customer service delivery on that one. I will also say that's not Enbridge money, that is taxpayer money. We're all Canadian citizens, we all paying for that kind of. That's coming from all of us. I should also mention that their DSM money, their demand side management money is also not Enbridge money, it's ratepayer money. So all of these services, when we kind of talk about incentives, it's not Enbridge

giving us that incentive. Yes they are the delivery for that incentive. But ultimately it's either the taxpayer or the ratepayer who's paying for it. So yes, we need more incentives. But yes, we also need to move away from incentives. We need to kind of creating a level playing field for people to have a more equal choice. Would I choose as a new customer if I had to pay $5,000 for bringing fossil fuels or would I go all electric in my building if I didn't have kind of pay that kind of thing. But it's forced upon me as a, as a new homeowner, I'm guaranteed to get those pipelines brought into it. Why? Because it's all subsidized and the developer doesn't pay for it. So they want Enbridge to come in because they don't actually take on those costs and additional electricity allocation. So I did want to kind of highlight all of these things are all incentives that we as either taxpayers or ratepayers are paying for. They're not coming from the companies. And I should also mention one more thing on this one we have to move away from the incentives. I'm a fan of incentives but like let's face it, we all want incentives and nobody wants to pay for these incentives but they have to be paid for. So we really got to move towards financing and we have to move towards a level playing field because the incentives and

scaling up of these actions that we all knew need to get scaled up, we can't afford to do it via incentive model. We have to do it by creating a level playing field in our energy system and providing real choices for consumers to choose from. But that choice will only be possible if we create a level playing field. Okay, so there are no more questions but I am still genuinely curious. So I'm going to be your final question. Gabby. Thank you. You mentioned the other provinces, how it's different. Fair enough, we all agree with that. But it is the rate payer then that will end up paying. Square that for me. Yeah, the rate payer will probably pay it because Ontario Energy Board will have to. There's only one pot of money that needs to come into it and Ontario, Ontario Energy Board like, like Enbridge is going to get its 9%. If Enbridge is truly worried about affordability, maybe they should take it off their profit margin. I'm just saying they never talk about, they always talk about affordability and adding rate bases but they never talk about it from kind of like oh let's do a little bit of rate based sharing

in terms of like the, you know, that kind of mentioning about saving on the distribution system. I would kind be very curious myself to see what kind of sharing, profit sharing has taken place on that one between the ratepayers and Enbridge. But ultimately when it comes down to it, we're all paying for these choices whether we know it or not, whether we're paying for it at present or whether we're paying for it in the future. And I think one of the key things that this is, that's why the level playing field is so important is providing real choices to ontarians is the goal on this one. We know we do not have a level playing field. We know we give free infrastructure to new developments. We know that we don't charge franchise agreements and many of like other different provinces, we know that there's cost associated with. Because the reason this issue came to our attention at Clean Air Partnership is because we found that some municipalities were actually charging their low carbon utilities for use of the right of way. And when we asked, wait a sec, why are you charging your low carbon utilities for access to the right of way and why not Enbridge? They informed us that it's not their choice. They're not allowed to charge Enbridge, but they say that they have real charges and real costs associated with infrastructure in the right of way. It could be something as simple as like you can't go with a truck because it's like you

gotta go in and with a hand person and dig it out. And we've been asking municipalities to try and kind of calculate those costs. Not easy to do, unfortunately. But ultimately what it comes down to is we have to find a more level playing field and create more transparency in our energy system for who pays for what and correct the subsidies that are in place in order to provide real choices to ontarians and reduce the cost associated with the rate base as a whole as well. Because. Because that's a different one. But there's another topic that we can go into. No problem. No, no, no problem. You did answer the question. So I do appreciate that. And with that, I'm just looking around one more time. There is no more questions. But Gabby, thank you so much for joining us and thank you for your presentation tonight. Okay, thank you very much for allowing me the time on your agenda. I really appreciate it. Have a good evening. Yes, you as well. Take care. Thank you. Okay, Gina, Gina Lamel is here from the Seniors for Climate Action. Now, front row, a Keener. Thank you for coming and waiting. And then, Evan, I saw you walk in. You're in the wings. Okay. You're going to close us off tonight. So Gina, thanks for waiting and I'll turn it over to you. Okay, Go ahead. Thank you. Mr. Mayor, members of council and city staff, good evening.

To refresh your memory, I'm a lifelong resident of Guelph and I am the chair of the Guelph chapter of Seniors for Climate Action Now. We are the Canadian group of older adults acting to address the climate emergency and protect the planet for future generations. Last fall, while driving in my car with my 19 year old son, we heard yet another news report of an out of control wildfire. I asked him what he thought about the climate crisis. He's a very optimistic, positive young man. But his reply was, we are doomed. He and many others, but especially youth like the youth who are here this evening believe that we are on a trajectory to an unsustainable planet. And so do I. This is why we at SCAN are very grateful for the first step you have taken against fossil fuel giant Enbridge. Today, we're asking you to take another bold step and approve all of the recommendations concerning the Enbridge franchise Agreement. Approval would be staying true to your publicly stated priorities. In 2022, Mayor Guthrie was appointed, as we've all heard, to the Board of Mayors. Sorry, Board of Directors of the Global

Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy. And here is what that website says. In his role as a GCOM Board member, Mayor Guthrie will serve as an ambassador for urban climate action at local, local, national and global levels and represent the region of North America, helping guide North America towards ambitious emissions reduction goals and helping national governments meet the highest ambitions of the Paris Agreement. It also says the City of Guelph has implemented multiple initiatives to cut emissions, earning a reputation for environmental and energy leadership. In Canada, the City is replacing its diesel transit fleet with electric buses, developing the first circular food economy in Canada, banning single use plastics, and is committed to becoming a net Zero community. Mr. Mayor and Council, I challenge you to recommit yourself to these ambitious emissions reduction goals and climate initiatives. Be an example and guide communities in Ontario and across North America to do the same. Be the climate leaders that GCOM says that

you are. The City's website also affirms that the City is committed to the United Nations Race to Zero and has set targets for the whole community to reduce carbon emissions by 63% and by 2030 and to work together to become a net zero carbon community by 2050. Proposing significant cuts to environmental investments as are proposed in the 2025 budget is not consistent with these commitments. Although the City continues to invest in transit and active transportation initiatives, the overall reduction in funding will slow down progress on electrification and other essential environmental projects without significant change like the change that that young man man spoke about. Guelph is on the trajectory to climate doom. Guelph's community greenhouse gas emissions are up 8% compared to 2021. Guelph needs climate leadership like that touted on the GCOM webpage. We need bold decisions, radical shifts, and we need every one of the environmental initiatives that you are planning to defer or reduce and we need them now. The GCOM website says that Guelph has a reputation

for environmental and energy leadership, but that was in 2022. We want and need that kind of leadership again and we need that now. The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change states that there's a rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a livable and sustainable future for all of us. And the choices and actions implemented in the next five years will have impacted now and will reverberate for hundreds, even thousands of years. COP28 concluded with an urgent message emphasizing this need for a radical shift. COP 29 just ended and is calling for us to bolster climate action. Climate action requires public financing, no doubt, but there's at least one way to minimize the burden on the public purse and that's renegotiate our deal with Enbridge. Today you can all be ambassadors for radical urban climate action. Vote in favor of all of the recommendations concerning the Enbridge franchise agreement. Vote against big oil and gas, and vote for bold climate action. Be the international climate leaders that GCOM says you are. We only have five years until 2030 for any chance.

Great, thank you. Sorry you were cut off there. I'm sure you practiced and you just got cut off, so. But we appreciate it. Is there any follow up questions to the delegate at this time? There isn't, but thank you very much. Okay. Thank you for your presentation. Evan. You're. You're closing us off. Come on down.

Thank you, Evan. Thank you for coming. You know the drill, so I'll turn it over to you. Great, thank you. Mr. Mayor and members of council, I'd just like to apologize for my bit of laughter earlier in the, in the, in the evening. It was disrespectful of council and the delegates and I apologize for that. The proposed motion that before you is a step to end a perverse fossil fuel subsidy paid. Paid by municipal taxpayers. As you know, the motion would ask the province to allow municipalities to charge fees to use our city owned roadways for gas pipelines. It would also instruct city staff not to enter into an agreement that would lock us into providing free access for 20 years. It's completely illogical that we're forced to provide free use of public lands to this gas company. First, we're missing out on significant revenue based on fees charged in other provinces. We estimate that Guelph would be earning $8.8 million per year. Second, by not receiving those fees, we are providing a major hidden subsidy to the methane gas system in Ontario. Burning methane gas contributes about one third of Ontario's greenhouse gas emissions. Taxpayers should not

be subsidizing this climate destroying gas by giving this company free use of our public lands. Enbridge will tell you that they pay municipal taxes and somehow that makes them good corporate citizens. Anyone that owns property in Guelph pays taxes. Paying your municipal taxes is very different from paying for the use of public lands. And like many members of council here tonight, our household pays municipal taxes. But that doesn't allow me or any of you to build infrastructure for free on public lands. Taxes and land based fees for the use of public property are entirely different. The agreement Enbridge wants Guelph to sign would also force us to pay a significant portion of the cost of moving gas pipelines that conflict with our municipal infrastructure like sewers. This means that we could pay potentially millions of dollars when there is a conflict with gas pipelines that are paying nothing to use these lands. This is not fair and has been a major problem, a major infrastructure problem for other projects, including in the City of Toronto where the

city had to pay up $14 million for the movement of certain infrastructure projects throughout the city. This agreement is totally unfair. By allowing free access for gas lines to these public lands and potentially charging taxpayers with these conflicts arise. If we want to truly reduce energy poverty, we shouldn't do that by subsidizing fossil fuels and should instead help residents install electric heat pumps, which are the cheapest way to heat homes. The city could use some of that revenue to increase the low income grants for heat pumps that the city already provides for low income people through the wonderful Guelph Greener Homes program. Then there's the city budget. We first became aware of this Enbridge franchise agreement when we heard that the Mayor had decided to cut the city budget by $15 million with almost every environmental program that the city funds on the chopping block. By passing this motion, Guelph would be joining municipalities who are also asking for the end to this subsidy, like the City of Toronto and the City of Ottawa. As the climate crisis continues to worsen. Let's be on the right side of history with this one small step forward.

And to put a finer point on it, Guelph climate emissions jumped so much in 2022 that it amounted to overshooting the city's target by 17%. And emissions continue to rise. Emissions rising, cutting environmental budgets, giving subsidies to a multinational fossil fuel company that made a profit of $1.3 billion in the last quarter. Hmm. When thinking about this motion this evening and final decisions on the budget, I would really like you to contemplate about all of the children and young people in the city. In 20 years, will you be able to look them in the eye and say that you did everything you could to stop runaway Climate change. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you for your presentation. Thanks Evan, for coming. Let me see if there's a follow up question for you. Doesn't it doesn't look like it. Again, thank you for coming. Oh, is there one? I'm sorry, who is it? Sorry. I'm so sorry. Councilor Keaton. My apologies. I thought you were swatting that big dragonfly behind you.

So over to you. No worries. Thank you. Through you to the delegate. I was wondering if you could speak a little bit about how you feel about Enbridge versus renewables. Well, I think it's a very good business decision on the part of every. Just about every fossil fuel company has been investing in renewables. Some would call it greenwashing, but let's make no mistake that it sounds like an awful lot of money that they've invested in it. But it amounts to just a very small amount of their total revenue and their total capital investment. By the same token, the concept of rng, as they call it renewable natural gas isn't scalable to the extent that we would need to fight climate change to any way, shape or form. It's a feel good, warm and fuzzy thing that they're offering to customers and just on. Just based on. Based on the constrictions or the constraints around trying to actually make renewable natural gas work at scale, make it an extremely difficult thing to do. So I would argue that it's great public relations for them. It's nice that they're adding something to the renewable energy side of things,

but frankly their business is burning stuff and I don't see that ending in the foreseeable future. Sure. Thank you very much. Thank you. And for real this time, there's no more questions. Evan. So sorry about that. Thank you very much for your presentation. Okay, council, it's back to us. I think it would be appropriate that Councilor Karan move the recommendations. Okay, seconded by. Let's go, Colossus. Is there any questions? Only questions. And I do see Gibson's hand. Go for it. Thank you. Through Mr. Mayor, I'm just wondering if I could see the motions on the screen. I'm not decided whether or not I'm going to ask to break them apart. I have a feeling I'd like to support some, but perhaps not all.

Could I just perhaps separate. Oh boy, there's a lot here. Yeah. Would it be easier if we just broke them all apart? Please. If you don't. If you don't mind. And one at a time. Oh, that's fine. That's Fine. Yeah. Okay. Anything else before I call the vote at all? Seeing none. Just if you don't mind showing the, showing the motion before we vote. Yeah, I just wanted to make sure there was nothing more before I went to all the votes. So thank you. I, I sorry, I do need to say a comment. I'm sorry, it's very, very quick. So sorry everybody. It was just before I go through each one, so I, I just want to say that. And you think, you probably think I'm making this up, but I'm not. I had such a good meeting at the, I think it was a couple of GCOM meetings ago where the ambassador for under, under GCOM is the former mayor of Vancouver. So Gregor. Okay. And Gregor is, you know, we've become, you know, acquainted with each other now because we're on this, this thing together. And if, if I hadn't met him, I probably wouldn't have changed my mind a lot on a lot of this stuff. So, so it's, it's a positive thing.

So thank you to Gregor for this. But he, it's interesting out in Vancouver, he was the former mayor of Vancouver. Sorry, I should have said that. He was telling me how they just, when I was with them, the new mayor of Vancouver has just changed things back to allowing for gas to go to all new subdivisions. Okay. Like if you look it up, they just, they just changed it and. But when Gregor was the mayor, they had actually done heat pumps and they made it. And the rule, the rules out there kind of allowed municipalities to do that very different from on Ontario. Okay. And so anyways, they had made. It was more like a statement position. It was more like a statement position of their counsel at the time under Gregor. And it, it was just a real acknowledgment that we got to start to move things off of the, of the fossil fuels. And like I'm a big free market guy. Everyone knows that. Like, it's not, I'm not actually putting down Enbridge by any, I'm not like that.

But it's, it's about the shift and in a free market sort of position that I'm always in, sort of a libertarian type of guy, is that it should be more free and more of a choice that's on the same level for the non fossil fuel companies to be able to enter this space. And so I get that these motions in front of us here, you know, might not be like exact at how they are. Some of them are a bit unknown, like the one about MPP Shriners legislation We don't really know about that and you know, we don't know if the rate payer is going to pay or whatever. But I just, I just want to basically pick up on what Councilor Alt said, which is, which is similar to what I heard from Gregor in Vancouver and that was that the people that aren't on the fossil fuel pipes won't end up paying in their rates because they're not paying it in the rates anymore because they're off it. And in a way, you know, and we can argue,

I'm not wanting to argue this but you know, like the carbon tax is there to sort of start to nudge people. It's a nudge, it's a nudge to try and help people understand that there's other choices to be made, that you, you don't have to continue down the same road, no pun intended, for some of the things that are happening with fossil fuels. And so I, what I'm trying to get at is that it might not be like perfect here, but it's more like a, a statement that's being made that we do need to level the playing field and, and that, you know, Councelor Karan, I, I think if there's one thing out of her motion that is relevant to me anyways, it is this sort of 20 year contract. This like to me that just. It, I, I can't square that, that we would be bound, even though there might be 7 year or 14 year type of kind of motions or availability to kind of wiggle room on some stuff. But I just, I think that, I think that we

need to send a message and it's a respectful message. It's not, I'm not, I'm not being disrespectful but a message to me by approving this, it's a message to proclaim choice. Choice in the fact that there are other ways of heating and cooling your home. There are other ways of doing things. And I think that's where I'm landing on this to make sure that that choice is sort of promoted very clearly for people that it's not just the status quo that we're in today. Anyways, I thought I would just mention that just because it is something that is very different in other provinces. What doesn't, it's not afforded here in Ontario where it is a little bit in other provinces. So. Thank you. Sorry, with that, can I call the vote one by one? Is that okay? Okay. Can I have it up on the screen for me? All right, so the first One is just to receive. Receive for information. Can I call the vote on that one? I think so. Is anyone against that receiving it? No. So that's unanimous. The second one is that council is requesting the Province of Ontario

to amend Section 9 of Regulation 58406 under the Municipal Act 2001 to permit municipalities to charge fair fees for for profit gas utilities for their use of public property, as municipalities do in most other provinces. Okay, I'll call the vote on that. Is anyone against? Number two. Okay. One. Gibson. No. Two. Billings. Do I hear three? No. Just kidding. Okay, two. Number three, that council directs. You're. I'm going too fast. Clerks, are you good? No. Okay. Number three, that council directs staff to the satisfaction of the deputy. Deputy CAO of IDE to negotiate a franchise agreement with the gas distribution company that A will allow the city of Guelph to charge. Sorry, Councilor Gibson, do you need me to split out A, B and C, or can I have it all as one? No, but I do. I do have comments, if you don't mind, on this one. Okay, go ahead, it's yours. I'll turn my mic off. Go ahead. I think that there's a lot of. If I may, Mr. Mayor, through you, I think there's a lot of platitudes in this motion that speak to trying to protect the rate payer, especially in this clause where we know definitively, I mean, we've even had the Clean Air

alliance member state that the ratepayers will pay for this. So $8 million, if that's what's being charged to Enbridge, they'll simply put that into reserve fund, go back to the OEB at their next rate, review and pass that on to the rate payers. We are already experiencing energy poverty like never before in our province. In our country, we've seen G rates go up by almost 40% because of the carbon tax. I'm not looking to contribute to the energy poverty rates, especially for those people in marginalized housing or in housing insecurity. So I don't believe words and placation in some of these clauses do anything more than just try and put people's minds at ease. They won't work. This will be borne out by the rates and I'm not going to be contributing to that today. So. So those are just my thoughts, thank you. Okay, no problem. And Councillor Karan just wants to also bring comments to this one as well and then I'll call the vote. Yes, thank you. And these clauses are aspirational. I think we all Recognize that. But change is coming. It has to. We're in an energy transformation. And by stating that this is our aspirational goal, we're saying to the negotiation to the province and to the OED and

to our fossil gas supplier, that we want to see change. The transfer of that, let's just say $8 million, because that's the figure that round we're talking about may indeed go to rate payers for gas customers, but that $8 million will also be revenue to the city. And then all members of the city aren't paying to subsidize the energy industry. And that $8 million can go to home energy loans, retrofits, utility bills, subsidies for low income families. There's a way to redistribute that money that benefits the people of Guelph rather than putting it on all of us equally through subsidization. Okay, thank you. So I will call number three then. If we could have it back up on the screen in its entirety. So number three, abc. Is there anyone against that? Okay, two. It looks like Gibson and Billings again. Oh, and Chu, sorry. See, I see you wave in there too. Sorry about that. And then number four will be that the city Guelph supports

in principle. Bill 219, no Free Ride Fossil Fuels Act 2024. Tabled November number 4, 2024 by Guelph. MPP Mike Schreiner. Is anyone against number four? Okay. Gibson and Billings. And then number five, that the above referenced motions and a letter of Support for Bill 219 be circulated to MPP Mike Schreiner, Premier Doug Ford, Minister of Municipal affairs and Housing, Paul Calandra, Stephen Lech, Minister of Energy and Electrification, and the Ontario big city mayors, the Associated Municipalities of Ontario and its member municipalities. Is anyone against that? Number five. Just sending a letter. Letters, plural. Okay. Nobody's against that. Okay. Sorry,

Counselor. Alt will personally drive it around for everybody. Yeah. In his electric car, might I add. Okay. All right, that finishes that off. That item is now done. Thank you very much, everybody. I'm sorry, point of privilege. Yeah, yeah. So Councillor Gibson made an assertion that what is driving the cost of electricity and of utilities is the carbon tax. And we have no evidence of that. And in fact, we're aware that a lot of the utilities are in investing heavily in distribution because we know that we're going to need more electricity. So I just like to state that I, as a counselor, and I think this body should not accept that as a fact. Yeah. Okay. I think that would be up to each of us to determine whether or not, we accept it without, you know, a motion and, my goodness, a deep dive debate on that issue. So you've made your point clear. We got lots of points of consideration around the table. That's fine. I think we should just move on. On recommendations for bylaws. Oh, K, that's you. Would you mind moving the. The bylaws for me? Yes.

Through you, I'll move that Bylaws 21 005, 21012 and 21017 be approved subject to Section 284.114 of the Municipal Act. Great. Thank you. Seconded by. I'm going to go Quran. Anything on the bylaws? Nobody? Okay. Is anyone against? Okay, that's unanimous. Thank you. The only mayor announcement that I have is that I'll see you here tomorrow morning. Morning. Okay. And now my Ward four mates will adjourn. Billings and Bucetil. Is anyone against adjournment? That's Nobody. So that passes as well. Everyone, have a great night. See you here tomorrow. Counselor Alt is also bringing us donuts in the morning, so we will see everyone tomorrow.