Supporting Vancouver's BIAs and Growing VANSTAT – Amendment

Great. Thanks, Councillor Meiser. And I'll just ask the clerks, because I don't have a line of sight, just to keep us on time. Before we delve further into this item, I should ask if any councillor has a conflict of interest. Now is the time to disclose it.

And I'm not seeing anybody on the queue. Do we have a seconder for the motion?

Seconded by Councillor Montague. Okay, thanks. We will now hear from registered speakers for the motion. I will note that public speakers should state whether they are in support or opposition to the recommendations and may only speak once, and also ask speakers to note if you are residents of Vancouver, if that's not already noted on the speakers list. And our first speaker is Terry Smith.

Good morning, Terry. Can you hear me? Good morning. Yes, we can, Terry. Please go ahead when you're ready.

Thank you very much. Perfectly on time. Thank you, Terry. Our next speaker is Joshua Davidson.

Thank you, Joshua. Our next speaker is Christina E., also by phone.

Okay, everybody, that is the end of our speaker's list. So thank you to everybody for speaking to committee on this item. And now, committee members, is there any discussion? Okay, I see we have several. If we can advance, Councillor Orr first, please.

Yeah, thanks. Question to the chair, to the mover of the motion. Who owns the data that would be generated through SmartBid, SmarterBid? Would it be the BIAs, the vendor, or the city?

To Councillor Orr, I don't have that specific technical data management information at my fingertips, but I would imagine that staff may be able to potentially provide that information if possible.

Thank you. Through the chair, to the mover of the motion, the website uses crime as a metric, but the motion uses incidents. Is that on purpose? Is there a difference between crime and incidents?

I would imagine just based on definitions of crime and incidents that those potentially mean two different things. Incidents could be anything from things like graffiti removal, say a broken bus shelter, a business with a smashed front window, vandalism. Some of those are, well, most of those are probably crime. But I would have to get more granular in terms of the technical aspect of it.

Could be more other things, just like poor people hanging out.

But as mentioned, Mount Pleasant is using this tool already and with great success.

Has staff done any analysis on reporting bias in BIA-generated data compared to, say, 311 or police data?

Hard to say.

What safeguards, through the chair to the mover of the motion, what safeguards ensure this doesn't over-represent complaints about visible poverty or nuisance activity?

That's a very specific question, and I would you know, place my trust in the professionals that steward our BIAs to use discretion in terms of filtering those requests. But, Councillor Orr, to your previous question, I just received some information from staff that the data would be owned by the BIAs and shared with the city. And that's how it's been functioning. Okay. Owned by the BIAs.

Interesting. Okay. I'll jump back on. That's interesting. Thanks.

All right. Thanks, Councillor Orr. And can we advance Councillor Fry, please?

Thank you. And if I may, through you, Chair, to question the mover of the motion. I mean, this is unusual on a few levels. First and foremost, why wasn't this submitted for staff review?

That is something that I take responsibility for. I've been out of the country for two weeks, and I forgot that step. But I'll just note that many councillors around this chamber don't submit motions for staff review, including yourself.

Oh, I do, actually. So please don't speak for me on that note. I don't know who else doesn't, but because this is a sole source procurement, effectively, it is somewhat unusual. Is there an urgency to submit this now without staff review and any comments?

Yeah, this is a relatively small investment. It's $50,000 to expand this to nine additional BIAs. And as Councillor Fry, you've heard at the BIA roundtables, I know you attend regularly, BIAs have been advocating for this tool. And as I mentioned, Neil Wiles from Mount Pleasant BIA has been using this with great success in order to improve response times to public realm incidents in their neighbourhoods. So I think, you know, we have a great test case. We have data and, you know, small investment. Let's move forward.

I mean, it is a small investment, but it is a sole source procurement, and there's no link to this company or any information about SmarterBit. I've Googled, and I can't find them online. Are you familiar with the company and who owns the data and what?

Yeah, so as mentioned, I received some information just a few minutes ago from staff that the BIAs will own the data, and that's how it's been functioning.

And who owns the company?

I don't know the background of who owns the tech company, but I'd encourage you to go online or reach out to anyone else.

Well, I literally can't find them online, so that's why I'm asking. It is so unusual to have a sole source procurement from a member motion that wasn't reviewed by staff. Even if it is a small amount, it is sort of an unusual precedent, and I'm just hoping that you had a little bit more detail on who you're suggesting we...

Yeah, I understand the app was made specifically for the BIAs. I just don't have the background as to where their office is, for example.

Thanks, Councillor Fry. Next, Councillor Maloney.

I'm obviously concerned where the $50,000 will come from to expand this pilot. I think it should have been provided for in the 2026 budget instead of dipping into city reserves, which should generally be used in the case of genuine emergencies, unforeseen expenditure or life-saving measures. When staff reports back, I'd really appreciate examples of third-party data sources being used for city purposes, and if so, what safeguards are in place to ensure the integrity of that data. Another issue is that the VAN 311 app is, I think, very cumbersome and time-consuming to use, and I'd like to see the city invest in it. in improving VAN 311 so that all users benefit from the investment. Generally, in discussion with BIAs, I've heard that this is a good investment of a small amount of money, especially compared to a couple of overtime shifts of police, which could be an alternative expense if the services aren't provided. So I'm pleased that the service is provided by a local software developer, but like Councillor Frye, I... be interested in more information about who they are and why we're not doing an open tender process. I've heard that this feeds requests and information directly into the BIA's respective contractors and that's more efficient for them and gives them better and more service than what the city can provide through VAN 311. And I've also heard that if it is appropriate for a 3-1-1 report, they can make one.

With this program, we can get added data to feed in to the broader city statistics. And my understanding is that it's not related to enforcement or policing, that that's done differently. And I hope that that is the case. Graffiti removal, litter pickup, faeces removal, they're all important things to get done quickly for BIAs. So I understand that this is not replacing but complementing existing services. So I will vote in favour of this and I'll be very interested to get a fulsome report from council when they report back.

Staff.

Thank you. That's all, Councillor Maloney? Yeah. Great. Thank you. Councillor Zhou?

Yeah. Thanks, Chair. So I want to be very brief. I think this motion is a very practical and data-driven proposal that builds on something that's already working in our community. We all know BIA is at the front line every day, supporting safety, cleanliness, economic vitality in our neighborhoods across Vancouver. They often see the issues first. They will respond quickly. So I think what this motion does is simple but powerful actions. They help us better capture underground knowledge and turn it into actionable data. Yeah, so with this tool, we can improve how we identify trends at neighborhood level, better allocate city resource, strengthen coordination between BIAs, the community policing center, and the Vancouver Police Department, and ultimately respond faster and more effective to the emerging issue. I think what also stands out to me is the value for money. It's a very small one-time investment, but we can scale in a proven tool, improving data quality and support evidence-based decision-making. And this is exactly the kind of smart target investment we should be making. Yeah, and also, you know, this motion strengthens the collaborations. it brings together BIA's city staff and the committee partners into a more coordinated system. So I think, yeah, from my perspective, I wholeheartedly support this motion brought forward by Councillor Meiszner. Thanks.

Thanks, Councillor Zhou. Councillor Domenico?

Thanks, Deputy Mayor. I just wanted to offer a little bit of context just with respect to the ask as I see it coming from Councillor Miser and the motion on the floor. We regularly have meetings with the BIAs to hear a whole range of issues, everything from the ability to expand and support retail and commercial in our city as well as public safety concerns. And one of the things that was highlighted, and I believe it was Neil Wiles from the Mount Pleasant BIA, he actually spoke at length and in detail about this technology to help better collect incident data information and to collate that and to move away from very sort of administrative, burdensome steps that they're doing with spreadsheets. And what I heard around the table from the BIA partnership and the other members of the BIA was that they would welcome something that would help make it easier for them to do their jobs. And they do a lot that goes even beyond the scope of the role of a BIA in terms of... managing the public realm, beautification and so on, but they do deal a lot in responding to concerns over vandalism and so on. But I think just to sort of address the concerns about who is this company, we're not providing or the motion is not suggesting that we are providing and sole sourcing funds to a company. It is to the BIA partnership is the way I understand this. So it's a grant. to the BIA partnership. And what they do with that is for them to determine, we can put parameters around that. But just to be clear, this is not providing a contract to a third party. And unless I've misunderstood the motion, that is how I read the motion at this time. So I think that it really needs to be, and again, I will look to the mover of the motion and others if I have misunderstood it, but that is not what this is. This is not procurement. This is not a contract. My understanding is this is a grant to the BIA partnership. And so I think we really need to set that straight. And I think also just to remember that, and we hear this all the time, that it really takes a village. The BIAs are helping the city deliver on our priorities and And I think a lot would fall through the cracks if we didn't have the IAS frankly in the city Doing some of this work and doing some of the heavy lifting.

Thank you Thank You councillor domino council miser comments Everybody further questions and their comments so far this motion is really about listening directly to the BIAs, as Councillor Don Bonato was just outlining through the BIA partnership meetings, which are a very valuable opportunity for councillors to hear directly from BIAs on a regular basis. And this is what they're telling us they need to help their members. So Mel Pleasant, I mentioned, has been using this platform for several years now. It's actually four years, and they've had great success with it. And also recently, there was two pilots that took place in the South Granville BIA and the Hastings Crossing BIA, and they were successful pilots of this platform. This app was made specifically for the BIAs. And as Councillor Domenato also highlighted, this is not a sole source contract. This is awarding a grant of $50,000 to the Vancouver BIA Partnership in order to fund the monthly cost of this app. In my eyes, this is a good investment, a worthwhile investment. As I articulated earlier, our BIAs are really on the front line of our neighborhoods. They are addressing not just the concerns of small businesses, but also residents. They're keeping streets clean. They're removing graffiti. And in many cases, they're helping people who are vulnerable get connected to services as well. And I know that's become an even bigger part of what Downtown Vancouver BIA does. So this particular motion does require two-thirds support from council. So I really hope that all councillors will support this really important initiative for the Vancouver BIA partnership to help continue to improve their neighborhoods and the city that we share. Thank you.

Thanks, Councillor Meiszner. Councillor Orr, you're back.

Thanks. Yeah, I still have tons of questions. For example, is this company PIPEDA or FIPPA compliant? Does it store data in Canada? Does it protect that data? What kind of encryption is it using? Is it SHA-256 or higher? If these questions aren't answered, can we ensure that there's no liability for the city? I know it's a grant, but that would probably leave us on the hook for liability reasons if these aren't freedom of information compliant. Look, I'm not opposed to better data, but data isn't neutral. It matters who is collecting it for what purpose. This motion proposes to integrate incident reporting from BIAs into the city's decision-making systems. And so that may sound practical, but BIAs aren't neutral. They represent specific economic interests and the issues they tend to report reflect that. Those are real concerns, but they are selective concerns. And if we elevate that data without safeguards, we risk building a system that over-represents some problems while ignoring others. We also need to ask why we are investing in a parallel business-driven reporting system instead of strengthening our public systems like 311. And if this moves forward, I think it needs clear safeguards, strong privacy protections, transparency, equity analysis. a firm commitment that this data will inform, not drive, city responses. But I'm not getting a ton of that insurance. So I'm not sure here what to think. I'm out of time.

Yes, you are. Thanks, Councillor Orr. Councillor Fry, please go ahead.

Yes, still questions that I'm struggling with. I know that technically this isn't a sole source procurement, but the operative direction in enactment clause A does specifically articulate that that $50,000 in one-time funding to the BIA partnership is to administer a pilot expansion of this smarter bid system. And that seems, for all intents and purposes, is a sole source contract. I do worry, to Councillor Ward's point, about where the data goes, how the data lives, ultimately where the server information is stored. Is it in Canada? Is it in the United States? Is it... somewhere else? Those are important questions. The idea that this is supposed to integrate with city systems does present potentially some kind of security risk. I don't know. I'm not an IT professional. That's why we have IT professionals on our staff. And when we talk about integrating a system with our own existing city systems, that potentially presents challenges. You know, I have huge respect for Neil Wiles, but he hasn't been here to present or speak to this item. So We're getting sort of third-hand information from the move or the motion about the ED of Mount Pleasant BIA's opinion on this particular issue. information and at the long at the end of the day we have to make informed evidence-based decisions you have not presented enough evidence for me to support this in full um and now out of respect for neil and the bias who i do think have probably weighted the considerations maybe not from the perspective of um like our own it professionals who have to integrate this with our own system um I'm prepared to not vote against this, but in true form, when we're not presented with ample evidence to make an informed decision, I have no choice but to abstain because this motion, as it's been presented, is frankly, I think, quite poorly written. It hasn't given us the opportunity to vet this properly through the staff, which... Most of our motions are supposed to, and I take that some feel that that's not a rule that applies, but I think that that is the importance of vetting our motions through staff review to get that input. So I'll have to abstain on this.

Thank you, Councillor Fry. You are exactly at time. Councillor Meiszner?

Yeah. I did just send in an amendment to add two new clauses, F and G. Okay.

I'm going to ask the clerks to move us to the amendment queue before we begin, please, if you want to put yourself back on.

Thanks. Deputy Mayor Kirby Young. So I was just in conversation with the deputy city manager around the delegated authority piece on this. So this just proposes to add two pieces of language around delegated authority to delegate our authority to execute the grant agreement and the associated amount, and that no legal rights and obligations will arise or be created by council's adoption of these recommendations. So pretty straightforward. And... Hoping for council support.

Okay, moved by, we have an amendment moved by Council Miser, seconded by Councillor Klassen. Any discussion on the amendment? Councillor Frye.

Appreciate these amendments. I wouldn't say that they're necessarily straightforward. These are fairly weighty legal considerations that certainly give a little bit more confidence to the fact that we're not walking into this completely blindly and committing the city to, again, a company that hasn't even been linked in the motion. So we have no ability to kind of verify who they are, what they are, where they are. But I think this points to the importance of doing this the right way. So I do appreciate that staff have come back with some serious legal parameters around this and given a little bit more confidence. I'm still a little bit uncomfortable and would likely continue to abstain on it, but I do support these amendments for giving a little bit more clarity, a little bit more security, and a little bit more legal guardrails around a motion that hasn't been properly reviewed.

Thanks, Councillor Frey. Councillor Meiszner, go ahead.

Yeah, thank you. I know there's been a couple comments about motions not always being submitted for staff feedback. I think this is the first time that I missed that step. But I will add that Neil Wiles from Mount Pleasant BIA, who again is on a plane overseas right now, otherwise he would be here. We had a fulsome conversation yesterday about his experience with this app and the benefits of this for his BIA. And I'll just remind councillors, and I think pretty much all the councillors were at the Vancouver BIA partnership meeting where this was mentioned, where Neil was advocating for expanding funding for this app or allocating funding for this app to additional nine BIAs and all the benefits that they've had with it. So I'm not going to stand in the way of providing more support to our BIAs. Again, these organizations are on the ground level, on the front lines of our neighborhoods, advocating for small businesses, for residents, for cleaning the sidewalks, for cleaning up graffiti, for picking up garbage, all things that we want to see happen in our cities. So this is a small investment. I think it's reasonable. We have a proven test case, and let's move forward with it, and let's continue to uplift neighborhoods across Vancouver.

Okay. Thanks, Councillor Miser. Councillor Orr, to the amendment.

Yeah, thanks. I agree with Councillor Frye. This is pretty complex. I wish this had been baked into the motion. I appreciate the effort. I still have so many questions around privacy rights. I don't know if this actually gets around that, if this actually protects the city, if it protects BIAs. But I do appreciate the amendment. I just wish it had been in the motion. I still don't know if I support the original intent of the motion, however. But I appreciate this motion. I'll support the amendment.

Okay. Thank you, Councillor. Councillor Maloney to the amendment specifically.

Thanks. I just wanted to take the opportunity to ask a question of staff through the chair if that's all right. I'm interested to know if the mover of the motion or staff can tell me how detailed the information is that is collected. I mean, my understanding of it is that it's incidents asking for help rather than the identity of individual people For example, if there was a report of a crime to police, descriptions of assailants or whatever it might be.

And would we typically include as grant conditions requirements of protecting the privacy of people or any other safeguards for members of the public?

And BIAs are actually statutory creations, aren't they? So I'm assuming...

Yeah. But they're created by legislation, regulations.

I can't, I'm not familiar with... Yeah, I'm just speculating as to whether there is any... there are any restrictions or conditions of their existence in terms of how they use, how they behave.

Thanks very much.

Thanks, Councillor Maloney. Councillor Klassen, go ahead.

I'll be very brief. Good discussion here today. I think it's fair to say that— Councillor Klassen, can I just guide you to speak to the amendment specifically? Yeah, again, I think that I'm supportive of the amendment. I realize that it's—but we're getting close to the end here, so I wanted to be able to just generally say that I'm very supportive of the— of the thrust of this. And so having the additional clauses, if it gives some additional assurance that we know that our BIAs have been integral to really uplifting our city, especially over the last several years. I think our interactions with the BIAs, our regular quarterly meetings that we established, have found their way of helping us work together closely. And for having a tool like this that has been tried and tested by the Mount Pleasant BIA to expand it more broadly, to try and deal with all the many issues that they deal with in terms of making sure that they support local small business in our communities. This is a complete no-brainer for me. So I think it's something that we continue to support and the BIAs, and I think that this additional opportunity is a good one that will probably make the work even stronger. Thanks very much.

Thank you. I'll just remind councillors that we are still on the amendment. So if we're going to make comments on the main motion, we will be going back to the queue and have a chance to do that before we vote on the amended motion if this passes. So, Councillor Fry, you have the floor to the amendment.

Yeah, thank you. And a question through you to the city manager or deputy city manager. This new language, so I think one of the salient issues here is around the data integration and and what it means for our systems and working with a new third party that we haven't vetted at all and integrating it with our existing information technology systems, which is my interpretation of this motion. Does this new amendment specifically, I guess, Clause G around legal rights and obligations, does that indemnify our IT folk to, if they think that this is a security risk or that there's some information technology or freedom of information issues that are baked into this,

Okay, so I guess what I'm asking then is does this give our IT professionals the flexibility to say, you know what, we've got to back out of this because it's a data breach issue potentially or a privacy issue?

Hey, thanks, Council. Right. We're going to call the vote on the amendment now, please.

No, this is. Yes. Sorry, Mayor Simeon.

This is Councillor Miser's amendment to add the two clauses.

OK, that passes with none in opposition. We'll go back to the main queue now.

I think I was on that.

I am. Okay. I just wanted to let other folks have a chance to have the conversation since I'm sharing this portion. But here's my perspective on this one. I think that we do want to foster innovation.

Okay, well, I think it's fine to participate and to make comments. I think that's, do you want to cede it? Okay, go ahead, Councillor Domenato. Yeah, I do think that what we want to be doing is fostering innovation and supporting that in our city in terms of smart implementation strategies and allocation of resources and outcome-based efforts. The BIAs are really important partners to the City of Vancouver. I think that there is a lot of sort of framing in this motion and guardrails around evaluating, looking at opportunities to integrate data. There's phrases in here about exploring the opportunities to enhance coordination, to look at, quote, the feasibility of integrating third-party data sources, et cetera. It doesn't suggest that that shall happen. It says that we should look at the opportunity to do that. And I think that that is quite worthy. I think we have a number of different third-party data systems in the city of Vancouver. If I think of things like Easy Park, for example, when you look at those, they have six parking apps. It's been widely reported on the news lately. We want to look at that kind of data. How are parking stalls turning over? Are there issues with that? Those kinds of things. Vancouver Public Library uses different systems. Do we have different libraries that are fuller or less? We have third-party systems in our community centers for recreation. in terms of registration. We've actually just moved and spent, council just provided a fairly significant award to upgrading that and we want to look at again, what does swimming data look like? How long are people waiting for those kinds of services? Things like litter collection. While the City of Vancouver manages it, we have third parties. I know that we'll be discussing waste later today, where, for example, multifamily buildings use third-party data. Those are all, I think, the sorts of data that we want to try to get a lens on and look at opportunities to bring in. And I think that's the intention for VanStat. is to foster better integration so that we can look fulsomely at what is actually happening in our city. So if we subscribe to that and we want, for example, to look at are we effective with waste collection or are we seeing, for example, lower usage of certain community centers or facilities, why is that? Is it because the facilities are not updated? Although, is it because the populations are changing that area? What are the barriers to that? I think we want to have all that kind of data. So it doesn't say thou shalt do. It says please explore the opportunities to look at that integration. I think that the BIAs are pretty lean and nimble. I think that they've worked on developing this system together. It's a fun name that they've attached to it, Smarter Bid. I thought that was a nice framing around it. But I do think that the amount of data and insight and collaboration, I think, in terms of how we execute, we provide things like graffiti grants. to the BIAs and we also do to other small neighborhoods and areas. This would enable council to get a line of sight into how are they using the graffiti grants? How many incidents and calls are they receiving for the graffiti? So I also see this as a transparency commitment from the BIAs that they're very willing to share their data and information and provide that to us so that we can also look at things like are the graffiti grants effective and working? What type of ones are they receiving? For example, I remember that it became an issue with not just street level graffiti, but larger, the taller top of buildings where folks were scaling them and we had to adapt there. in the strategy in terms of how do you actually support business owners in getting up closer to rooftop. So I think we sort of can't distinguish between the desire to integrate data from one third-party source versus another. What we can do is put – there's a lot of good questions raised here today around – integrity of that data and evaluating it and looking at appropriate safeguards for how it's utilized. But getting a fulsome picture across all of our partners, I think makes a lot of sense. So from that perspective, I'm happy to support it because that is exactly what we're trying to do is get towards a smarter city, whether it's through this or through other partnerships and other data that we have access to. Thank you.

Oh, I'll take the chair back. Do you want to continue? I think we're pretty much, we're almost there. Is that okay? Councillor Fry, final comments?

Yeah, just to reiterate, I definitely support the work of our BIAs. I think they do really amazing work, and I appreciate the opportunity to meet with them and talk with them on the regular. I will be abstaining on this vote fundamentally because an abstention is where we don't have enough information. This is as exciting an idea it may seem to be. The fact that it has not gone through the proper kind of screening channel through staff, and we're dealing with a lot of last minute additions to this to tighten it up legally, suggests to me that this could have used a bit more of a thorough review. It is quite unusual to take this route with a single source, even if it is at arm's length through the BIA and a grant to the BIA that we are asking. This specific contractor, again, that's not linked in the document or really articulated beyond a casual mention that we heard at a BIA partnership from one of the proponents that uses this service. And that's not to suggest anything inopportune, but we do have a responsibility as councillors, as delegators, as stewards of the public purse to at least do the due diligence. And that is a fairly consistent position of mine when it comes to these decisions that we make. We need to walk in with eyes wide open. And so without suggesting anything wrong with this approach or who this operator is and working with the BIAs, there remain unanswered questions for me, including what this may ultimately look like from a privatization kind of perspective if this is a larger-scale maneuver, moving to integrating third-party operators in our data management. And even when it comes to things like parking apps, we do vet those through our IT professionals. We don't introduce those through member motions. And if we were, it would be hopefully, I would hope, vetted through our IT professionals and our city management and our professional administrators that we rely on to vet these kind of things. So on that... supportive of supporting the BIAs. I hope this is a successful pilot, but I don't have enough information to vote with confidence in the affirmative. I will be abstaining, which does count as an affirmative.

Thanks, Councillor Fry. Final comments? Councillor Meiszner, please.

Yeah, thanks. Just lots been said on this. Just to close. This is really a small investment that will pay big dividends for BIAs and for our neighborhoods. And as I mentioned, and as counselors are aware, this has been used by Mount Pleasant BIA for four years now and also piloted by two other BIAs in the city with great success. And they've been advocating at our BIA partnerships for this small investment in order to expand the use of this tool to nine more BIAs. So, you know, I think that the case is clear why this is a good investment. So BIAs can continue to do the important work. And this is going to help them do it more effectively. So I'm not going to stand in the way of this. I'm not going to pick it apart. I'm not going to abstain. I'm going to support this motion today. Thanks.

Okay, thanks. We'll now call the vote. Clerk, can you please take us to the voting screen?

And I will note that the motion requires eight affirmative votes pursuant to Section 206J of the Charter.