← Auditor General Committee May 7, 2026
Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the Auditor General Committee meeting of Thursday, May 7, 2026. This meeting is being held in person and by electronic means. Council members and the public may participate by either method. Any voting members joining electronically are reminded to enable video to confirm quorum. I'll ask that you do so now. The meeting is being live streamed on the city's website and YouTube and meeting progress will be updated regularly on X at Van City Clerk. In case of an emergency requiring evacuation, there are two exits located beyond the glass doors and to the left. If the glass doors are blocked, please use one of the four additional exits within council chambers here. Do not use the elevator. Use the stairs instead. If you require mobility assistance, remain where you are and security staff will guide you to a safe location. A defibrillator is available at the end of the hallway outside of chambers. I'd also like to begin by acknowledging that we are on the unceded homelands of the Musqueam, Squamish, and TTsleil-Waututh people. We thank them for having cared for this land and look forward to working with them in partnership as we continue to build this great city together. I will also recognize the immense contributions of the City of Vancouver's team members who work hard every day to help make our city an incredible place to live, work, and play. I'd like to welcome External Advisor Gordon Ruth to the Auditor General Committee. He's joining us virtually this morning, so welcome, Gordon. We're pleased to have you join us and look forward to your participation in the committee. Clerk, may we have a roll call, please? Thank you.
Councillor Domenato in the chair. Councillor Kirby-Young? Present. Councillor Montague? Present. Councillor Klassen? Present. Councillor Zhoul? Present. Archie Johnston? Present. Charlene Taylor? Present. Gordon Ruth? And present. This meeting has quorum chair, Dominato.
Thank you, clerks. And for our external liaisons, Archie, Charlene, and Gordon, if you do want to ask questions when we get to the question point of the report, please raise your hand on screen and the clerks will acknowledge you. And for the rest of members of council, you know how to use the Crestron. But I just wanted to flag that for you. So just kind of raise your hand and the clerks will be able to see you. With that, we'll begin with our plan for the day, which is we have one item on the agenda. And this is the audit of community grants. Before we begin this item, does anyone have a conflict of interest to declare?
Hearing none, this item has a presentation, and I'll turn it over to our Auditor General, Mike McDonnell, who is here to present and respond to questions, along with staff from his office, Lori Berndt, Deputy Auditor General, and Subran Pramachadran. I apologize. Hopefully, you'll correct me on that. Senior Auditor.
It's over to you. Thank you, Chair. Good morning, committee members. Today, my team and I will present the results from our Audit of Community Grants. It's a topic that's near and dear to my heart personally.
Well, it would be near and dear to my heart. As we all know, auditors are heartless beings. So if I had one, it would be near to it. So next slide, please. We have our slides up.
Go ahead. There we are. Excellent. Council members expressed interest in an audit of community grants, seeking assurance on the efficiency and effectiveness of granting processes carried out by the Arts, Culture, and Community Services Department, or ACCS. Our examination had a broad lens encompassing program design, implementation processes, supporting grant approval, and the monitoring of grants and reporting to Council. Council approved spending $34 million for 931 grants for 2024. Underlying our grant criteria was the reasonable expectation that grants would align with strategic priorities, and the processes to recommend grants for council approval would be fair, objective, and transparent. Okay, we're one slide ahead, so just hold right there, please. Could you go back? Okay.
There we are. That's the right one. Thank you. ACCS provides not-for-profit organizations with a variety of grants to assist a wide range of community services. These services are provided through child care centers, neighborhood houses, theaters, shelters, arts and culture organizations, and other community-based social service organizations. Section 206 of the Vancouver Charter allows Council to provide money grants to charitable institutions and organizations deemed by Council to contribute to culture, beautification, health, or welfare of the city. ACCS distributed $28 million across 826 operating grants and $6 million across 105 capital grants in 2024. These grants were a mix of one-time and ongoing grants and included operating support and capital assistance. Operating grants focused on providing funding for specific projects or providing organizations with funding to assist in covering their operating expenses. CAPITAL GRANTS FOCUSED ON PROVIDING FUNDING TO BUILD OR UPGRADE FACILITIES USED BY ORGANIZATIONS TO PROVIDE SERVICES TO THE COMMUNITY.
THE OBJECTIVE OF THE AUDIT WAS TO DETERMINE IF THE CITY OF VANCOUVER DESIGNED AND ADMINISTERED ITS COMMUNITY GRANTS PROGRAMS TO EFFECTIVELY AND EFFICIENTLY DELIVER ON COUNCIL APPROVED POLICY AND PRIORITIES. Effectively means having clear and measurable objectives, designing the grant programs to achieve these objectives, and measuring and reporting out on the resulting level of performance to track progress and improve the programs. Efficiently refers to optimal use of resources intended to achieve outputs and outcomes through means such as streamlined processes. The audit focused on the period between July 1st, 2023 to June 30th, 2025, and included materials produced prior to then
that were used as guidance policies and administrative procedures during the audit period. We examined 19 grant streams, providing three-quarters of the total community grant funding. Next slide, please.
We set out to examine aspects of governance and oversight, grant selection and monitoring and reporting, which is primarily carried out by three ACCS teams. We examined whether ACCS had appropriate policies, processes, and objectives in place to support stewardship of grant funding, in alignment with council-approved policy and procedures, suitable grant selection processes to effectively and efficiently deliver on program objectives, developed and applied grant monitoring processes to manage risk and ensure accountability, and tracked and reported on the performance of the city's grant programs. Next slide, please. There were several items out of scope for this audit. We didn't examine compliance with financial controls and corporate policies. Nor did we assess the processing of grant payments made by the city's accounts payable system or electronics fund transfers. We didn't look at implementation of potential recommendations included in the jurisdictional scan of municipal granting or examine the activities of grant recipients. We also didn't examine grants administered outside of ACCS. Other grants outside of scope were grants provided to the Vancouver Coastal Health Authority and the Vancouver School Board. We also didn't include non-profit leases, which were the subject of a separate examination in 2024. Next slide, please.
Overall, we found that our audit criteria were partially met. We concluded that the department's granting program aligned with charter requirements and linked to council's strategic priorities. While we identified a number of good practices, however, we also identified opportunities for improvement. Next slide, please.
The report contains 10 recommendations intended to further strengthen the administration of community grants. I'd like to thank the ACCS senior leadership team, all of whom I think are here today, for their assistance and cooperation throughout the audit, for their response to the report, and for the action plan to the audit's 10 recommendations. I now ask Laurie Barrett, Deputy Auditor General and Engagement Leader for this audit, and Subramanian Prebhachandran, Senior Auditor on the project, to present the detailed audit findings and resulting recommendations. Laurie?
And good morning, committee members. The following slides will present the audit findings and recommendations related to our examination of grant program planning and design. And next slide, please. Thank you. For the audit, we examined a sample of 19 grant streams, including 10 operating and 9 capital, which covered approximately 75% of the value of grants dispersed in 2024. We found that all grant streams had goals that directly or indirectly linked to Council priorities and strategies. Defining program objectives is a core component of designing a grant program so that success can be assessed and measured.
We found that ACCS had developed objectives that were specific, realistic, and measurable for five of the 19 grant streams that we examined. Expanding this practice to all streams would assist in determining the best balance between the number of grants and the monetary value of each and create a foundation for demonstrating effectiveness. Objectives are also related to the distinction between attribution and contribution grants. Attribution grants often align with issuing fewer, larger, multi-year grants that support goals of achieving meaningful outcomes, initiating systemic change, and attributing impact back to the city's investments. Conversely, contribution grants can have broad community reach, but their impacts are more intangible and symbolic as they typically involve a large number of smaller grants. This attribution-contribution distinction is central to decisions about grant size, reach, and strategic intent and can be applied to both ongoing grant streams and one-times awards. Next slide, please. These findings and considerations led us to the first of our recommendations, that ACCS should create measurable objectives for all grant programs, demonstrate how they align with council priorities, determine if their intent is attribution or contribution, and develop a grant balance aligned with these considerations. Next slide, please. Performance measurement frameworks provide a consistent way to assess and report program performance to support accountability, impact assessment, and continuous improvement. They align an organization's strategic goals with individual programs through clearly defined key performance indicators, or KPIs. Effective performance measurement frameworks enable answers to the questions, what does success look like, and how do we measure that success, and use those answers to adjust and refine programs to achieve results. ACCS had 40 metrics for activity levels, including measures such as total attendance at public events, total investment in grant-supported child care spaces, and number of clients accessing homelessness services. While it is important to measure levels of activity, and this is a good start, on their own, measures of activity are limited in their ability to demonstrate impact. We also found that ACCS's metrics did not include efficiency measures. These could include administrative measures such as processing time per application or the number of applications processed per employee. Next slide, please.
This leads us to the second recommendation, which is for ACCS to develop performance measurement frameworks for its grant programs to ensure performance data is well connected to grant stream objectives.
Next slide, please.
Using a risk-based approach to the planning and design of grant programs supports right-sizing grant administration practices relative to the risks presented by various grant scenarios and factors such as grant size and project complexity.
Documentation includes the risks themselves, as well as appropriate risk responses. And through monitoring and ensuring that risk responses are performed as intended, grantors can identify any adjustments as needed. We found that ACCS had identified seven high-level granting risks, but that connections between these risks and individual grant streams could be strengthened.
Next slide, please. Therefore, we recommended that ACCS should build on the granting risks it has identified and improve its risk assessment process by developing and monitoring a grant risk register that documents risks in each granting area, the likelihood and consequence of identified risks, appropriate risk treatments, and monitoring activities to ensure the risk register remains relevant and actionable over time. Next slide, please.
Having a standardized policy and procedures for community grants is a good practice that we saw in several municipalities such as Edmonton, Toronto, and Ottawa. Granting policies would typically include sections that define what a grant is, identify the objectives and priorities of the granting program, and assign accountabilities for the granting process. ACCS did not have an overarching policy to guide grant administration, but utilized the city's corporate policies and some guidance and procedures, documents for specific grant streams. Reliance on discretionary decision-making can create risks of unintended outcomes, inconsistencies, and unjustified spending, and developing some uniform standards and guidelines could reduce granting risks without compromising granting effectiveness. Next slide, please.
So based on this finding, we recommended that ACCS should enhance the efficiency of its granting programs by improving guidance for processes and decisions that apply across the grant lifecycle through establishing a clear definition of a grant, minimum requirements and guidance developed from the results of the risk assessment process for each phase of the grant life cycle, circumstances and processes for new grant opportunities and one-time direct award grants, and standardized and consistent practices as appropriate across granting streams. And I will now turn the presentation over to Subran, who will discuss the findings and recommendations related to grant administration, as well as information provided to Council.
Thank you, Lori. Up next slide, please. Thank you.
So with regard to criteria clarity, criteria can be thought of as two kind of buckets. There's eligibility criteria, which is mandatory criteria that applicants must satisfy to qualify for a grant, and that ensures that the applicant's proposal is aligned with objectives.
And then there's assessment criteria to determine how well an applicant meets the criteria by evaluating as a means of measuring relative merit and funding priority. We found that eligibility criteria was clear for each of the grant streams we examined. However, there were some gaps for some of the assessment criteria. These gaps included, in some cases, having assessment criteria without weights that helped prioritize key criteria or weights without scoring guide to facilitate consistent scoring by evaluators. Next slide.
We found that ACCS appropriately promoted grant opportunities through a variety of means to potential applicants. This included email distribution, postings on the city's website. For select streams, there was also application assistant tools. These included materials that were translated into different languages, and in some cases, webinar sessions available for prospective applicants to guide them through the application process. All this designed... to encourage a wide variety of relevant applicants to apply for those grant streams. However, we did note that assessment criteria was not always published and the relative weightings used to select grant applications were not published for certain streams. Next slide. To improve granting assessments, we recommend THAT THE CITY SHOULD DEVELOP CLEAR ASSESSMENT CRITERIA ALIGNED WITH EACH GRANT STREAM SUBJECTIVE, INCLUDING THEIR RESPECTIVE WEIGHTINGS AND RATING SCALES, COMMUNICATE ASSESSMENT CRITERIA TO POTENTIAL APPLICANTS TO ENSURE TRANSPARENCY IN GRANTING DECISIONS, AND DOCUMENT INTERNAL GUIDANCE TO PROMOTE CONSISTENT OBJECTIVE AND APPROPRIATE ASSESSMENT OF APPLICATIONS ACROSS GRANT ASSESSORS. NEXT SLIDE.
We found that for two particular streams that ACCS had developed multi-year funding format that produced win-wins in reducing administrative burden for both applicants and staff. Applicants only had to apply once and staff adjudicated the decision once. And so although funding in these cases for these three-year grants were pre-approved for years two and three, they remained conditioned on Council approving annual budgets for those particular years. Grant recipients we spoke to expressed gratitude for the reduced administrative burden that these streams provided them. Next slide.
To enhance operational efficiency while also increasing funding certainty for grant recipients, ACCS should assess the opportunity to build upon its existing multi-year operational grant streams to increase the proportion of multi-year grants relative to one-year grants.
Next slide.
With regard to records, the assessment or adjudication process for applicants and for ongoing competitive grant streams involved essentially two steps.
The initial step involved the scoring of an application by adjudicators. Some of these adjudicators were external to the city, and they generally scored the application relative to predefined criteria. This was followed in some cases by staff discussions of factors that were not considered in the initial scoring. These discussions included alignment with council priorities, balance of program characteristics of the recommended recipients, and funding continuity for prior recipients.
Next slide. In some cases, the first phase of the assessment was well documented, but subsequent phases were not. At times, it was unclear how the initial and subsequent assessments were consolidated into final recommendations. Staff was able to explain the selection decisions, but assessment documentation needed to be improved to be able to withstand objective review for both ongoing and one-time grant streams. Next slide.
ACCS should review its grant assessment methods and tools and improve the documentation of factors considered during the grant assessment process to ensure that complete records are maintained that support grant recommendations to counsel.
Next slide. Thank you. Terms and conditions for grant agreements. We found that all grants were appropriately approved and all grant documentation was appropriately stored. The grant agreements had appropriate terms and conditions, including provisions for returning unused funds and reporting requirements for recipients. However, we did note that for six streams, those streams did not require final reporting. This could create a risk that if the recipient did not reapply for the grant, that the city would not receive a report on what the recipient was able to accomplish with the grant. Next slide. The city should review and update its grant agreements to ensure that they include reporting requirements where lacking.
Next slide. Thank you.
We found that for the monitoring process that the reporting process was not overly burdensome for recipients and staff did a good job in leveraging other mechanisms for reporting. For example, we did note that for select arts and culture grant recipients, they were Recipients were able to report select statistics through CADAC, which was a national joint centralized system through which arts organizations can submit financial and statistical information for use by a variety of funders, and that would include the city. This allowed recipients to streamline the reporting and not have to duplicate reporting certain statistics and financial information to multiple funders and did not have to do anything unique for the city for that reporting.
There was some gaps and variation in monitoring tools, and this included some updates not being received as required by grant agreements and some inconsistencies in the follow-up process. We did note that the monitoring process did lead to some effective outcomes. In one granting team, there was situations where recipients had either failed to submit reports or reported challenges in delivering their programs. In these instances... Staff was able to redeploy funding or discontinue funding for those recipients. Therefore, ensuring monitoring activities are appropriately tailored to focus on high-risk grant recipients, criteria, and streams may assist in the overall granting effectiveness.
Next slide. Based on this finding, we recommend that in alignment with a risk-based approach to granting, the city should establish grant monitoring activities proportionate to grant risk and ensure that each ACCS granting team develops corresponding monitoring protocols.
Next slide. Thank you. Reports to Council. During the audit period, which was July 1st, 2023 to June 30th, 2025, ACCS had provided Council with 43 reports. This included some helpful information, which included grant recommendations, budget requests, grant stream descriptions. However, they did not compare results to grant stream objectives or compare and contrast planned and actual results. Tailoring information provided to Council within these windows to include grant performance may improve Council's ability to oversee the granting process. Next slide. Based on this finding, we recommend that ACCS should inform Council about the processes used to arrive at grant recommendations and report to Council on key performance indicators. These are the findings and recommendations identified from the audit report, and now I'll hand the presentation back to Mike. You could go to the next slide, please. We have two recommendations for the committee to consider, that the Auditor General Committee endorse the 10 recommendations in the report dated April 30th, 2026, entitled Auditor Community Grants, and further, that the committee recommend, the council endorse the recommendations in the report. I'm happy to take questions at this time, or if you wish to hear from the department.
Thank you. And I didn't acknowledge that we do have staff from the city manager's office here, as well as arts, culture, and community services also available to answer questions. But certainly, if that's the end of your presentation, I'll turn it over to committee members to ask questions. And just a reminder, you have up to five minutes to ask your questions. And again, flagging that for our external liaisons, please just put your hand up so the clerks can see if you do want to be added to the speaker list. But right now, I have Councillor Zhou, followed by Councillor Clausen. So we'll start with Councillor Zhou.
Yeah, thanks, Chair. Thanks, Mike, and your team for this very important audit. Also, thanks for our ECCS department. Very important work to supporting our nonprofit organization. So my first question is about this... evaluation, the KPI, basically, the performance of KPI. So, you know, once said, I understand it's very challenging. How do you evaluate the performance for each of the grant recipients? How do you, you know, compare one with another? I understand the challenge from the ECCS department. So based on your review, do you have any recommendations? What are the objective KPI performance?
indicators we can compare to see you know we give one recipient not really make a big difference to the community the otherwise not too much big difference so yeah well when the um uh when the department has sought guidance from uh from council in terms of the overall direction and the impact that council is desiring to see um you know that uh guidance is provided through uh culture shift and other strategic documents, it would be, I think, logical to link performance indicators back to the desired impact that's outlined in those documents. Now, you did say, I think, quite correctly that this is challenging. It takes time. It's not a get in there one year and measure. It takes time to move the needle. And so what I envision is actually a progression of performance indicators. Right now, the department has a lot of activity measures, a number of people that it touches, and that's a great start. The next step is, well, how do you know you're moving the needle? What does success look like in the near term, in the medium term, potentially in the long term? The further out you go, the harder it gets. Harder it is to attribute anything back to specifically what the city has done because there's more and more players involved. But I think it's important to try to see if things are moving in the direction that you want them to.
But how do you quantify that in the performance metrics?
Well, it's not uncommon in the social sciences sector that there are measures out there that rate poverty or impacts that the city is looking for. So really, those are your objectives, Councillor Cho, the strategic priorities, the areas of impact that are outlined. And so I think the question comes back to asking you what success looks like. How would you know? How would you be satisfied that the city's efforts are moving the needle?
Okay, thank you. That's an interesting question. So we have to all think about that, how to reflect into the grant program. So other questions, I still heard a lot of concerns from our cultural community who do not have access to all those information. I know we provide a lot of translation into different languages, but still a lot of nonprofit organizations in the cultural community, they are not aware of our grant programs. So again, based on your audit, what is the best way to enhance that, make sure that we reach out to those cultural communities so they are able to apply?
To be honest, actually, the audit found that the department had done quite a good job in promoting opportunities and was quite helpful to applicants as they were going through the process. We spoke with a number of not-for-profit organizations in the community. The department itself had done its own surveying, and there was actually a fairly high degree of satisfaction on the front end. So in that sense, I didn't have any recommendations for improvement.
Okay, so I know, you know, reach out to the community is different from reaching out to our cultural community who do not speak English. So that's my biggest concern here. I know we do translation into different languages whenever we, you know, have the grant application announcement. But how do we really reach out to the groups? Not just translate that, post on our webpage, that's it.
I think that would probably be a question better directed at management.
Okay, yeah. All right, so other questions regarding the... some of the applicants did not receive the grant. And how do we communicate the reasoning to the applicant? Because we need to make sure the communication is smooth and they know what happened. So the next time when they submit the application, they probably have a better chance. Did you review that process?
Well, we reviewed whether the process existed. We found that it did in terms of how it actually works. I think that's a question that's again better addressed to management if They would care to yeah, thanks Mike What we can do is someone can move a second round to then and then you could ask questions of management after but I'll advance counselor Clausen Thank you for that suggestion. Yeah, I'd like to move second round, please So a second round of questions has been moved. Can I get a seconder? second second Seconded all in favor And that carries. Thank you. Go ahead, Councillor Claassen.
Yeah, thanks very much. I'll start with the AG, and then I'll save maybe my questions to staff a second round. Just with so many grant streams and types of grants annually and aligned over 20 different city strategies, did your office form a view on whether the grant systems have become overly complex or administratively diffuse over time? and whether a greater consolidation and standardization could improve effectiveness to taxpayers.
Well, we're doing a bit of a dance here in the sense that the grant streams exist because council has directed the city staff to do so. And if that's council's direction, then that is policy. And that's not in my purview to question council's policy decisions. However, when I look at 62 grant streams for $34 million, that does seem to me, given my own personal experience, particularly with United Way, to be a lot. We do have, if you turn to paragraph 50 in the report, a discussion around grant size and the number of recipients and the conversations that I believe need to take place at the council table with respect to how impact is best achieved. And again, in my experience, larger grants tend to have potential for greater impact than grants small dollars sprinkled across a large number of organizations. But that depends on what you're trying to achieve, which is getting back to our recommendations around, well, what's the intention here? What does success look like? If success is symbolic, then little grants work well. If success looks like impact... You know, when I look at the culture shift document, it mentions impact 18 times in the context of what the city wants to achieve. doesn't speak about reputation management or symbolism or anything along those lines. So I do believe that that's a conversation that needs to take place in terms of what is council's objective here and how is that best achieved? We can't be all things to all people. And so where are the priorities?
That does answer that question, I think, quite well. And I had another question, but I think you've already answered it. In your view, is counsel sufficiently defined the overarching purpose of philosophy of the grant system? And I think the answer is no.
Well, yes, but your other question was about rationalization. and so that's the next step in the conversation recognizing that perhaps there are areas that should be higher priority than others you know they're saying when everything's a priority nothing's a priority um so i i'm suggesting that council should have that that frank conversation going forward about where it really wants to have the greatest impact and to focus ask one more question and then i'll come back for a second round but
And just to be absolutely clear, did your office identify any evidence of inappropriate grant awards, or was your primary concern the city could not consistently demonstrate fairness, objectivity, and impact through the outcomes?
Definitely no evidence of grants that were awarded for the wrong reasons, if you will. What there was was an objective process that created a ranking and and then a subjective process that's applied after the fact, and that's where the documentation fell down. Now, this is a very normal process in my experience, that you start with an objective assessment, it creates a ranked list, but that's an imperfect process because it can lead to inequities. So say, for instance, you've got six grants, and I'm just pulling these ideas out of the air, they're not specific examples that we saw, but say six grants went to... organizations that offered services to children but none went to services that offered to seniors and they're supposed to cover both well then there might be a rebalancing to ensure there could be regional inequities as well in terms of that that ranked list and the city might have objectives that span the entire city not just specific neighborhoods Those are subjective and very valid subjective reasons for adjusting those priorities. What we're suggesting is, we're talking about tax dollars here, that it should be well noted as to what those decisions were, why they were, and that that is also part of the conversation to be had with you when those decisions were made.
We've just got 10 seconds left. granting process be helped by having a mission statement and have to be like a one or two word answer sure okay all right thanks very much
Thank you for those questions. And just given, and sorry, this wasn't built into my script, but I wanted to make space for, I know our staff wanted to provide an update from their perspective in responding to the Auditor General's recommendations. And so if those on the queue waited to ask questions, you might let me indulge me. Sorry. Oh, sorry, we'll turn that off. It's just to invite staff up to provide an update and then it might also address some questions as well and then I'll come back to Vice chair Kirby young then Charlene Taylor and then back to Councillor Zhou So I suggest we proceed that way so Well, yeah, well hang on one second
Okay.
Okay. Sorry, committee, we're just navigating a few administrative issues here. Go ahead.
Thank you so much. Thank you so much for the opportunity to share a few words. Margaret Witkins, General Manager, Arts, Culture, and Community Services, and I'm joined by a number of staff who support the grant process within ACCS. I'd like to begin by acknowledging the work of the Office of the Auditor General. We certainly appreciate the audit and the opportunity it provides to strengthen practices. At its core, a grant is a tool that allows the city to advance council priorities and support work with tangible benefits for Vancouver residents and communities. Through ACCS, the city provides funding to many organizations delivering arts and culture programming, social services, community supports, and infrastructure. This includes anything from festivals and cultural institutions to small community-based programs and inclusive spaces. as well as organizations supporting seniors, youth, tenants, neighborhood serving services across Vancouver. Nonprofit organizations are essential partners for the city. They advance city priorities by delivering services that the city does not provide directly. As noted, the scope is broad and reflects the many ways community organizations contribute to the vibrancy of our neighborhoods, economic activity, and build a more inclusive, resilient, and connected city. Within that context, ACCS works diligently to ensure public funding to support this important work is administered in a way that is fair and transparent. Grant processes are grounded in city policies and informed by best practices across municipalities and other funders. They seek to balance strong administrative oversight with funding delivery objectives while also operating within resource and system constraints. Within this context, recent jurisdictional reviews indicate that ACCS's grant programs align with, and in some areas, lead municipal best practices. The audit provides an opportunity to further strengthen how these grant processes, assessment approaches, and decision-making are documented and communicated. ACCS accepts in whole or in part the OAG's recommendations. The audit identifies areas for practical action and enhancements. Some recommendations align with work already underway or in place, including the expansion of multi-year grants. Several are also supported by existing processes and governance, including council-approved grant frameworks and regular reporting to council through reports, briefings, and annual grant impact summaries. Certain audit recommendations, such as those focused on performance measurement, do present feasibility challenges within a municipal context where grant programs support such a wide range of priorities and services. Some recommendations could introduce additional administrative requirements that could reduce ACCS's funding delivery or increase barriers to applicants. So these are ones that need to be approached carefully to ensure there is a commensurate benefit. As outlined in our response to the OAG report, ACCS will implement recommendations in a way that reflects operational realities, available resources, and the need for accountability and accessibility. This will include strengthening consistency in documentation and processes. expanding our risk-based approach to grant administration, enhancing clarity around objectives, measurements, and alignment with council priorities, and continuing to build on the multi-year funding to support stability in the sector. We also continue to report to Council through existing mechanisms and explore opportunities to improve clarity and transparency, as well as responsiveness. Thank you, and we'll be happy to take questions when we get to that step.
Thank you very much for those updates. It's appreciated. Vice Chair Kirby-Young, go ahead.
Yeah, thanks. Good morning, everybody. And I appreciate and thank the Auditor General for the work and the response from staff. I have a level of frustration around the grants process and I have for a number of years. So this might inform some of my questions. I'm interested to hear from the Auditor General during your work. If there's any contemplation around defining best practice metrics with regards to things like efficiency and cost of administration. And I frame that question saying that many charitable nonprofits, for example, often proudly state what the cost of administration is relative to funding that flows out in the community. Is there any consideration given to that or any thoughts on that?
Yes, we did highlight, Councillor Kerby-Young, that that is a deficiency in the performance measurement framework and that there is an opportunity to better assess and report out on the efficiency of the programs overall.
Okay. And then my other point is really something that you also touched on, Mike, and that was around... clarity and transparency for potential recipients or grantees that there was, and I think it's acknowledged, but there seemed to be a lot of process in administering the grants, but less rigor, if I can say that, with respects to publishing the assessment criteria and how they were awarded. And so we often end up sometimes with bewildered applicants or quite honestly sometimes counselors that don't understand why how a decision was made how something was weighted and why a particular grantee that may not align with counselors priorities receive something or a grantee that does align did not so do you feel that publishing the criteria would help to alleviate some of those challenges from the different stakeholders involved in these in this ecosystem
We did identify opportunities for improvement in that area and have a recommendation to that effect. It's done inconsistently. And so, as I said, opportunity for improvement.
Okay. And would you rate that as sort of a strong recommendation if you were giving it credence relative to some of the others?
Not to be flippant, but I think they're all strong recommendations.
I asked the question, you would say that. Let's pivot to really alignment with council priorities. This is something that I feel somehow the process really precludes any meaningful engagement with council or opportunity to evolve those priorities and ensure that grant allocations are aligned in a meaningful way with council priorities and quite honestly, a changing city. For example, we see affordability becoming a real issue or food security, and yet we don't pivot. And we have these, you know, council sets priorities, but our granting system is not responsive, I think, in adapting to those. So how do you want to provide a bit more insight on how we do that? Does that come back to council more with a midterm kind of conversation around or an onus on staff to really demonstrate alignment with council priorities? how they are zeroing in because it is a bit it does seem a bit like there's we're trying to help so many organizations and there's so much need but i question whether or not we're zeroing in on really critical areas let's take that question to staff does staff want to comment on that maybe um
THANK YOU FOR THE QUESTION. I DO SEE THAT IN OUR MANAGEMENT RESPONSE TO SOME OF THE RECOMMENDATIONS, WE HAVE PUT FORWARD AN OPPORTUNITY TO GAUGE COUNCIL'S PRIORITIES AT THE BEGINNING OF THE COUNCIL TERM. SO ONE OF THE REALITIES OF OUR GRANT PROGRAMS IS THAT THEY ARE ALIGNED TO COUNCIL PRIORITIES AS WELL AS LONG-TERM STRATEGIES. that are broad in nature. And so as part of our management response, we've put forward an opportunity to seek more specific council direction related to the council terms, kind of specific emphasis around grant program objectives and priorities. And so I think in part, although we would indicate that our current grant programs... are aligned to council priorities and council approved strategies. Those are broad in nature, and we do see opportunity to enhance the level of focus in line with some of the comments we've heard today.
Yeah, thank you for that response. I mean, I do appreciate sort of the recommendation and the effort. I would dispute that they're fully aligned with council priorities. I think that the conversation happens, but I don't think in practice that changes have been made substantially to actually reflect that. I think there's a big gap there. I'll leave it there for now, Chair.
Thank you. Charlene, go ahead.
I just have three questions for the department. With respect to recommendation number seven, which departmental policies and procedures will take priority and how will they address variation across the different teams?
Thank you for the question. So the recommendation number seven relates to how we enhance our documentation for grant programs, if I'm remembering off the top of my head. And so really... What we found through our review of the recommendations is that we do have documentation in place for all steps of the grant administration cycle. And sometimes those are held in different systems. So sometimes in VanApply, sometimes those are held in spreadsheets. And so the focus of our action in this area would really be to enhance our consistency
and synthesis across all of the grant programs versus honing in on on a singular area it's it's really that opportunity for consistency okay and then the second question on recommendation number seven um what objective metrics are being used to balance administrative demands with staff capacity
Objective metrics to balance administrative demands with staff capacity. Currently, we draw heavily on practices in other municipalities in terms of how we approach the level of documentation, the level of reporting requirement that are placed on organizations that are applying for grants. The jurisdictional review that was undertaken in 2024 did reveal that we are at the lower or middle size of sort of staff relative to the size of the grant program. And so there are kind of general guidance. These are some of the general points of reference that we use to determine whether or not our administrative efforts are right-sized.
And with respect to recommendation number five, given the broad scope of funding programs, what specific steps will be taken to ensure the feasibility study is not just theoretical, but actionable?
The feasibility study, I'm sorry, could you just elaborate on that aspect?
Sorry. What specific steps will be taken to ensure the feasibility study is not just theoretical but actionable? This is on number five.
Thank you. So number five focuses on how we enhance our communication related to assessment criteria. And in this area, we generally have clear assessment criteria across many of the grant programs. And there really are kind of a few targeted areas where there are kind of exceptions to some of our core programs. And so what will make this practical is that we will take a very kind of hands-on approach for those areas that are exceptions to ensure that enhancements can be realized.
Okay, thank you. Thanks, Charlene.
I'm going to actually, I don't know, I've suddenly jumped ahead here. I'm going to let Archie Johnston go ahead of me. So just advance Archie. Oops.
And thank you, Mike, and your team for an excellent report. Very thorough and very helpful to uh to uh i hope the uh the department of terms going through um in terms of um the recommendations um i noticed that the response from our management and they indicated that um a number of the items recommendations will be implemented by december 2027 which is a year and a half from now and i was just wondering as a number of them relate to improving efficiency whether management has considered any steps to move forward the timing of their review and implementation of those of those points really to a more near term
Thank you for the question. As you'll note in the management response, there's kind of a range of time frames. Some of them are within year 2026, and then others, as you've properly noted, are targeted towards the end of 2027. The ones that have a longer time frame are ones where We won't wait until December 2027 to initiate improvements, but we do know that to make substantial change would require some time. And so I would, you know, look at performance measurement as an example. Further to Councillor Zhou and the auditor's discussion, performance measurement is one that does require a fairly kind of... nuanced and detailed look to determine how to put a meaningful framework in place that supports accountability but does not introduce undue administrative burden. And so we would want to make sure that we take the time to do that right. That does not necessarily mean that we wouldn't be making incremental improvements in the meantime, but in terms of full completion of the recommendation, we wanted to allow adequate time.
Thank you. Archie, further questions?
No, that addresses the issue, and I'm glad that the department's moving forward a number of the issues on a quicker basis, particularly around the efficiency area.
Thank you for that feedback. I'll advance. Councillor Zhou, go ahead.
Yeah, thanks, Chair. So I'm going to direct the question to the staff right now. So similar question. So how do we do differently in terms of reaching to our cultural community instead of just translating into their language and post on the website? What we can do differently to really reach out to the cultural community?
I wonder whether Sonia or Brenda, would you want to speak? I may draw on one of the experts from our grant teams. I know that it is improving the accessibility and lowering barriers to the grant programs has been a major emphasis over the last number of years. And so I think the auditor noted some of the areas of improvement. And so likely what's needed is for more direct conversations related to what could further lower the barriers for some of the specific groups that you may be connected with. And I would certainly welcome being put in touch with specific organizations where you're hearing barriers, and we can explore if there's further measures that can be taken.
Yeah, just some idea. Maybe, you know, think about doing some targeted session. I don't know, South Asian community, Chinese community, Filipino community, for those nonprofit organizations on a regular basis, I don't know, quarterly or yearly, so we can reach out to more of those groups. Just some idea.
Thank you for the feedback.
Yeah. Okay, so other questions. Again, how do we enhance the communication with the applicant who did not receive or got declined of the grant application so they know the feedback? Because right now, I think the process is only they ask why we got declined, and we will provide some feedback. But how do we make sure that regardless, they can be provided feedback so they can improve their application next time?
Currently, we will have detailed debriefs with any applicant who is interested in understanding kind of the factors that weighed into their grant assessment. And that is something that is done on a routine basis with dozens of applicants for each grant cycle. And so that is currently available. I think what we're hearing through this grant audit is that there is an opportunity for us to increase kind of the synthesis and consistency and documentation around how that is approached. And so that's takeaway work for us following today's audit presentation.
Okay. Thanks, Margaret. That's all my questions. Thanks, Chair.
Thank you, Councillor Hsu. Councillor Claassen, go ahead.
Yeah, thanks very much. I'll direct my questions to staff. And thanks, Margaret, for... for responses so far. I'm kind of building a little bit upon what Councillor Kirby-Young was talking about, which is sort of shifting, if you like, paradigm. You know, there are over 10 to 20 years, Council will see different societal and even political priorities evolving. And so... And I know that we went through a fairly lengthy strategic planning exercise at the beginning of this term. Does ACCS sit down, evaluate that, and then pose recommendations saying, we're hearing that you don't want to go here, but you would prefer to go here with a grant stream, for example?
All of the grant streams and the objectives that are published are explicitly linked to council direction. And so that is certainly already in place. And then we also have examples of where grant streams have been adapted based on kind of specific and emerging direction from council where, you know, there might be sort of a... a kind of substream that is identified in order to address a particular priority. And so there is that kind of overarching direction as well as responsiveness. And I think through the findings of this audit, we would look to kind of enhance that connection to council to ensure that the interim priorities and the opportunity to translate that into our sort of performance measurement as well as more detailed objective setting is made more explicit.
Would it help to have a particular team member or team members whose one of their important goals is a transformational process to evaluate which is, and things build up over time, and I take part of the blame. Council comes in, and then they immediately sort of respond to what they're hearing out in the public, and they want to make changes, put their stamp on it, if you like, or respond to what they think are their priorities of the day. But you're oftentimes left with hangover policy direction from 10, you know, like two or three council terms back even further that are still driving some of that. So I'm just wondering, is there a potential process that is maybe prompted by this audit that allows you to go, you know what, we need a, you know, manager of transformation or, you know, I'm not going to give, but just somebody who's responsible that would work with obviously you as a general manager.
You know, I think the team that we have working on the grants program is highly committed to continuous process improvement and also ensuring that the work that we're doing is delivering on council priorities. And so the vision and the motivation is... is in place. And as well as the expertise for that transformation is really held by the folks that are in this room. And so I don't necessarily think we need a standalone position. I do think the audit gives us some wind in the sails to make sure that we're using this as an opportunity to kind of really focus in on what those grant program priorities and how they're attuned to council term priorities.
That's great. And again, I'm not I'm not suggesting I know how you manage it is how you prioritize these things. But is there a way to report that process back to council in a clear and objective way? And would more council direction help perhaps through a recommendation from the audit today as part of our final recommendations to say, you know, we'd like to better understanding how this is by early next year or something like that?
Yeah, I think so under recommendation one as well as recommendation 10, if you look at the management response there, it may be a question on whether or not you feel that those ones adequately address this interest insofar as we are proposing that we would check in with council at the beginning of the term to confirm council's priorities relative to the grant program and then that we would integrate that into our annual reporting to council. And so, which would include helping us to refine our grant impact report so that it's more attuned to kind of the specific priorities stated by council at the beginning of the term. And so, I think we, you know, we have some steps already laid out there. And depending on your view, you know, I certainly see that how we're intending to respond sounds aligned with your questions here.
Thank you very much. Appreciate that.
Thank you. Thank you for the questions. I'm going to advance myself. I have a couple of questions I want to circle back on. Appreciating that with respect to the grant streams you've taken, you looked at the strategic direction by council at the outset of the term. When it comes to eligibility criteria and assessment criteria, there was largely... developed by staff at the staff level. So we may say, okay, we think these areas are priority, but when it comes to eligibility assessment, staff are driving that. Is that fair?
Generally, the terms of, the initial terms of a grant program would be initially council approved, but the ongoing administration is held by staff, yes.
One of the reasons I ask is, and it speaks to one of the recommendations around providing counsel with a better understanding of the processes arrived at, you know, determining that this group is eligible for grant or we assess that, is that we've, in many cases, are funding provincial organizations. They may have an office based in Vancouver. But in the last, when I went through the last series of grants, it wasn't clear to me when we funded a provincial organization, They would say, let's just say, we offer a range of services across the province, including in your city, but I didn't get a sense of, well, to what degree? So you're offering presentations in Vancouver schools, but how many schools? Or is it largely you're going to all 60 school districts and providing services? And so... I'm curious if based on the audit and that's something you might be looking at because I think that's a gap for us as council.
How do I know said provincial organization is delivering anything in Vancouver or are they taking all that money and using it for general operating and doing the service outside of Vancouver? So I would like sort of your thoughts on that because that's an observation I've made over now a number of years of our granting programs.
It's a very helpful question and observation because I can certainly affirm that on the assessment side of things, that type of information is looked at to confirm that the organizations are delivering services effectively. in Vancouver commensurate with the grant request. So that is certainly part of the assessment in the adjudication process. And I think the further opportunity that you've highlighted is to ensure that council is aware as part of our reporting that that has been assessed. So I think that that's a good piece of feedback.
Yeah, I appreciate that. I'd be interested in that. Charlene asked an interesting question, and I was noodling on this a while. She was talking about it's highlighted sort of the administrative burden on those applying, and that moving to multi-year makes it less burdensome, easier. But I am curious in terms of our internal administration of grants. are we leveraging technology to help us with all of these pieces whether it be from agreements to assessment to the reporting back are they meeting because a lot of this touches on getting to a better outcomes framework and I'm just curious like are we doing like are we using spreadsheets for this like what level of technology are we using to help us manage all of this because I think there's some good recommendations in here but it also requires some implementation and So in a world of AI as well, I'm curious what that looks like for your team.
Yes, so the grant management system is called VanApply, and that was introduced a number of years ago and offers some opportunity for technological improvement and efficiency. No system is perfect, and they all have their constraints. And so I would say with honesty that we are still operating in a mode where it's a combination of, you know, purpose-built software as well as spreadsheets, and so there's more work we can continue there, but it is something that we look at in the context of our CPI.
Okay. And then the questions, I'm not going to go back to timing, but I appreciated those questions about the timing and there's different sequencing. I would imagine for the grant streams where there wasn't assessment criteria publicly available that we would be able to make sure that's in place for the next round of grants so it's transparent to the applicants.
Yes, and using that as an example, the instances where assessment criteria weren't identified are kind of specific, like the theater rental grants or the Chinatown partnership grants, where the nature of the assessment is different. And so while they may not have been communicated as assessment criteria, the... kind of evaluation approaches articulated in other ways like guiding principles, et cetera. And so I think a piece of it is, again, that consistency and ensuring that we are making explicit things that may be implicit for certain focused programs.
Okay. Thank you for answering all those questions. I'm going to advance Vice Chair Kirby Young. Go ahead, Vice Chair.
Yeah, thanks very much, Chair. And I'd like to direct my questions to staff. And I'm really interested to hear your thoughts around, for example, how... Staff contemplated things like time-bound streams that could respond to specific priorities. I'm not suggesting, I'm just using this as an example, but when we're in the midst of real affordability challenges, food security becomes a big issue. That if we had an allocation, for example, set aside that would allow the ability to deliver time-bound streams or that for some organizations would allow them to... Support them and getting them on their way, but they may not sort of create a paradigm where they're supported year after year, but it allows council to support different things in the city and then have some more focus in the rest of the grants program in terms of ongoing city priorities.
Yes, thank you. I definitely agree that time-bound grant streams can form a part of the overarching grant program. It does exist to a limited extent already. You know, I think sometimes we think of the grant program as a portfolio where, you know, some of the grants are providing, you know, stable ongoing support, whereas others are, you know, project-based and, you know, there are examples. of limited term funding like the Building Safer Communities Program where it was enabled by senior government funding and tailored towards a really focused objective. And so I think that is certainly something that we could build on in the future.
Okay. I think that's a really intriguing possibility. It allows the opportunity for the city collectively, I say the city, you know, in terms of staff at council, et cetera, to pivot and respond to what's going on. I guess sort of a corollary question to that. And this is probably something that happens at the city all the time, which is, you know, does staff feel that parties get layered on, but things don't get taken away? Like at what point are we becoming less effective because we're granting to so many organizations versus trying to pull back a little bit and focus in on less organizations that can sustain over time and really try to tackle into some of those enduring city priorities.
Yeah, thank you. I think one of the ways that we would look at it is that the overarching priorities are very broad. The jurisdictional scan from 2024 also found that, you know, some jurisdictions do have that kind of medium-term plan that helped translate those broader objectives into something more near and medium-term. And so I certainly relate to how you've described that.
Okay. I do think what we're talking about effectively, of following up on the question is really around how do we build flexibility and for change management and a more responsive granting system and do you feel i i feel that do you feel that we have that now i i certainly don't um how does that feel about that
I mean, I think if we're hearing from council that the grant programs do not seem responsive to council priorities, then that is kind of the key feedback that we need to hear. And I do see that as part of our... ongoing work as well as the response to this audit that there is room to more closely connect Council's immediate objectives with the grant programs. There will always be a question around change management because the grant programs have developed over time in a way that there is kind of core operating support that organizations have you know, come to integrate as part of their operations. That said, it is council's authority to direct us to do differently and we would seek to manage that change.
Yeah, and I appreciate that, Margaret. And just for clarity, I'm not saying just council's priorities, but also the city's. There are things in our cities and our cities are different today than they were five years ago, 10 years ago, 15 years ago in terms of the composition of people that we have, where they're from.
what people need so i just wanted to reflect that back yes thank you thank you for those questions um i'm going to advance gordon ruth go ahead gordon yeah thank you um actually questions if i may to management um we talked earlier about uh you know how you mentioned earlier how you placed with regard to some other municipal uh similar organizations um and we know what your output we know the number of grants and uh the volume the dollar volume just how big it actually is the the department budget is uh my first question um the second question actually relates more to the recommendations around documentations and information to support uh how some of the decisions have been made and and this actually i don't this element i don't think was covered in the audit but i am curious if your staff have like an annual attestation that they sign off to indicate that you know they're There's no level of potential bias, like they're not, you know, they're there themselves, aren't part of the organization that's applying for the funding. If something like that's in place and is done on an annual basis.
Thank you for the question. So the grant budget is approximately, within scope of this audit, was approximately $34 million. And then in terms of your question around bias, this is integrated into our ongoing employee policies and processes. Each year, staff are required to... sign a conflict of interest attestation, and that would certainly require reflection on if there's any potential conflict relative to any aspect of the role of the city, including grant adjudication or administration.
Thank you.
And, Chair, if I may just follow up? Yes, go ahead. So thank you for the attestation comment. That's helpful. And, yeah, I recognize the volume, the dollars in the grants. I'm just curious what the departmental budget is.
Oh, of ACCS as a whole?
Yes.
You know, I would want to not say the wrong number, so I can provide a follow-up on that.
All right. Thank you. Thank you for those questions, Gordon. I'll advance Vice Chair Kirby Young. Go ahead.
Chair, am I the last one on the queue? Sorry, I'm flipping between screens.
Yes, you are.
Okay, I have a proposed, I know that if we're concluding questions at this point, I know that the committee has a role in receiving the report for information, and then it goes to council, and I have a motion to propose, which I have. emailed in. And I'm actually just sending an updated one. So if the clerks can pull up my second email, please.
Not the first one. Vice Chair, we will. Just one moment. I'm just being alerted by the clerks that our external liaison, Charlene, may have a follow-up question just before we move to that. Just give me one minute.
Can you stop my time, please?
We will.
I think I was in there before it ran out.
We just ran that down.
We'll reset that.
Charlene, did you have a question before we advance the recommendation?
Yes, I just had one quick question for the department. I was just wondering whether they conduct a community needs assessment to demonstrate any gaps in services or needs for grant applications and whether they would present that to the council. Just for clarification, thanks. IF I MAY CLARIFY, IS THE QUESTION ABOUT GAPS RELATED TO NEEDS FOR GRANTS? SO SERVICE NEEDS AND THE POTENTIAL FOR GRANTS TO SUPPORT? Yeah, just like earlier they mentioned, for example, affordability was a key. So I was just wondering, just in terms of when you do a general analysis of needs in a community, is there anything that you find or present to council or in your own, you know, I guess... bucket of potential programs. The feedback that we get into our grants to help inform our grants programs related to needs would come through conversations we have with organizations within the program, so through their reporting and ongoing engagement, as well as other kind of community-based activities that staff would undertake. To my knowledge, we have not done a survey directly related to community needs.
Thank you.
Thank you, Charlene. To check in with the clerks before we go back to the Vice Chair, is there anyone else with hands up for questions from our external liaisons?
Nope. Okay. I'm going to advance you, Kester Kirby-Young.
Yeah, thanks very much, Chair.
I have emailed in a motion, and I hope the clerks have that.
Maybe I'll pause just for a moment for it to come up.
And they did send it a bit earlier so committee members could start reviewing. I realize that the external advisors may not be on that email chain.
Yes, so, Vice Chair, I think what we're going to do is suggest a five-minute recess or ten minutes, just because both staff and the external liaisons need a moment to review it.
Five minutes? Yeah, so move five minutes. Seconded. All in favor of a five-minute recess so that we can review the amendment?
Okay. Okay.
Okay, so we're going to take a five-minute recess. Thank you.
Yeah.
Thank you.
you
That's right.
Okay, committee members, I'm going to bring us back here. And just a note in advance, Vice Chair Kirby Young, we do now have an updated motion that's been circulated and will be displayed, and it includes the recommendations from the Auditor General.
as well as an additional recommendation. So I'm going to let Vice Chair Kirby-Young speak to that and just making sure we've got it on the screen first so that everyone can see it.
And our liaisons have it as well?
Okay. Okay. Go ahead, Vice Chair Kirby-Young.
Yeah, thanks very much, Sharon. Before delving into the motion on the point of procedure related to what you were saying, I think we have a gap with this committee that we receive a report, but it does not include the recommendations for endorsement. So if my committee members are scrambling to write those, I recognize it's included in the presentation, but council doesn't get the presentation until the meeting is happening. So it might be a great best practice if we could have a cover sheet on all reports that actually include the administrative recommendation.
Yes, I wholeheartedly concur. And I was just speaking with our auditor general about that as well as that practice. I think that makes a lot of sense. So I appreciate you raising that.
Great, thank you. So I'll proceed to introduce a motion. It has three clauses, as the chair mentioned. The first one is, the first two are really administrative for the committee to endorse the recommendations in the report if it so sees fit to do so. And then recognizing that the ultimate authority is with council, clause B recommends that the auditor general ask council to endorse the recommendations as well. And then C is really the substantive piece here. And what I think it does is really parse out from the audit review and some of the recommendations, some of the really key gaps and opportunities that we have collectively to continue refining the granting program. And so it is requesting council to direct staff to report back by next spring on the implementation work with respects to Paying specific attention to changes and improvements that demonstrate alignment to council priorities is a best practice ongoing and at the commencement of each term. Adoption of mid-term reviews to council on outcomes in alignment with those council priorities. Looking at defining best practice metrics with regards to efficiency and cost of grant. excuse me, administration, the potential to adopt strategies such as time-bound streams and other practices that would allow the grants program to effectively support both ongoing and emerging needs in the city and achieving greater transparency for the public and potential grantees through practices like publishing evaluation assessment criteria for clearer and improved transparency. Propose that for the committee's consideration.
Thank you. And that has been seconded by councillor Clausen So it is on the floor for debate and decision And if you want to speak to it, please add yourselves to the queue for external liaisons Please raise your hand so our clerks can see your interest in speaking to this You're not see anyone on the queue I'll just check in with the clerk's do we have anyone from our external liaisons that wish us to speak?
Nope. Oh, Councillor Clausen. Okay, go ahead, Councillor Clausen. Just really simple. Thanks to the Auditor General and his team for completing and presenting the audit, and to our staff team in ACCS who are working positively and constructively on this one, and I look forward to seeing the recommendations put into action. Thanks very much. Thank you, Councillor Clausen. Vice Chair Kirby Young.
Yeah, thanks, Tara. I'll just close by saying I think that when the city of Vancouver is taking valuable dollars and expending them to support a number of different streams, whether it's arts, culture, different nonprofits, so many organizations that are doing great work in the city. It is really important that the stewardship of those dollars is. looked at in terms of its efficacy on an ongoing basis and that it is responsive to both ongoing needs in our city as well as emerging ones. You know, we've seen so much change happen in our city in terms of development, in terms of... The identity of new residents, affordability challenges, so much is happening. And so I think and yet we have some ongoing areas that have been very, from a values perspective, been very important to the city. And so I do think that there's opportunity. And I appreciate through this audit that we're having this conversation with the Auditor General, with our staff team around continuing to improve the program and build in. I think some additional strengthening of some best practices, but also some flexibility that the program itself can adapt to the needs of the city and the residents that it serves. And so to me, that's how I view this work. I think it's encouraging to have the opportunity to do that. And I'm grateful for staff's kind of responsiveness and willingness to look at some of those pieces. I think that it's really important work that will have a real impact. And we want to make sure that we're expending funds where they really are. having demonstrable outcomes for people that need it. So I appreciate the conversation today very much. Thank you.
Thank you very much. And that concludes all of our speakers. So I'll call the question. Please vote online. And I think for our liaisons, they may have to do a show of hands. Is that correct, clerks? Or can they vote online? Oh, they won't. Right. Good reminder. Thank you. So to our committee members who get a vote, please vote online. I'll take a vote assist in favor. Thank you.
Thank you. And that passes unanimously. Thank you very much to committee members. Thank you to all the great questions. And thank you to our external liaisons. Could I get a motion to adjourn? Moved? Second. Seconded? All in favor? And that carries. Thank you very much. Thank you to the Auditor General and your team. Thank you to our liaisons joining us online. And thank you to staff as well and management for the responses. And I wish everybody a good day. Thank you. Thanks, everybody.
Thank you.
Thank you.