March 2023 Newsletter

Hello Spring Ward 6!

In this edition of the March newsletter you will learn more about the new safe and inclusive bylaw, how ENMAX sets their fee will be explained, and kids safety reminder and much more.

Bylaw Ensures Safe and Inclusive Access to City Facilities

A good City is a caring City.  A great City is also a compassionate and safe City. To succeed as a City, we need to have all members of the community participating.  Everybody, including 2SLGBTQIA+, has legislated fundamental Human Rights, as well as the freedom to flourish. This now includes safe access to public events, by way of the Bylaw recently passed by Council in response to protests against such access.  Safe access is now ensured, while the right to protest is still preserved, albeit at a prescribed distance. This new Bylaw will save significant City and Police resources which are currently being consumed by the protests.

From an economic perspective, the City of Calgary is in an international war for talent – competing with as many as 1,000 jurisdictions for skills. Our future prosperity depends on winning this battle. The people we seek to help us reach our potential share our values. I have worked with two of the largest investment funds in the world, who confirm that how we treat everybody is high on their list of criteria for investment. They recognize the double win – a robust business case coupled with a caring community of people supporting a diverse quality of life.

I believe we need to show leadership in safeguarding the rights and wellbeing of all our citizens at any events they choose to hold or attend. I support this new bylaw because I believe it does “strike a balance between respecting the right to protest, and The City providing safe and inclusive access to public services”.

The Delivery Results For Calgarians Report

The City of Calgary’s performance report is now available. You will see how tax dollars and user fees were spent in 2022, how the community is doing and more. The Delivering Results for Calgarians: 2022 Performance Report provides this information for 2022 and over the whole 2019 to 2022 service planning and budgeting cycle.

Performance measure results in 2022 improved compared to 2021. Measures performing better than anticipated increased by 7.4 per cent, and measures that did not perform as planned fell by 3.9 per cent. Approximately 88 per cent of strategies which advance service to the community have been completed or are progressing as planned. Highlights include:

• Responding to important social issues with the development of strategic teams and initiatives such as the Indigenous Relations Office and the Anti-Racism and Equity Programs, and sector-wide capacity building with the Mental Health and Addictions Strategy and the Community Safety Investment Framework.
• Advancement of affordable housing goals, including providing approximately $11 million in Housing Incentive Program grants, leveraging $55 million from the Rapid Housing Initiative, and selling nine surplus parcels through the Non-Market Land Sale. Collective initiatives have resulted in the creation of approximately 3,500 new affordable units since 2016.
• Improving public tree health with a robust tree inspection and pruning program, increasing resilience and minimizing damage from severe weather events, pests and diseases.
• Ongoing delivery of Specialized Transit to enhance mobility for Calgarians with disabilities throughout the pandemic, despite significant changes in customer demand.
• Reliably delivering safe drinking water, despite challenges like the COVID-19 pandemic; heat waves; lower than average river flows; extended cold weather events; and taste and odour issues.
• Delivering waste, recycling and disposal services while minimizing health and safety risks for our customers and employees. This included offering financial relief to customers, by holding residential cart rates and landfill tipping fees at 2019 levels through 2022.
• Distribution of $179 million of prevention investments to 194 organizations to support and build capacity for community organizations. These investments included Family & Community Support Services; Crime Prevention Investment Plan; Community Safety Investment Framework; Emergency Resiliency Fund; Mental Health and Addictions; and the Capacity-Building and Emerging Issues Fund.
• Delivering of the Tenant Relief Program during the pandemic to provide relief to tenants and landlords. The program was crucial in providing empathy, support, and preserving relationships, while supporting economic vibrancy throughout the pandemic.
• Increasing security controls and an elevated response to security incidents, particularly during the pandemic, demonstrating our commitment to keeping people, information, and assets safe and secure.
• Enabling technology solutions and implementing thousands of data changes to the human resource, financial, and supply chain systems during our organization realignment.
• Maintaining our AA+ and AA credit ratings (with S&P Global Ratings and DBRS Morningstar respectively) throughout the downturn and pandemic, through prudent fiscal management, debt and reserve management practices.
• Providing tax relief for Calgarians, including the Phased Tax Program; re-opening grants; hailstorm deferrals; hotel/motel deferrals; and the Property Tax Assistance Program. Indirect tax relief was also provided from the removal of Tax Instalment Payment Plan (TIPP) fees.

Read about hundreds of accomplishments by downloading the report at http://www.calgary.ca/performance.

ENMAX Fees On City of Calgary Billing Explained

The Government of Alberta has brought in a temporary price ceiling for the Regulated Rate Option (RRO). Customers on the RRO will not pay more than 13.5 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh) on their bill for electricity usage between January 1 and March 31, 2023. Any costs above this rate ceiling are being deferred and repaid by RRO customers over a 21-month period between April 2023 and December 2024.

For reference, the actual ENMAX January RRO rate approved by the Alberta Utilities Commission is 29.1 cents per kWh, an amount 15.6 cents per kWh higher than the ceiling rate, and 13.2 cents per kWh (83%) higher than the RRO was a year ago in January 2022 (15.9 cents per kWh).

All electricity customers in Calgary - regardless of retailer - see the LAF collected on their bill, and the calculation of this fee changes monthly based on the Calgary RRO price for electricity.

What might be new information for some is that, according to ENMAX’s 2017 agreement with the City of Calgary, the LAF for January, February, and March 2023 will continue to be calculated based off of the actual RRO (29.1 cents per kWh in January) and not the ceiling amount that customers will see on their bills. As such, the LAF paid by all Calgary electricity customers (regardless of retailer) will be increasing materially for January usage.   

The Local Access Fee is set by the City of Calgary, appears as a line item on ENMAX bills, is collected by ENMAX Power (via retailers), and is remitted directly to the City on a monthly basis. It is prescribed to be 11.11% of the “distribution revenue” where that revenue is the sum of ENMAX’s regulated delivery rate and the floating monthly electric Regulated Rate Option (RRO) rate. That 11.11% has not changed since 1997, and the current agreement between ENMAX and the City says that it will not change until at least 2037. In relative terms, the LAF has not and does not change.

 What changes is the RRO. Every month the RRO is re-calculated, and so every month the absolute value of the LAF is recalculated accordingly. In November the RRO was 18.245 cents per kWh. In December it is 22.133 cents per kWh. 11.11% of those numbers is, obviously, two different numbers. Has the LAF rate increased in December? No, but the amount it is calculated off of has. A simple illustration would be to consider the GST. If you buy a $10 item one week your 5% GST on that item is 50 cents. If some particularly bad inflation hits and next week that item is $20, a 5% GST works out to $1. The GST rate has not increased, but the *amount* of GST you actually  pay has. That is the same as what is happening with the LAF on RRO electricity.

 For the 75% of Calgarians on a fixed electric rate, the next logical question would be “Why am I paying based on the RRO when I made the decision not to be exposed to that rate’s fluctuations?” The answer is that the LAF contract makes ENMAX Power responsible for calculating and collecting the RRO for the City, and ENMAX Power does not have visibility into what an individual customer is paying their retailer for electricity, so they use the only publicly available mass market electricity rate: the RRO.

Safety Reminders For Kids

There have been incidents of strangers approaching children in our communities. This is a gentle reminder to have a discussion with your children on how to stay safe.

1. Walk with others and use the buddy system. There is greater security in numbers.

2. Stay at an arm's reach or more, away from strangers.

3. If someone is following you on foot or in a car, go to a place where other people are present. Do not try to hide.

4. If someone in a car should stop and ask for help or directions, do not go near the car.

5. No one should ask you to help look for a lost item. If a stranger asks you to help them look for something, run to a safe place.

6. Never go anywhere with someone you do not know (neither in a car, nor on foot).

7. Never take anything from strangers.

8. Inform your parents or another trusted adult about any encounter with a stranger as soon as possible.

56^th Pathway and River Cleanup

Calgary Parks is preparing to host the 56^th Pathway and River Cleanup  this coming May 5^th to 7^th.  This event sees volunteers throughout the City helping to keep our pathways and riverfronts clean. To register for a designated route click here.  Registration is open until March 31^st.

For citizens who do not want to participate in the event but still show pride in their parks, our TLC Cleanup Kits will soon be available for pickup at the Inglewood Bird Sanctuary.  We can also arrange to send larger quantities of the kits to a drop off location desired in the community (e.g. a Community Association).

Street Light Outages

How can we report street light outages and other related street light information?

There are two ways anyone can report street light outages:

• To 311 directly via the “Street Light Maintenance” service request
• Logging it into the outage map

What was the response time in 2022 to fix a street light?

The average response time is currently 34 days. The average response time since 2018 has been around 22 days, with 2022 being an outlier due to supply chain issues, staff issues and a service provider change. The service target is 30 days and The City is expecting to work through the current backlog by the end of Q2 2023.

In January there were limited crews working due to a Covid outbreak staff experienced causing delays. Our supply of luminaries ran out in February 2022 and new supply did not arrive until April 2022. There were similar issues with steel poles in early 2022 causing additional delays.

ENMAX Power Services Corporation (EPSC) served The City of Calgary with notice of the conclusion of their contract overseeing the maintenance of The City’s street lighting infrastructure on March 18, 2022. EPSC, and its predecessors, have conducted the maintenance of The City’s street lighting infrastructure ever since the first street light was installed over 130 years ago. This cancellation of service has likely contributed to work delays. ENMAX had historical knowledge and work practices built into their operations and The City has been training the new service provider on these practices as they transition into this role. During the transition, ENMAX’s experienced street light staff were redeployed to other areas within ENMAX Power. In some instances, this left a smaller pool of experienced staff available for the maintenance of The City’s street lighting.

Who is the new street light service provider?

On December 1, 2022, Iconic Power Systems became the sole provider of The City’s street light maintenance services. Iconic Power and EPSC began transitioning the street light service November 1, 2022. While some response delays are expected while the service transitions, it is expected service will be restored to the 30-day service target by the end of Q2 2023.

Who is responsible for streetlights not maintained by the City of Calgary?

1. Street lights in back lanes – please contact Enmax directly.

2. Street lights on Deerfoot Trail (provincially maintained):

• North of Stoney Trail South, please contact Carmacks.
• South of Stoney Trail South, please contact Chinook Operations.

3. Street lights on Stoney Trail (provincially maintained): • North (16 Avenue N.W. to 17 Avenue S.E.), please contact Carmacks.

• South (Macleod Trail east to 17 Avenue S.E.), please, contact Chinook Operations.
• South (Macleod Trail west to Glenmore Trail), please contact AHSL.

Keeping Storm Drains Clear This Spring

Storm drains are a part of Calgary's stormwater system. There are about 60,000 storm drains in Calgary working to capture water and melting snow off sidewalks, streets and roads.

• Keep your storm drains free and clear of snow, leaves and debris
  If it's safe and possible to do, remove debris or snow blocking the drain. Create a channel, if need be, to help water flow. 
• Pooled water on your street
  In communities built after 1990, The City installs devices in the storm drain to control how fast water flows into the system.  During and after a rainfall event, these devices allow water to pool on the road (usually in a depression or low spot, called a Trap Low), until the stormwater system can accept the extra water.
• Take a picture
  If the storm drain remains submerged for more than 90 minutes or you cannot safely clear ice and snow away, take a photo and submit it via the 311 App or a web request.  Attaching a photo goes a long way in helping our crews respond on a priority basis.

Green Calgary Rain Barrel Sales

With changing weather patterns in Calgary, capturing rainwater can help you, and our community, build resiliency during times of hot and dry weather. Rain barrels also help to keep water on your property, so less dirt and contaminants wash into the rivers. Made locally with recycled material, Green Calgary rain barrels can be used to water trees, shrubs, lawns and flowers. Rain barrels are $78 for a limited time with pick-up and delivery options available.

Visit one of Green Calgary's rain barrel sales events between 10 a.m. and 2 p.m. to yours:

• Saturday, April 29 – IKEA Calgary
• Saturday, May 13 – The Genesis Centre
• Saturday, June 3 – Calgary Horticultural Society
• Saturday, June 10 – Vivo for Healthier Generations

Check greencalgary.org for details on all sales event dates and locations. Join the thousands of Calgarians already using rain barrels. Pre-order yours at greencalgary.org, starting April 1, 2023.

Community Association

March is Community Association Awareness Month. Ward 6 is home to 12 incredible Community Associations that are essential in helping create a sense of community in our area. These volunteers are the ones that devote countless hours to supporting our communities with programs, events, safety and development.

On behalf of the Ward 6 office, we would like to thank all our Community Association for all their hard work. It is because of your efforts that Ward 6 is a remarkable place to live. It truly is a pleasure to work alongside you.

Join your Community Association today by purchasing a membership, volunteer or reach out to thank them for all their efforts.

• Coach Hill/Patterson Heights (CHPH)- www.chph.ca

• Discovery Ridge- www.discoveryridge.com

• Glamorgan- www.myglamorgan.ca

• Glenbrook- https://glenbrook.community/

• Glendale- www.myglendale.ca

• Signal Hill- www.shca.ca

• Springbank Hill- www.springbankhill.org

• Spruce Cliff - https://sprucecliff.org/

• Strathcona/Christie/Aspen (SCA)- www.scacalgary.ca

• Westgate- www.westgatecommunity.ca

• Wildwood- www.mywildwood.ca

• West Springs/Cougar Ridge (WSCR)- www.wscr.ca