The committee met at 9:02 a.m.

[J. Routledge in the chair.]

J. Routledge (Chair): Good morning, everybody. We’re here today to review the budgets of the statutory officers.

I’d like to begin by acknowledging that I’m speaking to you from the unceded traditional territory of the Coast Salish people, the Tsleil-Waututh, the Squamish and the Musqueam people.

I’d like to welcome the Police Complaint Commissioner, the Office of the Police Complaint Commissioner.

First of all, I want to introduce the committee to you. The Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services is Megan Dykeman, representing Langley East; Pam Alexis, representing Abbotsford-Mission; Lorne Doerkson, representing Cariboo-Chilcotin; Greg Kyllo, representing Shuswap; Ben Stewart, who is also the Deputy Chair, representing Kelowna West; Mike Starchuk, representing Surrey-Cloverdale; Grace Lore, representing Victoria–Beacon Hill; and Harwinder Sandhu, representing Vernon-Monashee.

Welcome, and over to you, Commissioner.

Review of Statutory Officers

OFFICE OF THE POLICE
COMPLAINT COMMISSIONER

C. Pecknold: Good morning, everyone.

If I may, I would also like to acknowledge that I’m appearing before you on the unceded traditional territory of the Lək̓ʷəŋin̓əŋ-speaking peoples, the Songhees and the Esquimalt First Nations.

With me virtually are deputy commissioner Andrea Spindler; executive director Dave Van Swieten, from our corporate shared services, whom you’ve met previously; and Amie Foster, who’s our executive director of our business operations.

I am going to take you through our submissions and identify our requests and the drivers for those requests. Of course, I anticipate that I will answer any questions you may have. But before I do, I thought you might wish to hear a little bit more about what we do, to give you some context of our budget request.

[9:05 a.m.]

A few points. First, we administer an administrative discipline regime with respect to the conduct of municipal police officers. This regime does not apply to the RCMP. We have no jurisdiction with respect to the RCMP. They’re overseen by a federal complaints review commission.

We are not an investigative agency. We do not conduct investigations. We oversee investigations that are conducted by the police themselves, and we provide oversight and monitor those investigations to make sure that they’re thorough and complete.

We also do not make specific decisions about whether misconduct has occurred or not. Rather, we oversee a process of, as I’ve said, investigations, but also a process of adjudications. In the first instance, decisions about whether an officer may or may not have committed misconduct are made by senior police officers sitting as discipline authorities, or, if necessary, through various processes, it may be referred to adjudicative review. Those adjudicative reviews occur by retired judges and are arms length from our organization.

We’ve been described by the courts, essentially, as a gatekeeper or supervisor over the proceedings. So we monitor, oversee, ensure the thoroughness of the proceedings and, essentially, as the courts have described, open the various gates for the matter to proceed.

We have broad obligations to the public to inform, advise and educate the public and assist the parties through these processes. I’d also note that because the overall purpose of the administrative regime of the Police Act, part 11, is to correct, educate and prevent police misconduct, there are significant requirements of confidentiality with respect to the proceedings.

This requires, as you can imagine, a careful balance between the rights of complainants — persons who are complaining about police conduct — and the rights of those officers. While only a small fraction of the day-to-day interactions between the public and the police come to our attention, there is a need that has been identified by a prior special committee of the Legislature for us to improve our accessibility.

Improving accessibility, of course, is a balance between the fairness to all the parties — but to ensure that those who are, perhaps, in the public with a power imbalance, or perhaps suffering from mental health or addiction, have reasonable access to the police complaints process. As I’ve said, the courts have recognized that that’s a balance.

With respect to our specific request, I’d like to acknowledge at the outset that a number of these external drivers have come together more or less contemporaneously. This has required us to advance what is, I acknowledge, a significant budgetary request to you. But because these matters are external and beyond our control, we find ourselves in a position of having to go through some significant growth in the coming years at perhaps what might be described as the least opportune time to do so — i.e., in the middle of a global pandemic. I’ll describe some of those drivers in more detail.

You did hear from my colleagues yesterday about the case-tracking system. We provided you with a presentation. I don’t intend to go into that in my presentation but, of course, will answer any further questions that may have arisen for you.

We also have existing mandatory obligations under the act that are related to the adjudicative reviews that are referred to. As I noted, in 2019, a special committee of the Legislature reviewed the police complaint process and, in late 2019, submitted a report on that review. That report outlined a number of recommendations, some of which were directed at government, with respect to legislative change; some of which were directed at our office, primarily around our need to increase our accessibility, as I’ve described earlier.

[9:10 a.m.]

Finally, as you may be aware, the city of Surrey has decided to transition to a municipal police service. This is one of the most significant transitions of a policing model that I’m aware of in the country and probably the largest RCMP detachment ever to transition to a municipal police service. As a consequence, there have been some automatic occurrences with respect to our jurisdiction as a result of the appointment of that board — of the police board, I should say — and of the pending hiring of police officers.

The funding request for fiscal year ’21-22 is for an overall increase of $1.8 million in operating and $390,000 in capital funding. That comprises an increase of $113,000 in operating and $4,000 in capital to cover inflationary pressures in known increments. This is primarily related to salary increments.

As we presented to you yesterday, our part of the case-tracking system is $234,000 operating and $274,000 capital funding toward the joint initiative by four independent offices of the Legislature.

Overall, a further increase of $1.4 million operating and $112,000 capital funding to support the transition oversight responsibilities related to Surrey’s establishment of a municipal police services.

And finally, in order to move toward implementation of some of the recommendation of the special committee, we’re seeking some funding in the order of $35,000 for outreach and education as part of the mandate for the Police Act.

In terms of this existing fiscal year, as outlined in our request — I’ll speak to it a little bit more — we find our­selves with a pressure in terms of our adjudicative funding. You’ll be aware that that adjudicative funding, in the past, has fluctuated depending on a number of drivers, which I can talk about a little bit more. That amount, at this point, is estimated to be around $400,000.

Moving to the outreach and education, as I’ve said, in 2019, the Legislature’s Special Committee to Review the Police Complaint Process made several recommendations regarding the need to increase capacity to provide access to the complaint process for Indigenous and newcomer communities. The OPCC, through our service plan, committed to increasing our cultural competency resources and expertise to better serve these communities. As a result, we’re seeking new investments in light of those special committee recommendations.

Since 2011, adjudicative costs have exceeded the initial approved dedicated funding in all but two years. Previous advice from this committee has been to request access to contingency funding in-year when our statutory obligations require additional adjudicative funding. Consistent with this direction, we have identified the need for access to contingency funding within our dedicated adjudicative funding envelope, and our current estimates are about $400,000 a year.

The Police Act defines the circumstances where the goals of public accountability are met through the appointment of retired judges. Those retired judges are appointed upon recommendation of the Associate Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. They adjudicate matters of misconduct, as I spoke about earlier, and these adjudications occur at arm’s length from us. They are and can be legally complex, and the preponderance of cases are non-discretionary.

In addition, the OPCC responds to legal challenges brought to the courts through judicial review. Those happen with regularity. Those are certainly…. Access to the courts is a right for individuals, both complainants and respondent officers, and those petitions can cover a number of years, and they can have impacts on the budget in any given fiscal year depending on the course of the proceedings.

Investigations and, of course, adjudications that may result are driven by external complaints from the public or by police-identified allegations of misconduct. In that regard, I would note that in 2019-20, we saw about a 10 percent increase in complaints from the public and a 23 percent increase in orders for investigation.

[9:15 a.m.]

These, of course, are variable on external factors. We’ve provided you with some statistics on our stats in the first three quarters of this fiscal year, and there have been some fluctuations in terms of those inputs. Of course, they’re a bit of a lagging indicator, because it takes a number of months and sometimes years for complaints and adjudications to navigate through the various procedures, and therefore, the predictability of what fiscal year those matters might come together is difficult.

I think you wouldn’t be surprised to know that the pandemic has also added some pretty unprecedented challenges for our office, just like the rest of government and government agencies and provincial agencies. Our challenges have been with respect to arranging suitable facilities for what are publicly accessible proceedings and hearings, establishing health and safety protocols and other associated activities. This has added complexity, cost and delay.

We’ve also had to navigate, as all British Columbians and all Canadians have, the public health orders and restrictions that have delayed planned proceedings and forced us to seek other locations or otherwise deal with the matters. As just a small example, we’ve had to look for opportunities to use technology, where appropriate.

We’ve also looked for opportunities to comply with the requirements of the legislation with respect to these publicly accessible proceedings and fulfil the objectives of the legislation while keeping everyone safe. I would say that it has posed a very significant challenge for us.

We have taken all the steps we believe we’ve been able to, internally, within our operational budget, with respect to these adjudicative matters. We don’t have a lot of slack within the budget to do that, mostly, of course, because we are highly dependent on the timelines and requirements of the Police Act that require us to navigate through matters according to some very strict and required mandatory timelines.

One small example of the challenge with space is that the courthouses which were previously available to us for the purpose of publicly accessible hearings were no longer available to us as a result of COVID, and we had to look for alternative sites. There were also costs associated with having those sites professionally assessed for health and safety, consistent with WorkSafeBC guidelines and consistent with the public health orders.

Now I’ll speak a little bit, if I could, about the Surrey police transition. As you know, in November 2018, the city of Surrey municipal council voted to terminate its RCMP municipal policing agreement with the province of British Columbia and move towards the creation of a municipal police department. The new department falls under OPCC jurisdiction, and as I’ve explained, automatically by operation of the Police Act, it’s non-discretionary.

In preparation for these oversight responsibilities, which we have estimated, to the best of our ability at this point, at about 45 percent over the next three years, we’ve been engaged in a comprehensive planning exercise. We identified this to the committee last budget process — that we were going to be planning for this — and a notional amount of funding was given to us to plan for this matter.

I think it’s fair to say that it has been somewhat of a moving target, but it’s clear now, with the appointment of the board and with the appointment of senior police officers, that the matter is proceeding, and we are monitoring closely in terms of the timeline of those proceedings.

I should note, also, that regardless of how timely or not the service stands up, there is a pretty significant ramp-up time for our processes to be able to meet that demand. We do not have the ability to turn away matters at the door. If they meet the definition of admissibility for the Police Act, we must proceed with them.

[9:20 a.m.]

But the hiring of new staff, the training of new staff, the setting up of the appropriate systems to deal with the volume takes significant lead time and ramp-up time that we’re going to need to engage in, in the next fiscal year, robustly and thoroughly. You’ll be aware that the transition committee for the service was established and made certain recommendations. In light of that, we’re moving forward with that budget request.

As I’ve noted, we’ve gone through a number of projections and analysis internally. We’re happy to answer some questions. I should point out, of course, that the administrative process that we oversee differs substantially from the one that the RCMP civilian review commission oversees, so it is not an automatic apples-to-apples comparison in terms of their process and our process. Our best guide, in terms of the future workload, has been with respect to a similar-sized police organization. That would be the Vancouver police department, which represents, by far, the bulk of our work. That’s just by virtue of the size of the organization.

One of the matters that I would note is that through the statutory audit and the review of the special committee that occurred in 2019, the audit identified our need to continue to work on timeliness, both timeliness of investigations and timeliness of processes. There continues to be some challenges brought on by the complexity of the legislation. Those, of course, have been exacerbated by the global pandemic. As a result, as we plan for assuming the responsibilities with respect to Surrey, we want to spend some time thinking about how we can improve that timeliness but also how we can improve and expand upon our complaint resolution processes to improve the outcomes for all parties — police officers and public alike.

We did look very carefully at our physical footprint. You won’t be surprised to know that the perspective and orientation, with respect to our need for facilities and a physical footprint, has evolved somewhat, given the global pandemic and the amount of people, the bulk of our staff, working remotely. Given that the largest two police services will reside within the Lower Mainland, we do believe that we will require some physical presence for outreach and potentially to create some dedicated space for adjudications. But we will return to the committee in the fall of next year with a more robust business case on that matter. So there is no request in next year’s budget with respect to capital funding for facilities within the Lower Mainland.

I should note, of course, though, that notwithstanding us working remotely, we are in a very tight physical footprint here, shared with the other offices — the Ombuds­person, the Merit Commissioner and the Privacy Commissioner — and we have no ability, in this building, to expand beyond our present footprint.

I think I would note, just finally, in closing, that in terms of managing the challenges that we’ve experienced in the pandemic…. Again, I acknowledge they are not unique to our organization. They have certainly impacted our planning and our understanding of the timelines and capacity that we will have to meet the requirements that will come to us as a result of the transition of the municipality of Surrey. We’ve also incorporated, within our service plan, a number of initiatives we would like to achieve, many of which were borne out of the recommendations of the special committee.

[9:25 a.m.]

Those have been somewhat delayed and impacted by the requirements that we were engaged in to respond to the impact of the pandemic. We hope to be able to continue those, not the least of which is to increase and improve our outreach and accessibility, most especially in light of the diverse nature of the city of Surrey and the community and the growing nature of it. It’s, in our view, imperative.

I think I’ll pause there and welcome all your questions.

J. Routledge (Chair): Thank you, Commissioner. I think we probably will have a number of questions.

The first one is from MLA Doerkson.

L. Doerkson: Good morning, Madam Chair. Thank you very much.

Clayton, I wondered if you could just, for my benefit, put perspective on the size of the Surrey department. I’m just looking at page 21. It looks like almost a 50 percent ask. Now, I know that it looks like about $225,000 of that will be, probably, for the Case Tracker System, but it is a big ask.

I wonder if you can put it into perspective with what you’re currently looking after.

C. Pecknold: Yes, I can help you with that. We did provide some statistical information within our package and with our annual report that’ll show you the number of officers. The challenge with projecting with Surrey is, as I’ve talked about earlier, that it’s not an apples-and-apples comparison. The study of the police services branch of the Ministry of Public Safety examines police resources across the province and publishes statistics with respect to that.

The statistics with respect to an RCMP detachment versus a municipal police department are not always comparable. For example, the RCMP have a significant amount of centralized services. Now, as the city transitions towards a Surrey municipal police service, we looked at their population, and then we looked at a comparative in Vancouver, and then estimated, based on our inputs. Assuming, of course, a fully ramped-up Surrey municipal police force with the same ratio of police officers to population that the city of Vancouver has, we then did, essentially, an analysis of their numbers — the expected inputs, complaints, reports to our office — and made an extrapolation of how many inputs we would get based on that.

In other words, we didn’t look at the existing Surrey complement of police officers. We looked at what a municipal model would look like, given the size of Surrey and given our inputs from the city of Vancouver.

Now, if you want some specific numbers, I could invite the deputy commissioner to give you some numbers about what we get in terms of the Vancouver police department.

J. Routledge (Chair): Would that be helpful?

L. Doerkson: Yeah, that would be interesting, for sure.

A. Spindler: Hi, everyone. When we’re looking at complaints specifically from the Vancouver police department, they do…. When you see on page 5 and 6 of the report here, you’ll see that we opened up 537 complaints last year. When you look at what factor of that was from the Vancouver police department, 310 of that came from the Vancouver police department. So quite a significant proportion comes from a single police agency.

Then when you look at the number of ordered investigations…. Those are in addition to the complaints we receive. Fifty of those ordered investigations, where a commissioner initiates an investigation, out of those 97 originate from a single police agency. You can see that Vancouver, being the largest police agency, is a significant driver of a lot of our work.

We’ve anticipated that with Surrey transitioning, they also will be a significant driver towards our work.

L. Doerkson: Can I have one more question, Madam Chair?

J. Routledge (Chair): Yes, please.

[9:30 a.m.]

L. Doerkson: The other question is to, I guess, our lodging there. It sounds like we’re at capacity, and I’m just wondering how long it will be before that becomes a crisis situation. And have you thought about any potential other properties, etc., if that one won’t handle any more people?

C. Pecknold: In terms of the existing facility here, we have been aware of our need for potential expansion on the longer horizon. Now, the impact of the Surrey growth has advanced that need — and the impact of the pandemic — in terms of our uncertainty with respect to access to the courts for adjudicative hearings.

Just to give you some more information about adjudicative hearings, there are two types. There’s something called a review on the record, and then there’s a public hearing. Now, in a public hearing, there’s a requirement to call witnesses. There’s a requirement for people to be in the same room that the matter’s adjudicated. Of course, you can imagine, with the public health orders, how difficult that is to achieve.

The courts were available to us at no cost, and of course, our incidence of or our frequency of public hearings was low. When you consider that they may occur more frequently just by virtue of volume in the future, and given the gap that was identified with the inaccessibility of the courthouse, we determined that in examining a future physical location, it would be a good idea to consider having some multiple-use space, which could be used for these hearings and potentially would be accessible to the police agencies for their own discipline proceedings. So that has advanced our organization’s need.

I also would suggest that our view is that, given our need to have a significant or improved outreach capacity, we should have a physical presence of some sort in the Lower Mainland. Had the pandemic not occurred, we would have been advancing to you a more robust plan, with a timeline and a space requirement well analyzed. We have done some preliminary work, but given that we’re not sure what portion of our workplace will continue to work remotely, it was decided to do some further planning as we move, hopefully, through this year to move out of this pandemic.

In summary, though, I would say that it’s our view that we will require some physical locale within the Lower Mainland, but we would be looking for the most cost-effective and convenient location.

L. Doerkson: Thank you to the delegation.

J. Routledge (Chair): We have a bit of a speaker’s list. Just so we all see the breadth of the questions, next is Megan Dykeman, followed by Grace Lore, followed by Mike Starchuk and then Greg Kyllo. Just keep in mind that we have until roughly 9:55.

M. Dykeman: I’ll be very brief. Thank you for the presentation. It’s an area I know very little about, so I hope that my question is applicable in the area.

I read through the report, and one of the questions that came up was related to the transition, of course, for Surrey. That is a very high price tag. What I’m wondering is in other situations…. I understand this is very rare. Is there ever a situation where the municipality has to bear some of that cost? Have they already? Is there ever a situation where, if you’re going to make a significant change, the municipality itself is responsible for covering at least a portion of the operational changes too? Because that is a significant amount of money, so I’m just curious.

I’d like to apologize up front. I’m completely not knowledgable in this area.

[9:35 a.m.]

C. Pecknold: Thank you very much. It’s actually an excellent question. The reality is that the way that the process works is that there are obligations on the police service itself. They investigate the matters. They have professional standards officers who investigate these matters. Then their senior officers will sit as what’s referred to as discipline authorities. Now, we sit and oversee that process and ensure that it’s thorough, but we don’t manage the process. In some ways, we’re a very interested observer to those processes.

I think what the municipalities would say is that they’re already bearing a significant amount of cost. What they’re bearing is the cost of investigating these matters and adjudicating them in the first instance. There’s one provision in the Police Act that if a matter goes to mediation, they must bear the cost of the mediation. However, there is no other mechanism for us to recover costs. I think, in fairness to the local governments, they would say that they are bearing the costs, because they investigate these matters and they must appoint investigators. So in that sense, there’s a shared cost.

M. Dykeman: So there wouldn’t be a mechanism in place to, with the $1.8 million…? Sorry, the transition money that’s going to increase the capacity. There wouldn’t be a mechanism to recuperate that from a municipality. It would just be part of the responsibility of the office to transition in order to provide these services?

C. Pecknold: There’s no mechanism for our office to recover any of those moneys, and there’s no mechanism within our act. Whether there’d be a mechanism for government to do that, I would leave to them, but there is no mechanism for our office to do it.

M. Dykeman: Okay. And I misspoke. I had said 1.8; it was 1.46. Thank you for answering that and for providing some background for me.

G. Lore: I really appreciate the presentation and the submission. Like my colleagues, my main question was around that increase for Surrey and just the size of that 45 percent — but, Deputy Commissioner, you really helped provide that in context there. I appreciate the combination of your efforts in answering that.

The second question I had was different and about what I see as quite a small dollar amount. I just wonder if you could speak more to that $35,000 for outreach and education. It seems to me — with objectives around cultural competencies, outreach, connections and raising awareness — a very small amount, given the range of folks you’re hoping to reach in different communities.

C. Pecknold: Thank you for the question. To be frank, we did think about a larger amount on that, but recognizing that the most significant need was in terms of our immediate human resource needs, we pushed some of the potential requests for that into outer years. We’re a small office. We’re about 20 people. Just simply hiring the people we need — to train the people we need, to make sure our systems are in place and rightly for Surrey — is going to take up pretty well all the slack in our resources while continuing to maintain operations.

To fund in the first year and to undertake a major outreach activity was probably beyond our immediate capacity, and we would see ramping that up in out-years. We also note that in the city of Surrey, the municipal police board is going to be doing its own engagement as it creates the new service. Although we won’t necessarily be collaborating with that, we plan to monitor very carefully the results of that so that we can tailor our own outreach activities to what they learn. There’s a certain amount of, I think, synergy in doing that.

To be frank, it was just a choice of what we can take on in the first year and what our most immediate priority is. Our immediate priority is to ramp up the training and the capacity of our analysts and our other training capacity to make sure we’re ready to take on these mandatory obligations. It’s not to diminish the importance of outreach — not at all. It’s simply a reality of our capacity.

G. Lore: Thank you for that. That offers quite a bit of clarity. I’m hearing you say that that $35,000 is to kind of start to get the wheels moving but isn’t encompassing what the vision or need is of that broader outreach. I’m glad to hear that. It seems to me extremely relevant that folks know who you are, particularly those most marginalized or disconnected from these kinds of services.

[9:40 a.m.]

I appreciate the issue of expansion. I just wonder if also on your mind are the potential downstream costs of effective outreach. If you’re able to ensure that more folks know about you and the role, that may in fact increase complaints, etc.

C. Pecknold: Yeah, that’s an excellent point, MLA Lore. The reality is we don’t know what, perhaps, the dark figure is, or the gap is, between unknown areas of concern. For example, if there are language barriers to people accessing our system and we work, as we wish to, to bring down those barriers, what is the figure of potential complaints that will come our way? We don’t know that figure. We’re certainly alive to it.

Part of our growth plan is to improve our data capacity, our data analytics capacity, so we can get a better understanding of who’s accessing our services and who may need it in the future. It’s certainly something that we’re aware of, but it’s a bit of an unknown figure at this point.

J. Routledge (Chair): Thank you. Our next question is from MLA Starchuk.

M. Starchuk: Madam Chair, we’re going to have to put an “s” on that “question” word.

Thank you, Commissioner Pecknold, for your presentation. As a person who lives in Surrey, I have been following this with great depth. I’m very surprised at some of the things that I’ve seen over the last couple of days in the report. One goes around the oversight and what MLA Lore had just talked about, about getting out in front of the curve with education, because Surrey is a very, very diverse city, and there are many pockets within the city that change themselves. I really think that has a big part in what your office is going to be able to do.

The first question I have is around jurisdiction. There are 850 RCMP members that are here, and I don’t think we’re going to flick a switch so that tomorrow there are going to be 850 SPD people. Your report says that the RCMP are not in your jurisdiction but that the municipal police are.

My question is: during the transition period, how will these complaints be processed when you have an SPD member showing up and an RCMP member showing up, it’s midnight, and nobody can see the colour of a uniform? Or they don’t know what’s happening and they want to lay a complaint, but they don’t know what agency they’re going to lay the complaint against. How would that process take place?

C. Pecknold: That’s an excellent question. It’s actually not a question that’s unknown to us. There are a number of integrated units within the Lower Mainland that operate with municipal police officers and with RCMP officers. When there’s a municipal police officer involved, depending on the circumstances, we automatically have jurisdiction with respect to that municipal officer’s conduct or a complaint about that municipal officer’s conduct.

The jurisdiction follows the appointment. The minute that our officer is appointed under the Police Act, we have jurisdiction over that officer, or a member of the public can make a complaint about that officer. If there is a joint initiative and, as in your example, there’s a complaint that comes forward about the incident, we then examine the incident to see whether or not the municipally appointed officer in any way falls within our jurisdiction and oversight on that particular matter.

What I mean by that is that there has to be an allegation of misconduct. Just because the officer is present, it doesn’t mean that there’s an allegation of misconduct, and it doesn’t mean that we will be proceeding with anything. It will depend on the incident itself. But it’s not unknown to us. The integrated units…. Well, in the Lower Mainland and throughout the capital regional district, these things do come up from time to time. We try to thread through them and identify what is specific to the officer appointed under the municipal Police Act.

[9:45 a.m.]

M. Starchuk: Thank you. If I could follow up, your example is great. Also in Surrey, with SkyTrain policing, there is that integrated unit that’s there. I just wanted to make sure that there was a mechanism that was in there.

Earlier on, your number of 45 percent of the workload that comes forward is based on numbers. I think I heard the deputy commissioner say that there was a cop-to-pop analysis that was done to extrapolate the numbers that would get to that point that was there. If we take a look at cop-to-pop ratios that are there today with the RCMP, the city of Surrey is way behind on that cop-to-pop ratio. When you base your number on 45 percent, is it on your cop-to-pop or on what’s predicted from SPD, as far as staff goes?

C. Pecknold: The cop-to-pop number is not all that reliable. As I alluded to earlier, I know it’s thrown around quite a bit, but it’s difficult to compare between RCMP cop-to-pop and municipal, mainly because of those centralized services. For example, Surrey municipality pays for a lot of significant, centralized services that operate out of [audio interrupted] headquarters there in Surrey. So we don’t tend to rely on that.

Our analysis was really based on an assumption of a similar structure, model and size, given the population of Surrey and the growth projections, to Vancouver police [audio interrupted] exact, and we’re going to, obviously, be monitoring all the way through it. As part of our hiring strategy, we have phased hiring strategies throughout the fiscal year. We don’t have the capacity or tend to sort of hire everybody at once. We’ve identified and triaged what would come on in the first quarter or what would come on in future quarters, so that there’s a sort certain iterative aspect to that.

Surrey — as you well know, as a resident of Surrey — is projected to continue to grow. Growth projections: in terms of the size of that Surrey police service, I think it fluctuated somewhat and will continue to fluctuate from the original report that was prepared, I suppose, almost two years ago now.

M. Starchuk: Madam Chair, my final question or comment. The report that was given to you guys is probably almost four years old, so there’s a hope that somebody will do another analysis of what’s going on. You started off your presentation by talking about how you’ve got a budget increase at a time when COVID is there, and it’s probably not the world’s greatest timing that that’s come forward with this. I agree with you.

This is where when I take a look at the $1.4-something-million extra cost because of the SPD coming forward, I’m wondering whether or not we have to do that right now, because currently SPD has four employees. They’re all administrative staff. They’re not the ones on the street with a car. They’re not going to interact with the public in the foreseeable future, if at all.

Is there really a need at this point in time to have a budget that’s that much when, really, there are only four staff members? I don’t know what’s being laid out, what’s being professed or what’s coming forward in the next fiscal year, as far as employees becoming SPD members, but currently there are four. I’m just wondering if this is one of those things we can shelve and bring back in another year.

C. Pecknold: Certainly, I do understand that perspective. We can, perhaps, give more detail as to what’s involved in training analysts to oversee these matters, in the timeline required to train these analysts.

The Police Act, part 11, is very, very complex, as I’ve mentioned. It has all sorts of mandatory timelines that we’re required to produce. Most of our analysts, when we’re hired, come in with law degrees, and there’s an approximate two-year period for them to really come up to speed, to be able to fully oversee these matters.

Our planning with respect to the hiring that we require in the next year is with respect to hiring, recruiting and training analysts, with respect to the capacity to train them and with respect to the needs of early complaint resolution officers and training, and it is a lag.

[9:50 a.m.]

We were anticipating a bulk, but by the time the bulk came and all of those officers were present in Surrey, we would not have the time to ramp up to be able to receive it. There’s a training process. There’s an early process that’s required to bring our people up to speed. We can’t simply hire people off the street and immediately put them in. There’s a period of training.

I’ll let the deputy explain a little bit more about our training processes.

A. Spindler: I’ll just take a few minutes here in relation to your question.

When we’re looking at bringing on new analysts into our office…. We do have a mix in our office, as the commissioner indicated. A majority of our analysts do have a legal background; some have a background in other areas, regulatory-type investigations; and then others have a former policing background.

The area that we occupy in overseeing police misconduct investigations is incredibly complex. The legislation is complex. The issues that come up can be complex. So there is a significant period of time for an analyst who comes in, who doesn’t know the legislation, who may not understand policing operations and tactics, use of force…. There is a significant period of time, in relation to the training of analysts, that is required.

What we’ve done is we have done a phased approach, in relation to our hiring plan, that will allow for certain resources to be in place, to be able to take on that training for those new staff members, to also bring on and push other programs to the forefront, such as alternative dispute resolution — so broadening that program area. Then we can be responsive in dealing with less serious types of complaints — and really driving at efficiencies that way — and having that resource broadened and brought up to speed. Also, looking at…. Some of those resources tie into what Ms. Lore had brought up, around that outreach and education section, which is bringing on resources in relation to engagement and education.

So we have looked at this hiring plan that focuses in on the analysts who do sort of the day-to-day work, but it’s also more broadly connected to being able to be responsive to some of the other recommendations that flow from that special committee.

We have the day-to-day work that we have to be able to respond to and ramp up on, as the commissioner mentioned, but then there’s also the other side of putting those resources in place so we can build those programs that we need to be responsive to the communities.

I hope that answers your question.

M. Starchuk: I’m a little stuck. There’s not going to be 800 members in this next fiscal year. It will probably be four years or so before they do that migration. If this is a step that’s coming forward and this is a ramp-up, do we expect to see next year an additional $1.5 and then the year after that as they grow? Because even if they did it in quarters as a hire, your work would fluctuate in that same ratio, as far as I see. If they hire 200 in the next fiscal year, that wouldn’t equal 45 percent of your workload.

I’m not sure if we’re talking about apples and oranges. I just want to be assured that when we talk about this money that comes forward for a very small amount of people that you’ll be doing with, if anybody, in the next fiscal year….

C. Pecknold: It might help, I suppose, if we explained a little bit more about our planning.

We looked at what we needed in terms of on-the-ground resources, as the deputy identified. The immediate on-the-ground resource is the analysts that are required to oversee the investigations. That involves a number of steps. They would be reviewing transcripts. They would be reviewing the investigative materials. They’re liaising with the officers. Sometimes they’re often liaising with the complainants.

[9:55 a.m.]

We recognize that we don’t know how many officers and that it’s unlikely that there’ll be a lot of on-the-ground resources in the next fiscal year. But the timeline required for us to hire, for example, in Q2 or Q3 or Q4 of next year takes into account that we would anticipate that in the following fiscal year, we’re going to see officers being hired. A collective agreement will be in place. They’ll be on the street. Albeit, it’s possible that they may be working collaboratively with RCMP officers. But the inputs will be required.

Part of that, the early hiring, is both for training and to set up the system so we are ready to receive them. We don’t have the discretion under the legislation to say: “I’m sorry. We’re not ready. We can’t take your complaint.” That’s the challenge that we have. We have to anticipate that the system needs to be ready to take on the hiring of those officers.

I recognize that the planning and the exact timeline as to when the Surrey municipal police service…. It does fluctuate. But our best estimates are based on what we are seeing now in terms of when they expect to be up and running.

J. Routledge (Chair): Okay. Thank you, Commissioner. I think we’ve got two more questioners.

I’ll move on to MLA Kyllo.

G. Kyllo: Thanks very much, Madam Chair and Commissioner Pecknold. Just wondering, and this kind of follows up on some of the questions of MLA Starchuk. That has to do with: what is your current amount of resources deployed for complaints that might have arisen today versus a complaint that might have arisen a year ago? Do you have any way of kind of determining or sharing with the committee what percentage of the overall resources are currently employed on complaints that might have happened within the last month, within the last three months, six months?

And I guess the timing…. I’m assuming that some of these complaints may have arisen a number of years ago, and they’re still actually under review. So if you could just share with us what percentage of resources are employed on complaints that might have arisen over the last year or two.

C. Pecknold: Thank you for the question. There is a requirement that complaints occur within 12 months of the occurrence, but there are provisions in the Police Act that allow for us to waive that time period, depending on what it is. Occasionally a complaint will come forward that’s very serious and that requires, in the public interest, that we waive that 12-month requirement.

Generally speaking, all our analysts are fully at capacity right now. We get weekly examination of their file load, and they’re at high capacity. I think it’s fair to say there’s been a high amount of public attention on police accountability in the last year, and as a result, we certainly have heightened awareness from members of the public as to our processes.

There’s a significant amount of time spent at the front end — talking to complainants, understanding their concerns and dealing with support agencies, non-governmental support agencies — to understand whether, in fact, we have an admissible complaint. Then those matters are processed through the timeline. Generally, the requirement is that they are investigated over a period of six months, but they’re often extended. That time is extended due to a need for a fulsome investigation.

I’ll certainly offer the deputy an opportunity to add anything she wishes to.

A. Spindler: I think that the information, if you’re looking for some numbers, would be included in the package that you would have received. If you do have our annual report, we do mention how many investigations get carried over from previous years. On page 12 of our annual report, you’ll see the number of files that we opened in the single year, how many investigations there were and then how many we carried over from the previous fiscal years — meaning ones that haven’t concluded yet and impacted our workload for that year.

[10:00 a.m.]

If you’re looking for actual metrics, if we’re looking at the annual report that we had released, for example, in addition to the 537 complaints and the 97 orders, we also carried over 191 investigations from previous fiscal years into the next fiscal year. So there is that spillover effect. We’ve got the new file loads, but then we also have the file loads from the previous fiscal years, because it does take time, depending on the complexities of the matters, matters that end up going through disciplinary-type processes. Those all take time.

G. Kyllo: Thank you, and I appreciate that. The information, or what I was trying to suss out, was more with respect to, I think, Commissioner Pecknold’s comment in that the resources that are required on complaints are kind of front-end-loaded. Following up on MLA Starchuk’s question, if only 25 percent of Surrey police officers are actually employed in the first fiscal…. We’ve yet to have any determination on when that may be. Just trying to have a look at: would the workload be…? On month 1, on day 1, there are very limited complaints that are coming through. I’m just trying to have an idea of when the bulk of the work would actually happen.

I’ve got a number of questions with respect to the Case Tracker System. I think, in light of timing, maybe I’ll just list out the questions, if I may, and then provide an opportunity for the commissioner to provide that at a later date.

On the number of complaints that are actually handled or run through the actual system, I’m assuming that when a complaint is lodged, not in all instances is there a follow-up. But just the sheer number of complaints that are actually utilized for the system, the number of staff persons that are actually utilizing the system, the [audio interrupted] with the current Case Tracker System. What is your annual budget that you allocate towards the existing system that’s in place? Then, also, what anticipated savings might there be, both in gross dollars and in actual efficiencies of staff, with the new Case Tracker System?

It’s interesting. You’re actually looking for an additional $234,000 increase in operating, over and above what your current allocation had been. From that, it does not appear that there are going to be a lot of efficiencies in at least the first or second year.

Also, if you could just provide what the risks are of the existing system. Yesterday, during the presentation, you certainly provided some of the benefits that might be available, but I didn’t really hear a lot spoken about the current risks with the existing system. Then also, are there any risks or any potential concerns you may have with respect to a new system? I know, just with past business experience, IT systems are fraught with all kinds of challenges. The implementation of new programming is way more difficult than anybody ever anticipates, and those budgets seem to grow.

Also, just one other question — to ask Commissioner Pecknold if he’s actually spoken to the lead manager or the gal that’s in charge and responsible for managing the current IT. I’m just wondering if she had actually made a presentation to your group with respect to what her thoughts are on the best path forward with respect to either maintaining or maybe implementing some improvements to the existing system versus the new $2.3 billion or $2.6 billion program.

Thank you very much.

C. Pecknold: Thank you. In terms of process, I take it that we would follow up on the number of questions in writing, if you like. But on the last question, perhaps I’ll ask Mr. Van Swieten to answer that.

J. Routledge (Chair): Yes, please go ahead.

D. Van Swieten: Sure, and maybe MLA Kyllo can expand a bit for me. You were speaking about talking to an existing IT manager. Could you clarify that for me?

G. Kyllo: Yes. Yesterday, during the presentation, there was indication that there was one senior IT manager that has responsibility for maintaining the existing system. I’m just wondering, from that individual’s perspective, what her particular thoughts were with respect to, I guess, the robustness of the current system, the ability to make some incremental improvements to that system versus throwing it all away and starting with a brand-new system that is yet to be developed.

[10:05 a.m.]

D. Van Swieten: Thanks for the clarity. That helps.

The existing resource is a business analyst for us, and her perspective on it is that with the new system, we’re not actually throwing away anything we’ve developed. We’re incorporating it into the new system. She’s acknowledged that the existing system is at the end of its useful life. Sometimes people from the program areas we support will approach her and say, “Hey, we’d really like to do this,” and there’s just no way to do that. There’s a lot of: “If you do a manual workaround like this, you can get it to work.” Overall, she’s in favour of replacement of the system.

J. Routledge (Chair): Okay. If I understand you correctly, MLA Kyllo, there are a number of questions that you’ve asked for that we would get in writing for our deliberations. That’s great.

We have one more person who wants to ask questions. I do want to make an observation that we are a little bit behind time and that there are two more commissioners that we’re going to hear from today. I want to respect their time and the fact that they’re waiting.

Having said that, I think that this is a very important exchange of information and perspective, not only because of the implications of a new police force but also that we are living in very unique historic times when it comes to oversight of police. I would not want us to feel that we’re giving short change to what is an important perspective.

I’m just saying that by way of yes, we’re behind time, but this is an important conversation.

P. Alexis: I’ll be very brief. On that note, as former mayor with an RCMP detachment, I can tell you we have been readying for this moment, because there have been several perhaps unintended consequences as a result of the change. Everyone has been in some sort of preparation mode. So thank you for that comment.

I have a question regarding access and outreach. Have you considered space in the Abbotsford courthouse, which opens formally on Thursday? As Abbotsford, of course, has a municipal police force, has there been some discussion about having an increase [audio interrupted], because you’re looking for something in the Lower Mainland, in Abbotsford? That was my question.

C. Pecknold: Specific to your question on Abbotsford, no, I don’t believe we have looked at that. We’ve done what I would say is a high-level [audio interrupted] require looking across the Lower Mainland — mostly, frankly, in a central location in Burnaby or somewhere around there.

We have not looked at specific space yet. We would plan to do that this fiscal year and then come back to the committee with specificity. I think that would also allow us, hopefully, throughout the year, to get a better idea of whether there are going to be any spaces available to us — such as a courthouse — or not, or whether our exclusion from the courthouses is permanent or semi-permanent. So we haven’t, but certainly, we’ll explore all those options.

J. Routledge (Chair): Thank you. Then that draws this part of the agenda to a close. I want to thank Commissioner Pecknold and Deputy Commissioner Spindler for your time and your very enlightening presentation. Thank you very much.

Shall we take a five-minute recess to regroup?

The committee recessed from 10:09 a.m. to 10:15 a.m.

[J. Routledge in the chair.]

J. Routledge (Chair): We are reconvening this meeting of the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services to review the budgets of the statutory officers.

Again, I would like to begin this part of our agenda by acknowledging that I’m joining you from the unceded traditional territories of the Coast Salish people, the Tsleil-Waututh, the Musqueam and the Squamish Nations.

I’d like to welcome the Chief Electoral Officer and his staff who are with him to go through your budget, make your presentation and then field questions from the committee.

I will just take a minute to introduce the committee to you. We have Megan Dykeman from Langley East; Pam Alexis from Abbotsford-Mission; Lorne Doerkson from Cariboo-Chilcotin; Greg Kyllo from Shuswap; Ben Stewart, who is also the Deputy Chair, from Kelowna West; Mike Starchuk, Surrey-Cloverdale; Grace Lore, Victoria–Beacon Hill; Harwinder Sandhu, Vernon-Monashee; and I’m Janet Routledge from Burnaby North.

Over to you, Mr. Boegman.

ELECTIONS B.C.

A. Boegman: Good morning, Madam Chair, Mr. Vice-Chair and members of the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services. Thank you for the invitation to meet with you via Zoom so that we can present our budget requirements for the 2021-22 fiscal year. I’d like to also thank the Clerk of Committees and her staff for scheduling our presentation for this time period. It is much appreciated.

I’m joining you today from our office, which is located on the traditional territories of the Lək̓ʷəŋin̓əŋ-speaking people, the Esquimalt and Songhees First Nations. We acknowledge with respect their stewardship of the lands we’re on.

Also on the call this morning are my two deputies, Charles Porter, deputy chief electoral officer, electoral finance and operations, and Yvonne Koehn, deputy chief electoral officer, corporate services. Jodi Cooke, executive director of electoral finance, and Tanya Ackinclose, director of finance, are also present.

I’m always pleased when these annual meetings come around. It’s an excellent opportunity to share with members of this committee and, through you, the entire Legislative Assembly and citizens of British Columbia, the activities and highlights of my office and the way in which we use public funds to serve democracy in B.C.

Like all organizations in our province, Elections B.C. has had to adapt its operations in light of the current ongoing pandemic. Staff have been working both remotely and in person at our offices where operationally necessary. We’ve been fortunate that with the implementation of our workplace COVID-19 safety protocols, the pandemic has not materially affected our ability to continue to provide services to British Columbians.

We provided our budget document and a copy of our annual report and service plan to you last week. In those documents, we review, amongst other things, our mission and organizational values. Our mission, of course, is to serve democracy in British Columbia through the delivery of modern, accessible and trusted electoral services designed with British Columbians at the centre. Two of our core values are accountability and transparency. This meeting provides us with an opportunity to bring those elements together and put forward the budget requirements that are needed to achieve our mission in an efficient and fiscally responsible manner.

Before speaking to the numbers that comprise our budget request, I’ll make a few brief remarks on the work of Elections B.C. and our key priorities for the upcoming year. Following these comments, Yvonne and Charles will each provide additional detail on our budget submission. Yvonne will speak to the ongoing operating and capital budget requests, while Charles will address our event and public funding requirements.

[10:20 a.m.]

After the intense event delivery effort of 2020-2021, our work in ’21-22 will focus on election close-out and reporting activities. And 2021-22 will also be a time to renew our work on implementing the legislative changes enacted in the Election Amendment Act, 2019, work that had been paused this past summer as we focused on pandemic election readiness.

As I reported during meetings with the committee last year, we’ve also been working on a number of other projects, including one to better understand and effectively respond to digital threats to electoral integrity.

This past year has been one of considerable change and significant challenge for Elections B.C. We began the year focused on implementing the Election Amendment Act, 2019. This bill implemented almost all of the recommendations for legislative change we put forward in a report to the Legislative Assembly in May, 2018.

As described by the Attorney General when he introduced Bill 43 in the Legislature, “these changes represent the most significant update to election administration in British Columbia in over two decades. If passed by this House, it will greatly enhance the accessibility and service Elections B.C. provides to voters.”

The legislation was passed unanimously by the House and received royal assent November 28, 2019.

Included in the many changes were key amendments to establish a list of future voters for 16- and 17-year-olds in B.C., as well as the modernization of voting processes through the use of tabulators to count paper ballots and electronic voting books to strike off voters in real time, to facilitate absentee voting and support campaign get-out-the-vote efforts.

Elections B.C. needed 18 months to implement this legislation, and our planned work was highlighted in our April 8, 2020, committee meeting. The onset of the pandemic and the necessity of being ready for a pandemic election, given the minority government at the time, resulted in a major shift in our priorities mid-summer.

Having learned from discussions with the provincial health officer that the pandemic was likely to continue to materially impact our province through 2021, it was imperative that we re-engineer election processes such that, if necessary, an election could be administered safely for voters, political participants and Elections B.C. staff.

As we know, an election was called on September 21, with general voting day on October 24, 2020. Looking back, I can state that the 42nd provincial general election was the most challenging event Elections B.C. has ever administered. Indeed, I believe it is likely the most challenging election ever administered in B.C.’s history.

Each element of the electoral process was more complex and nuanced than before, requiring unique thinking and targeted mitigation measures. Election planning was significantly more challenging and necessitated the development of a pandemic election model that maintained the accessibility and integrity of the vote while ensuring safety for all participants.

Critical to our success was the early and ongoing consultation with public health experts, our ability to vary from legislation in response to an emergency or extra­ordinary circumstances and our ongoing statutory access to necessary funding.

Charles will provide more detail on our preparations for and delivery of the election in his comments.

Before addressing the 2021-22 budget request, I’d like to formally express my appreciation, my great appreciation, to the entire Elections B.C. team for their dedication and tremendous work in administering the election and to British Columbians for adhering to our “Vote safely” rules and exercising their democratic franchise this past fall.

I am particularly proud to report that during the election, our offices indeed passed a number of WorkSafeBC safety pandemic audits and that there were no confirmed incidents of COVID-19 transmission at voting places, district electoral offices or at our headquarters in Victoria.

Elections B.C.’s budget request consists of four elements. The first is our core services operating budget, which is the amount of funding required each year to ensure we are positioned to administer our responsibilities.

The second element is our event budget, which is one-time funding required to implement legislative changes to our mandate as well as administer any current or pending electoral events.

The third element is our capital budget, which is the funding used to make necessary capital investments, which are then amortized over three to five years and thereby paid back through our operating budget in subsequent years.

The last element is funds necessary to administer the mandatory public financing requirements of the Election Act. This is passed-through funding, with Elections B.C. receiving the funds and then distributing them to eligible political participants according to the legislated schedules.

[10:25 a.m.]

I’d like to point out that given the unscheduled nature of the last election, neither our budget requests for 2020-2021 nor the current request will include the majority of funding necessary to administer the recent provincial election. Typically, these funds are reported and requested during the budget cycle preceding a fixed-date general election. With the snap election being called this past September, the Legislature and all committees were dissolved, and Elections B.C. used its statutory spending authority, as necessary, to administer the event.

The cost of the election will be reported in my upcoming report to the Legislature, which I anticipate will be tabled this spring. At this time, we estimate that the election will cost approximately $54 million, including those funds that are being requested for event close-out activities this coming year. This does not, however, include election expense reimbursements, which are new for this election.

For fiscal year 2021-22, our budget request is summarized on page 1 of the document before you. Our core services operating funding requirements for 2021-22 are $11.627 million. This request is consistent with what was presented last year to the committee and which was recommended for Elections B.C. It includes a scheduled increase of $307,000 for building occupancy and staff salaries and benefits.

Our event-funding requirements for 2021-22 are $2.749 million, comprised of three elements: $1.255 million for activities necessary to complete the administration of the 42nd provincial general election; $1.406 million for costs required to complete the implementation of the Election Amendment Act, 2019; and $88,000 for preparations needed to get ready to administer the campaign finance requirements of the scheduled 2020 general local elections.

Elections B.C.’s event-funding requirements vary from year to year, depending upon the electoral events we’re required to administer, whether new legislation has resulted in a change to our mandate and according to where we are in the four-year election cycle. Our current requirements for 2021-22 include funding for activities that are confirmed at this time. Should we be required to administer an on-demand event, or should our mandate be changed through new legislation, we will write to this committee once the budget impacts have been assessed and if any new funding requirements have been identified.

Our capital budget request for 2021-22 is $700,000. Given the technology-intensive nature of election administration, capital funding is largely associated with custom software enhancement and development, as well as the purchase of necessary computer hardware and servers. Our requests for the next fiscal year will be focused on two key projects: updating our existing electoral management systems to integrate them with the new technologies of voting modernization and continuing to develop an online portal for candidates to electronically file nomination documents and financial reports.

Last, we require a total of $6.750 million for the administration of the public funding provisions of division 6.1 of the Election Act. This is comprised of $3.5 million for eligible election expense reimbursements and $3.25 million to fund the annual allowances for political parties.

To summarize, our overall budget request for 2021-2022 includes $11.627 million for core services operating, $2.749 million for one-time event funding, $700,000 for capital projects and $6.75 million for Election Act public financing.

Yvonne and Charles will now provide more detail on the specifics of these requests.

Y. Koehn: Good morning, committee members. It is a pleasure to appear before this committee and to give you some details about the numbers you see in the budget proposal document. I will focus on our core services operating and capital budgets as well as the specifics of tables 1 to 4.

[10:30 a.m.]

Our ongoing core services operating budget request by business line is on page 12 of our budget proposal. The table lists expenses that support all business areas, such as salaries, amortization, building occupancy, office expenses and information technology costs, as well as those for the core business lines of address and boundary maintenance, voters list maintenance, political entity reporting and voter education. You can find an explanatory note for each expense line on the following pages, which provide additional detail about the nature of these expenses.

The request of $11.627 million for ongoing core services is consistent with what was proposed last year and is what this committee recommended for Elections B.C. for 2021-22. Our planned budget for 2022-23 also reflects what was requested last year. Elections B.C. has carefully analyzed our ongoing financial needs and determined that we can continue to meet our mandatory goals and responsibilities within this budget.

Our 2021-22 budget request is an increase of $307,000 compared to 2020-21 and is mainly attributed to building occupancy costs and an increase to salaries and benefits next year, resulting from the negotiated wage increase for schedule A staff, who are entitled to the same increases as BCGEU members. This holds true for 2022-23, and for planning purposes, we assumed that this increase would continue for 2023-24.

Amortization or depreciation is the allocation of the costs of a capital asset to operating expenditures over the expected useful life of the asset. So although the actual cost of capital assets must initially be paid from our capital budget, that cost must also be paid out of our future operating budgets over a number of years. Amortization fluctuates based on the level of investment in capital assets and the age of assets currently held.

Our building occupancy planned expenditure increases in 2021-22, as the lease for our warehouse expires in March 2021 and the lease for our office space has a scheduled increase in April 2021. With additional warehouse space needed in future in support of the voting modernization requirements of the Election Amendment Act, 2019, it was necessary to find a larger warehouse.

The voters list maintenance business line is increasing, as we will now be sending out letters annually to 16- and 17-year-olds to encourage them to register for the provisional voters list. This new future voter register was a key aspect of our new legislation and will reduce administrative barriers to electoral participation for younger voters.

The political entity reporting business line has been reduced to primarily reflect a reduction in budget for legal services, which better aligns with actuals spent over the last few years, as well as some transfer of the investigations budget to the office expenses budget line.

Other changes to the business line budgets are modest and reflect minor fluctuations between the separate line items as we adjust to changing circumstances and projects each year.

As mentioned earlier, Charles will address the event expenses and political public financing funding requirements. So I’m going to move to page 15.

We have included a pie chart that illustrates our core services operating budget request for next fiscal year — the $11.627 million. This chart shows that Elections B.C. is highly dependent on people and information technology. Once salaries, IT and rent are covered, we have very little flexibility in other areas.

Pages 16 to 22 of the proposal include the spreadsheets, tables 1 to 4, created by committee staff for our use. Table 1, on page 16, is the three-year budget plan by STOB and shows the current fiscal year, 2020-21, budget compared to our request for next fiscal year. This spreadsheet includes both our core services and event budgets for 2020-21 and illustrates how widely the total budgets vary from fiscal year to fiscal year as we move through different events.

The total of $21.126 million, shown in the bolded column, for our ongoing operating budget request for 2021-22 includes the $11.627 million mentioned earlier, plus $2.749 million for events and $6.75 million in annual allowances to political parties and election expense reimbursements for eligible candidates and political parties.

The planned budgets for the two out-years, fiscals 2022-23 and 2023-24, do not include any event funding. When we create our budget for electoral events, we do not simply take the prior event costs and add a percentage. Each budget is developed from the ground up based on the specific plans for an event, which are finalized during the fiscal year immediately before any scheduled events or as soon as an unscheduled event is called.

Funding for scheduled events occurring in the next fiscal year is requested as part of our annual budget proposal, while funding for unscheduled events, as Anton has mentioned, is requested as and when required.

[10:35 a.m.]

Table 2, on page 18, shows the budget versus actuals for fiscal 2019-20. The variance here is primarily attributed to the fact that we budgeted for event-readiness activities that would be needed if the risk of an early election call increased. Given that the risk remained low, we did not action some activities that were part of our event-readiness plan.

Table 3, on page 20, shows the actual expenditures for the last five fiscal years. You will notice that the total operating appropriation in this table is equal to the total operating expenses. This is because the total operating appropriation is the amount reported in the public accounts, whereas on the other spreadsheets, the total reflects the approved budget. This is a consequence of the funding process.

Funding for unscheduled events, such as unscheduled general elections, referendums, recall petitions, by-elections, etc., is from a special appropriation recommended by this committee and approved by the Minister of Finance. At the end of the year, the Ministry of Finance actually allocates Elections B.C. the exact amount necessary up to the maximum of that approval. So the budget reflected in the public accounts equals exactly the amount that was spent on those events. As such, the variance of actuals to the appropriation is zero, and no surplus is reflected, even when actual costs of the events are lower than the original estimate.

Finally, table 4, on page 22, is the capital spending plan. Our capital request for ’21-22 is $700,000. This is all related to information technology, as we do not plan to purchase any new furniture or equipment or incur capital tenant improvements to our office or warehouse.

When we came to the committee in the fall of 2019 for our annual budget submission, we had requested $480,000 for fiscal 2021-22, which was significantly less than we normally request, as our focus was going to be on delivering a provincial general election in that year. With the election occurring a year earlier, in 2020-21, we have reset our capital budget so that we can deliver on a full capital program and are now requesting $700,000.

As Anton mentioned, the capital projects include the continued development and implementation of changes needed for voting modernization as directed by the Election Amendment Act, 2019. These include making further improvements to the vote-by-mail tracking system, incorporating lessons learned from the 2018 referendum and the 2020 provincial general election as well as modernizing voting results recording and reporting.

Another capital project we are focusing on is the completion of the online client portal, which will allow candidates to file nomination papers and parties to endorse candidates more efficiently and will provide a secure means of submitting financial reports and election expense reimbursement claims. In addition, we plan to enhance systems and services by making improvements to our online voter registration services and our corporate electoral information system.

Thank you for your attention. Charles will now address the event-related and political public financing funding requirements.

C. Porter: Thank you, Yvonne.

Good morning, committee members. I’m Charles Porter, Deputy Chief Electoral Officer for electoral finance and electoral operations.

As Anton mentioned, my remarks will focus on Elections B.C.’s event-related funding requirements for 2021-22. Before getting into the funding request details and further to Anton’s highlights, I would like to briefly review the events of 2020, including an update on the current status of the 2020 provincial general election. Of course, 2020 was a year that none of us will forget.

From an electoral operations perspective, we began the year with three priorities. The first was implementing changes arising from the Election Amendment Act, 2019, including amendments to modernize voting administration through greater use of technology. Our second priority, given the minority government at the time, was to maintain an ongoing state of readiness for an unscheduled provincial general election. Third, we were preparing for the election that was scheduled, at that time, for October of 2021.

In January of 2020, we were already studying news reports of possible threats posed by COVID-19 and discussing its potential impact on elections in B.C. By early March of 2020, it became apparent that COVID-19 had become a global pandemic. We shifted our staff to a remote working model and continued our work on voting modernization.

We also reached out to the office of the provincial health officer, the PHO, to better understand the pandemic and its risks. That initial contact with the PHO became an effective partnership that we maintained throughout 2020, and we are grateful for Dr. Bonnie Henry and her staff’s assistance.

[10:40 a.m.]

Anton wrote to B.C.’s major political parties in April of 2020. He advised them at that time that COVID-19 posed significant risk to a general election, if it were called in the short term. In the letter, we advised that if an election was called in the short term, our only option would be to use the emergency powers under the Election Act to delay the election until it could be held safely.

Throughout the spring and summer of 2020, we continued to work on voting modernization and studied the pandemic’s impact on other jurisdictions holding elections. It became apparent from our research and discussions with the PHO that the pandemic, sadly, would not end soon and any election called in 2020 or 2021 would likely be held under pandemic conditions.

As a result, we began working with experts from the Ministry of Health and WorkSafeBC to design safe voting place plans and workplace safety plans. The plans included such elements as personal protective equipment, sanitization supplies, screens and social distancing measures.

In the summer of 2020, we began procuring the supplies necessary to administer a pandemic election. These were necessary steps to regain the state of election readiness required by our mandate. In late July, there was increased media speculation about the possibility of an unscheduled general election in the fall of 2020. We immediately shifted our operational focus to devote all of our resources to election readiness so that we would be prepared to administer a pandemic snap election if called upon to do so. Work on the voting modernization and other projects was set aside.

By the time the election was called in late September, we had achieved a high state of readiness despite the many complications and challenges arising from the pandemic and the unscheduled nature of this election call.

I cannot tell you how many sleepless nights we had addressing these challenges. In addition to delivering on our mandated obligations, our fundamental goal was to ensure that voters, political participants and election officials were safe throughout the election process. We also had to ensure plans were in place to address contingencies, such as localized or widespread COVID-19 outbreaks. We had to address the unique needs of voters in acute and extended care facilities and living in Indigenous communities where access had to be limited to prevent disease transmission.

I am relieved, happy and extremely proud to report that we were successful in all of these efforts. As Anton said, there were no confirmed instances of COVID-19 transmission associated with any of our offices or voting places.

One of our main areas of focus was to ensure effective physical distancing and pandemic response measures in district electoral offices and voting places. We had to achieve this while ensuring that the voting process stayed accessible to voters.

We quickly realized that the Election Act, in its current form, would not allow compliance with provincial health guidelines related to the pandemic, so we made plans to issue proactive orders of the Chief Electoral Officer to depart from the act’s provisions when necessary. For example, we used orders to expand the use of remote voting opportunities, such as vote by mail and assisted telephone voting.

Informed by the experience of other jurisdictions and the results of polling we conducted in the spring and summer of 2020, we predicted a major increase in demand from voters to vote by mail. We prepared for such an increase, and our predictions proved accurate. An unprecedented 596,287 voters voted by mail in 2020, a massive increase from the 6,517 voters who had voted by mail in the 2017 provincial election.

Meeting this demand for voting by mail on this scale involved a major procurement project in partnership with Queen’s Printer, B.C. Mail Plus and others and a major public communications effort. The massive increase in voting by mail and assisted telephone voting allowed us to provide good service to voters while reducing the numbers of voters voting in person, which supported physical distancing and safety protocols in voting places. We also added one extra day of advanced voting to further allow safe access to voting opportunities and a reduced population of voters at any given voting place.

The election itself went as well as an unscheduled pandemic election could go. I am grateful for the assistance of our many partners, the media, political stakeholders, our officials and election workers and the voters in this event for helping us ensure a safe process for everyone.

[10:45 a.m.]

Now I will turn to a discussion of our event-related funding requests for 2021-22. The details of these funding requests can be seen on page 11 of the submission, in the budget table on page 12.

Our event-related operating budget request for 2021-22 is $2.749 million. This includes $1.255 million for post-election work, necessary to complete our administration of the 42nd provincial general election; $1.406 million for costs to complete changes required to modernize the voting process as mandated by the Election Amendment Act 2019; and $88,000 for preparations to administer the campaign financing and advertising rules for the 2022 general local elections.

The $1.25 million for post-election work includes funding for many activities necessary to close out the election. Broadly speaking, these activities fall into the categories of salaries for temporary staff, information systems and office expenses, including professional services. Event close-out activities include reviewing and auditing election financing reports, consolidating and repackaging returned election supplies, processing voter registrations and updates, producing the final event voter’s list of participation statistics and ongoing investigative and reporting work related to the event.

The $1.4 million to complete implementation of the Election Amendment Act 2019 also broadly falls under the categories of salaries for temporary staff, information systems and office expenses. These funds will allow us to be ready to administer a provincial electoral event under a modernized voting model that includes using electronic tabulators to count paper ballots and using electronic voting books to strike voters off the voter’s list in near real time.

The results will be faster service for voters and faster results reporting, with almost all ballots counted on election night. Our goal is to ensure that we make sufficient progress in voting modernization so that we would be in a position to test the new equipment and procedures on any by-election which might occur in the following year.

The $88,000 for preparations to administer campaign financing and advertising rules for the 2022 general local elections includes costs to update the print forms, guides and training materials; legal services; and training costs. Our role in local elections is limited to administering campaign financing and advertising rules and does not include administering voting or candidate nominations.

Now I’d like to speak to election expense reimbursements for candidates and political parties. In order to administer the public funding requirements of part 10, division 6.1 of the Election Act, we require $3.5 million to fund election expense reimbursements for candidates and political parties resulting from the 42nd provincial general election and $3.25 million to fund the annual allowances for eligible political parties.

Under the Election Act, candidates received at least 10 percent of the valid votes in their electoral district, and parties that received at least 5 percent of the total valid votes provincewide are eligible to be reimbursed for up to 50 percent of their eligible expenses up to a maximum of 50 percent of the election expenses limit. In advance, the 50 percent is paid upon filing the report with receipts to support the reimbursement claim. The remaining amount will be adjusted and paid following an audit of the claim.

As indicated in the notes under this section on page 12, the total estimated reimbursements are about $7 million. It is anticipated that half will be reimbursed in the current fiscal year, with the remaining $3.5 million being required in fiscal 2021-22.

The Election Act also establishes annual allowances for political parties that meet certain criteria. The Chief Electoral Officer must pay an annual allowance in a registered party whose candidates in the most recent general election received at least 2 percent of the valid votes cast in all electoral districts, or 5 percent of the valid votes cast in the districts in which the party endorsed candidates.

Per the Election Act, funding for 2021-22 is based on an allocation of $1.75 per vote for the July 21, 2021, payment and $1.75 per vote for the January 1, 2022, payment.

This concludes my remarks. Thank you. Back to you, Anton.

A. Boegman: Thank you, Charles. Before opening up our presentation to comments and questions, I would appreciate the opportunity to make a few concluding remarks.

[10:50 a.m.]

Our budget has been very carefully considered and includes the operational, event and infrastructure requirements that we believe are necessary to administer our mandate and complete the implementation of the Election Amendment Act, 2019. It includes relatively modest increases to the core services, operating and capital budgets, as has been described.

As mentioned and as is current protocol, should Elections B.C. be required to administer any future on-demand events or should our mandate be changed through new legislation, we will write to this committee once the budget impacts have been assessed and if any new funding requirements have been identified.

One additional item that I would like to highlight for committee members is the report Digital Communications, Disinformation and Democracy that I tabled in the Legislature last May.

This report recommends updating the Election Act to ensure British Columbia’s electoral processes stay fair and transparent in the era of digital campaigning. The report also recommends taking proactive measures to protect our elections from cyberthreats to electoral integrity that have occurred in other jurisdictions. These threats include coordinated disinformation campaigns, foreign interference and anonymous digital advertising. Although these threats have not been widely observed in British Columbia, the risks they present to our democracy are real, and I encourage you, as legislators, to read and consider that report.

In closing, I’d like to thank you, Madam Chair, Mr. Vice-Chair and committee members, for this opportunity to present Elections B.C.’s 2021-2022 funding requirements. We’d be pleased at this point to respond to any questions that committee members may have.

J. Routledge (Chair): Thank you so much for your very thorough report. Now I’ll open it up to questions from committee members.

G. Kyllo: Commissioner Boegman, Charles and Yvonne, thank you very much for the comprehensive presentation today. I just have to say that you guys did an exemplary job of pulling off an election in the middle of a pandemic. As I watched, fairly closely, some of the recounts, with West Vancouver–Sea to Sky as an exam­ple…. I think that the final outcome of that was so close to the original numbers it certainly builds a lot of confidence in this organization.

I just wanted to say thank you very much for the work you’ve done under an extremely challenging situation.

J. Routledge (Chair): That concludes your remarks, Greg?

G. Kyllo: Yes. No questions, just some appreciation.

J. Routledge (Chair): Yes, I would echo that. I think we all would. Thank you.

G. Lore: Thank you very much for the presentation and the submission. I’ll echo my colleagues in expressing gratitude, not just for the big picture of what you did to make that election work smoothly but also the subsequent by-elections and the impact I think it had on individual British Columbians.

I know my experience during the election was one of connecting with folks who said how easy it was, how smooth it was, to vote by mail and how safe they felt when they went to vote in person. I think that kind of confidence for individual folks — as well as MLA Kyllo said, the big picture…. It’s hard to overstate what you pulled off.

That leads me to a bit of a question that’s less maybe about the budget this year but in thinking about future budgets or how you organize. That is if any of the changes or the different ways we did this election are worth holding on to and doing in future elections to increase access or whether there were benefits or lessons learned beyond a pandemic election that you might look to incorporate in how you operate on a regular basis.

A. Boegman: I can offer a few initial thoughts on that. Of course, lessons learned and learning from what hap­pened previously are a strong component of how we do event close-out activities at Elections B.C.

[10:55 a.m.]

We’re currently in the process of doing the final set of lessons-learned Zoom conferences with our district electoral officers and deputies. We have six regions and are just doing the Vancouver region now, with the second day of that conference scheduled for tomorrow.

I think that there were lots of things that we learned about accessibility and about challenges of accessibility. We’re very grateful that we do have very high levels of flexibility within the Election Act and the opportunity to provide different types of voting opportunities to meet the needs of British Columbians. We have the most accessible voting model in Canada. Notwithstanding the challenges presented by the pandemic, I believe we were able to provide opportunities to meet the needs of those who did want to vote.

One thing we’re closely watching, and we’ll be doing an ongoing survey of British Columbians around, is their interest in voting by mail. The Election Amendment Act, 2019 in essence allows for no-excuse vote by mail. Anyone who wishes to vote by mail is allowed to do so. There was tremendous increase in that model, a 7,200 percent increase over 2017. I’m trying to understand whether that is something that British Columbians will want to continue to do or whether it’s uniquely associated with the pandemic, and vote by mail will return to previous levels.

Certainly, the partnerships that we developed, especially with those in the health care sector, set a great model for us to continue to work on partnerships with First Nations communities to understand best ways to serve those communities — all things that we’re going to carry forward from this election.

I think the other comment that I would say is that we learned that the model of operator-assisted telephone voting that was piloted in 2017 and was brought into effect for this election proved invaluable in providing us with flexibility to deal with the very unique and challenging circumstances of an acute care hospital being on lockdown or some First Nations communities that were quarantining, or, in fact, in dealing with a Canadian frigate that was off the coast of, I believe, although it’s probably secret, somewhere in Southeast Asia, and all of the sailors on board the frigate were able to vote via this model, which, if it was not in place, there literally would have been no way to get them a ballot and have the ballot returned in time for it to be counted in the election.

So that’s, I think, from my perspective, lots to be learned still. There are going to be lessons learned scheduled with political parties. I’m having some lessons-learned sessions scheduled with a range of MLAs, from experienced MLAs to some rookie MLAs, and hope to talk about your experiences as well in learning ways that we can improve the electoral process for all British Columbians. Thank you.

J. Routledge (Chair): Thank you. The next question or comments are from MLA Alexis.

P. Alexis: Thank you. I just want to echo what my colleagues have said. Absolutely amazing job this past election. I also want a special shout-out to the staff that answer phones. You provide extraordinarily great information for us. It just makes everything so much more…. I think the access to information is just phenomenal.

I wanted to say thank you to that. It was an extraordinary time, and we saw extraordinary measures. Everybody was safe. So we can’t thank you enough. Great job.

B. Stewart (Deputy Chair): Thanks very much to Elections B.C., the staff. The information you’ve provided is very thorough and comprehensive.

One question I have is…. Coming up in this term of the Legislature is the Electoral Boundaries Commission. The Melnick Commission finished its work in 2015. What year have you budgeted? I’m just looking at page 12, and I’m just wondering: is there an allowance in your budget for either ’21-22 or the ongoing years for that review, and how much is it?

[11:00 a.m.]

A. Boegman: Thanks for that question. We do not have any allowances in our budget documents for the work of the B.C. Electoral Boundaries Commission. That commission is actually an independent commission of its own merit. I, as Chief Electoral Officer, am one member of that commission, but there are two other members that will be appointed when government brings the commission into force. It must be called under the current legislation within 12 months of voting day for the past election. That would be by October 24, 2021. Based on my knowledge from previous practices of the commission, the commission will typically put together its own budget and submit that budget through the Attorney General for consideration.

Certainly, the work of the previous commission highlighted a model that I hope is considered by government when they look at the boundaries commission, and that is of Elections B.C. providing secretariat support to the commission in its work. In that way, we’re able to significantly reduce the overall cost of the previous commission and offer significant efficiencies both in terms of starting up the commission rapidly as well as ensuring that the geographical work that the commission does is easily translatable into Elections B.C.’s systems.

J. Routledge (Chair): It looks like our final question, perhaps, is from Lorne.

L. Doerkson: I guess I’ll continue the praise. I know that we had…. My office was literally across the street from the UBC office, so it was unbelievable the amount of hours that they put in. But where I really wanted to pass on my congratulatory note was getting to seniors homes that were obviously on lockdown. I think in our riding, those became voting places. That was with some conversation with myself, but they definitely responded very quickly to that. I wanted to thank you for that.

I do have a question, though. Earlier in the presentation, Anton, you mentioned the number $54 million as a cost for the election itself. Did I understand that correctly?

A. Boegman: That’s what we’re projecting right now. Obviously, a core function of our finance team is reviewing all of the bills and the receipts that we’re still processing in relation to that election. But we’re anticipating that the overall costs of the election will be in that area, $54 million. That would include the funding that we’ve requested for the next fiscal year for the work on campaign finance review and reviewing the voters list and updating that with all the voting day registrations. But that does not include the public financing component, the election expense reimbursements.

L. Doerkson: Does it include the overall cost of your office here, which, if I recall, was $11.6 million or so? Does it include that?

A. Boegman: No. Our office operating cost is not included in the election costs. It includes costs related to the district electoral officers, their staff, the 19,000 election officials that they hire. It includes our costs for election supplies. There are over 200 tons of election supplies that we stage in our warehouse and then distribute throughout the province. It includes costs to print ballots. It includes costs of technology infrastructure to provide them with the networks and the systems that they need to use during the election. It includes costs for the additional headquarters staff that we bring on to support us throughout the event.

That is the range of the types of costs that it includes.

L. Doerkson: While I know we’re not talking about that number here, is it, though, the responsibility of your office to manage that budget as well, then?

A. Boegman: That is correct.

L. Doerkson: Is there an outside budget similar to that for the 2022 local elections, and if so, what would that number be?

A. Boegman: For the 2022 local elections, as Charles highlighted, we’re responsible for the campaign finance oversight and election advertising compliance activities there. So we have put in a budget for next year for $88,000 that will allow us to begin work on that to review our forms, as necessary, to begin doing outreach to clients in those areas.

[11:05 a.m.]

Next year, which will be the year ahead of the scheduled local elections, we will be bringing forward an additional budget based on the requirements that we know at that time. So we have a look ahead at one year, typically, for our events, because of the model that we do for our budgeting, which is a bottom-up model based on the requirements that are in place at that time.

L. Doerkson: One final question if I may. This is more information for myself. How did the $54 million compare to the last election?

A. Boegman: The comparison…. I was really comparing apples to oranges.

L. Doerkson: I understand.

A. Boegman: I would say the costs of the last provincial election were in the area of $40 million. Obviously, this election included unique costs associated with the pandemic: protective gear, acrylic screens and those sorts of things. Building occupancy over the three years since the last election, especially in the Lower Mainland areas, was significantly increased, and our requirements for voting places in offices changed significantly in terms of looking for spaces that were much larger, much greater air volumes and those sorts of things.

Also, the other cost pressures, of course: vote by mail, with that 7,002 percent increase, and the cost of mailing and receiving mail coming back was significant compared to 2017; staffing costs, although we actually employed less election officials in the pandemic — we had one official per station; and the wage rate for election officials had increased since the last election to make sure that we were keeping scale with increases to minimum wage.

L. Doerkson: Thank you very much for that. Awesome presentation, too. I’m a new MLA, and I think I’m meeting with you soon, so I look forward to it.

A. Boegman: I look forward to that too. Thank you.

J. Routledge (Chair): Well, with that, I’ll conclude this part of our agenda by thanking you, Anton, and thanking your team not only for your very thorough presentation but also for the work that you do. You ran an amazing election during unbelievable times — historic times. I want to thank you for your capacity, your vision and your commitment not only to keep us all safe but to keep our democracy safe. That’s really what it comes down to. So thank you very much.

We will invite in the Representative for Children and Youth.

Welcome, Dr. Charlesworth, and your team that’s joined you. I first of all want to acknowledge that I’m joining you from the unceded traditional territories of the Coast Salish, the Tsleil-Waututh, the Squamish and the Mus­queam people.

[11:10 a.m.]

This is the Standing Select Committee on Finance and Government Services, and our role is to review the bud­gets of the statutory officers.

Let me just briefly introduce the committee. We have Megan Dykeman, Langley East; Pam Alexis, Abbotsford-Mission; Lorne Doerkson, Cariboo-Chilcotin; Greg Kyllo, Shuswap; Ben Stewart, Kelowna West, who is also the Deputy Chair; Mike Starchuk, Surrey-Cloverdale; Grace Lore, Victoria–Beacon Hill; Harwinder Sandhu, Vernon-Monashee; and I’m Janet Routledge from Burnaby North.

With that, we will turn it over to you.

OFFICE OF THE REPRESENTATIVE
FOR CHILDREN AND YOUTH

J. Charlesworth: Lovely. Thank you so much. I’m very pleased to be with you this morning. I appreciate it’s been a long morning for you, so I’ll try and make it as interesting as possible. I’m pleased to have the opportunity to share with you the work of our office and our budget submission for fiscal years ’21-22 and ’23-24.

First of all, I want to congratulate each of you on being elected to represent the citizens in your ridings and on your appointment to the select standing committee. I look forward to working with you and welcome any opportunity to exchange information, learn more about what you’re noticing in your communities and be in service of you.

Before I begin, I’d like to acknowledge that I’m coming to you via Zoom from the traditional and unceded territories of the W̱SÁNEĆ people just north of the area known as Victoria.

I’d also like to take a moment to introduce the other members of our RCY leadership team who are on the call today. Joining us are the deputy representatives Samantha Cocker and Alan Markwart, chief financial officer Dianne Buljat and executive director of communications Jeff Rud.

With regard to our budget submission, we recognize that these are extremely challenging times for all governments in light of the worldwide pandemic and both its human and economic impacts. Our request, which I’ll get into in a bit more detail later on in the presentation, is essentially for a status quo budget in order to be able to continue the work we are doing to improve the lives of children, youth, young adults and their families.

First, I’d like to offer members, because this is our first opportunity to get to know one another, some background on our office and provide you with a snapshot of the work we do and how we’ve adapted during the past 11 months as a result of the pandemic.

The Office of the Representative for Children and Youth was established in April 2007. The creation of the RCY was a central recommendation of the Hon. Ted Hughes in his April 2006 report B.C. Children and Youth Review: An Independent Review of B.C.’s Child Protection System. We regard the Hon. Mr. Hughes as the father of the RCY. We’re very fortunate to have had his guidance and leadership until his passing last year.

In summary, the RCY is responsible for assisting children, youth and young adults and their families who need help in dealing with the service systems, including the Ministry of Children and Family Development, health authorities and Community Living B.C. We’re responsible for informing and advocating for improvements to those systems and providing independent oversight of MCFD and other public bodies that deliver services and programs to children and youth.

We have 75 FTEs, six of whom are attributable to a shared corporate services arrangement we’ve made with the Office of the Human Rights Commissioner. That includes finance, human resources and IT services. Our headquarters is in Victoria, not far from the Legislature, but we have advocates working in various parts of the province, and we continue to operate an office in Prince George.

Our work is mandated by the Representative for Children and Youth Act, and as per that legislation, we regularly report to another legislative committee, the Select Standing Committee on Children and Youth. We’re very fortunate because even though there are child and youth advocates or ombudspersons offices similar to ours in every Canadian province and territory, with the exception of the Northwest Territories, we’re the only such office with a regular, direct reporting relationship to a legislative committee. That relationship is important because it helps hold RCY accountable for our work, and it provides us with a direct and consistent connection to the B.C. Legislature, where so many decisions are made that affect children and families in this province.

Let’s talk about the pandemic. I’d like to spend some time talking about the work we do at RCY and how we deploy our staff in order to maximize our positive impact on the lives of children, youth, young adults and families in B.C. Of course, we have to start with addressing COVID-19, because it has affected us all in profound ways.

[11:15 a.m.]

Given the understandable priority that ministries and public bodies had to give to adjusting to the unique and very demanding circumstances of COVID-19, we committed to not releasing any public reports with recommendations until the fall of 2020.

We also established a specialized internal COVID-19 response team to monitor and collate RCY information sources and external information from service providers, interest groups and the public about pandemic-related issues and concerns impacting service delivery to children, youth, young adults and their families.

We had regular meetings, often weekly, with senior officials from MCFD and other ministries and public bodies to share and discuss this information, identify children, youth and young adults that our data suggested were more vulnerable, flag concerns about service delivery and communications and advocate for resolution of those concerns.

Just before carrying on, I’d like to take a moment to acknowledge that we experienced an unprecedented level of engagement with the ministries and public bodies that we work with — MCFD, the Ministry of Mental Health and Addictions, Education, Community Living B.C., the provincial health officer, the Ministry of Health and others.

There’s no playbook telling any of us how to address the pandemic and the physical, social, emotional and economic impacts. So the opportunity to share information and concerns, data and research, examples of what was working well and not working well and for whom supported the necessary creativity and informed decision-making, both in individual cases and for broader public policy decisions.

So I’m very grateful for the work that colleagues, de­cision-makers and legislators did and continue to do to support British Columbia. Thank you for your work.

We work with ministries and authorities to address the day-to-day needs of citizens, and we felt it was our re­sponsibility to support this work at a different level, sort of the 1,000-foot level, if you will, and monitor the real impacts of the pandemic on children and youth and share findings in diverse ways. Real impacts on mental health, special needs, youth in transition, substance use and family violence were particularly evident.

We collaborated with the Children’s Health Policy Cen­tre at Simon Fraser University and commissioned and jointly published two public reports directly relating to child and youth mental health and the pandemic.

We also collaborated with 12 provincial and community-connected organizations and parent networks that work with families with children and youth with special needs to develop a report released in December 2020 entitled Left Out: Children and Youth with Special Needs in the Pandemic.

The pandemic both illuminated and exacerbated the weaknesses and challenges in services to children and youth with special needs, and this report called on government to address the urgent needs of children and youth during the pandemic and to begin a much-needed and recognized systemic overhaul of those services for the long term.

The pandemic also had a dramatic impact on how the staff of RCY work. Remote work arrangements were initially put in place for all staff on a temporary basis. Then, given positive experiences with those arrangements — staff have been remarkable — we were able to implement this on a permanent and voluntary basis for almost all staff.

These changes have resulted in the pending closure of RCY’s Burnaby office effective at the end of this month. Following that closure, RCY advocacy staff based in the Lower Mainland will be actively engaged in the community through outreach and community education initiatives as well as regular clinics at child and youth hubs and community service agencies once the pandemic eases and also have access to ad hoc rental office space as required. I’ll come back to our Burnaby office shortly.

I just want to take a few moments to talk about the three legislatively mandated program areas. We’ve spoken a little bit about how the pandemic has impacted us, but of course what’s most important is we’ve carried on with the work day to day to day.

We have three legislated areas. We’re probably best known for our reviews and investigations unit. This team is responsible for reviewing and investigating the critical injuries and deaths of children and youth in government care or those who’ve received reviewable services. That includes child welfare, adoptions, early years, youth jus­tice, services for children and youth with special needs, mental health services and addictions services for youth.

[11:20 a.m.]

This team is experiencing a prolonged and significant surge in reported injuries and deaths of children and youth. To give you some numbers, during 2019-20, the reviews and investigations team received 3,185 critical injury and death reports for young people who received services during the preceding 12 months. What we do is each of these reports receives an initial review by our team, and of these, we determine what’s in mandate. So 1,329, or 42 percent, were determined to meet my mandate.

The critical injuries that are in mandate and that we review are life-altering. The categories most commonly reported include significant emotional harm, suicide attempts, suicidal ideations, sexual violence, physical harm, substance-related harm and physical assault.

The total number of in-mandate injury and death reports received by the representative’s office in 2019-20 increased by 16 percent over the previous fiscal year, and in fact, that total has risen by more than 65 percent since fiscal year 2015-16, when the office received 803 in-mandate reportables.

Let’s bring it to contemporary times. The pandemic has not eased the flow of reportables. At the current rate we’re receiving critical injury and death reports this fiscal year, we’re projecting a total of 1,800 for 2020-21. That represents a 34 percent increase over 2019-20 and a more than doubling of the reports during the past five years.

So we can anticipate the number of critical injury and death reports to continue to grow for two main reasons. First, overall reporting continues to improve, so that’s a good thing. Second, we’ll soon be receiving reportables from health authorities. That’s actually part of our legislation, but the health authorities have, to date, not been submitting reportables. That will be coming online very soon. Health authorities, by the way, provide some mental health services to children and addiction services to youth. These are very important areas for us to monitor.

The reviews and investigations team also produces investigation reports, reports that review critical injuries and deaths in aggregate and special reports. This fiscal year, the reviews and investigations team has released four public reports. One, entitled Invisible Children: A Descriptive Analysis of Injury and Death Reports for Métis Children and Youth in British Columbia, 2015 to 2017, was released in July. A Way to Cope: Exploring Non-Suicidal Self-Injury in B.C. Youth was released in September. And Illuminating Service Experience, which was a descriptive analysis of injury and death reports for First Nations children and youth in B.C. between 2015 and 2017, was released in December.

These first three reports represent new ways for us to share information to inform and support families, service providers and communities, particularly Indigenous communities, nations and organizations, as they endeavour to support their loved ones and community members and design responsive and effective systems and services. These reports didn’t include recommendations but did offer information and analysis. They identified areas for improvement and noted promising practices.

Just a couple of weeks ago we released Detained: Rights of Children and Youth Under the Mental Health Act, which was a report that offered the perspectives of youth who have experienced such detentions. Detained made a number of recommendations for how a government can better protect the interests of children and youth and improve services for those who experience severe mental health issues. This was the first in a series that focuses on child participation in processes that affect young people. The next report, scheduled for this fall, will examine child participation during family law and child welfare proceedings.

Another major report that the reviews and investigations team is currently working on — and this will be released soon, likely in April — explores the importance of belonging in the lives of Indigenous children and youth. It focuses on the story of one teenage First Nations girl who tragically died and how both she and her mother could have been much better served had the effects of intergenerational trauma been better understood and had greater attention been paid to the importance of belonging in the child’s life.

Our second mandated area in the RCY is monitoring. That team researches, monitors, reviews and analyzes systemic themes and patterns related to designated government programs and services for children and youth, provides insights to the ministries and partners about possible program and service improvements.

This monitoring function also plays a key role in tracking and publicly reporting out on the implementation of recommendations made by our office toward improving services and programs for children and youth. They also produce reports.

[11:25 a.m.]

In December, the monitoring team released a report entitled A Parent’s Duty: Government’s Obligation to Youth Transitioning into Adulthood. Improving supports and services for vulnerable young adults who were formally in care has long been a priority area for our organization.

Next month the monitoring team will release a detailed report about the service and supports available to children with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder and their families and how those services and supports can be improved. We believe this will provide valuable and timely insight into the lives of these children and families, their strengths and their challenges.

Moving into the spring and summer, the monitoring team will also be releasing a series of discussion papers followed by an omnibus report on planning for children and youth in B.C. This work is the result of an extended engagement and research process into care planning and how this could be improved for the well-being of children in the future.

The monitoring team is also guiding a strategic focus on the early years, on the social and economic value of prevention and early intervention in keeping families safely together and will be releasing research briefs and a public report about that as well.

Our third program area that’s mandated is advocacy, which, despite flying a bit under the radar because it doesn’t release reports in the same way, is truly at the heart of all that we do. Advocates are our front-line folks, the people who meet with and take calls from children and youth, families, social workers, caregivers, teachers, pediatricians, lawyers and other concerned adults every single day. They help people navigate what can be a confusing web — some call it spaghetti — of government services. They teach children and youth how to speak up for themselves, and they advocate directly on behalf of children, youth and young adults when necessary.

In the 2019-20 fiscal year, our office opened 1,583 advocacy cases, and since our inception in 2007, RCY has handled well over 23,000 cases. To give you an idea of the types of issues our advocates deal with, in 2019-20, 26 percent of our cases were complaints regarding quality of care or services received by children and youth and young adults and their families, 22 percent centred on ineffective or inadequate planning and 19 percent involved families looking for information regarding services.

The pandemic has resulted in a suppression of new advocacy cases this fiscal year, to date, at RCY, a phenomenon that’s been experienced, by the way, by many public services. And although there have been active efforts to engage youth and service providers online, including through our recently added chat and text function, the pandemic has severely limited the capacity of advocacy staff to be present in community centres and schools and at youth events and gatherings. For example, we would always attend the B.C. Association of Aboriginal Friendship Centres’ Gathering Our Voices annual conference that welcomes over 1,000 Indigenous youth from throughout B.C.

Because of the pandemic, we’ve had limited in-person opportunities to promote awareness of child rights and the ability of advocacy services, and that’s how people come to know us. Our advocacy intake is highly dependent on the awareness of our services on the part of youth, caregivers and service providers, and we know that means we need to continue to find different ways to engage during COVID-19. We’ve tried a number of different approaches. We’ll continue to conduct an assertive program of different approaches but also to re-engage in community engagement once the pandemic ceases.

However, lest you think that the numbers are indicative of us not being as busy, the numbers alone don’t tell the entire story. Over the past several years, there’s been a substantial growth in the complexity of cases that our advocates handle. These include children and youth and families and young adults dealing with acute and multiple issues with multiple service providers.

Another factor adding to the complexity of our casework is the movement towards resumption of child welfare jurisdiction by First Nations, Inuit and Métis Nations and communities as we strive to participate in new and unfolding processes and balance collective and individual rights of children and youth. As a result of that increasing complexity, the average length of time we’re involved in an advocacy case has almost doubled to more than seven months.

You should also be aware that changes to the Representative for Children and Youth regulation that was brought into force in July of 2019 expanded the advocacy jurisdiction of the RCY to include young adults ages 19 to 23, inclusive, who are eligible for agreements with young adults and our tuition waivers.

[11:30 a.m.]

The expected uptake in new young adult cases has also been suppressed by the pandemic, and it’s really because we have not been able to do the outreach to inform young adults of our ability to provide these advocacy services. Extensive outreach efforts will be required in the community once the pandemic eases, which should increase our intake.

We also anticipate there’s going to be another amendment to our legislation next fiscal year that expands the definition of “young adult” from those under age 24 to those under age 27. This expected change will increase the population of young adults eligible for our advocacy services by about 60 percent, not only for AYAs and tuition waivers but also young adults eligible for Community Living B.C.’s services. While we might be seeing suppression in case numbers now, we expect that to abate once the pandemic has passed.

While I’ve just described the basic work of our three legislatively mandated areas, I want to emphasize that all of our work at the RCY is supported by our First Nations, Métis and Inuit relations team, known internally as FINMIR. Given the overinvolvement of the child welfare system in the lives of Indigenous children, youth and families, we know it’s critical that we bring an Indigenous lens to all the work that we do.

To that end, I should mention that Samantha Cocker, who I introduced earlier, has been a vital addition to the RCY leadership team. She joined us in September, bringing a much-needed perspective to both our executive team and to the areas of advocacy and First Nations, Métis and Inuit relations, which she oversees as the deputy representative. Samantha’s hiring is in keeping with the original organizational structure for RCY recommended by Hon. Ted Hughes.

Samantha is of Cree and Scottish ancestry and has more than 20 years experience in a wide array of service areas relevant to the RCY. Prior to joining to us, she was deputy director of child welfare, Aboriginal services branch at MCFD, and prior to that, she worked for many years in a Delegated Aboriginal Agency.

This FINMIR team is dedicated to improving services to Indigenous children, youth and young adults; supporting First Nations, Métis and Inuit communities in resuming jurisdiction over child and family services; and helping the RCY to become a more culturally attuned and responsible organization.

Two-thirds of children in care are Indigenous, and Indigenous peoples are also vastly overrepresented in the justice system. Yet Indigenous children and youth are, relative to their needs, underserved in voluntary services such as community-based child and youth mental health and in services for children and youth with special needs.

As I mentioned, Indigenous Nations and communities are also beginning a journey toward the resumption of jurisdiction over child welfare services that’s enabled by new federal legislation, entitled An Act Respecting First Nations, Inuit and Métis Children, Youth and Families, and the province is in the course of implementing the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act.

Indigenous child well-being remains the top priority of this office, and it makes sense to have a dedicated team focusing on this area. The team is actively monitoring this shifting child welfare landscape provincially and nationally and, also, closely watching and supporting government progress with respect to the 2016 report Indigenous Resilience, Connectedness and Reunification. the calls for justice of the missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls inquiry, uptake on Jordan’s principle and the calls to action of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

In addition to the items I’ve already mentioned, some other major areas that you might be interested in that are a priority for us: continued emphasis on improving services to children and youth with special needs, children and youth with mental health concerns, youth and young adults in transition; support for families to be able to care for their children and, whenever safely possible, remain together; supports for children and youth with complex care needs; improving residential care services in B.C.; and improving substance use services.

That gives you a very broad overview of the work of our office, and now I’d like to turn to my budget request. The committee has received written copies of this request in both full and summary form, so I won’t go into all the details, but certainly we’re very happy to answer any questions that members of the committee have.

In summary, our previously approved RCY budget for ’21-22 is an operating budget of just under $10.5 million and a capital budget of $50,000. The previously approved operating budget included a 2 percent salary increase effective April 1 of this year for our schedule A staff. However, it did not include the approved salary increase for the representative for the previous and current year, nor for a salary increase of 2 percent for the RCY management staff, expected to be approved by the Public Service Agency effective July 1.

[11:35 a.m.]

Therefore, in order to maintain current staffing and service levels, we’re requesting an increase of $158,000 to offset these salary increases, resulting in an operating budget for ’21-22 of just over $10.6 million. That’s a 1.5 percent increase. We’re requesting no change to our previously approved capital request of $50,000.

In addition, we’re seeking approval to reallocate funding from our Burnaby office operations to address immediate service pressures on two fronts: the very substantial and continuing increases in critical injury and death reportables that I mentioned previously and the need to better address the increasingly complex and sensitive area of services to First Nations, Métis, Inuit and urban Indigenous peoples, which I’ve also outlined.

Our transition in the pandemic to remote and decentralized working arrangements for RCY staff enables the redeployment of savings to address these pressures instead of asking for an increase to our operating budget. The total building occupancy and associated costs of our Burnaby office are $274,000. Advocacy staff previously located at that office will work from home, hold clinics at community service agencies and will rent office and meeting spaces on an ad hoc basis as required.

Alternative arrangements such as this, along with professional services for expert online engagement, will cost us about $72,000. So we’re proposing that the remaining $202,000 be reallocated to address these service pressures.

As a result of the sizeable increase in reviews and investigations caseload, we propose adding an additional FTE. That’s required to address growth over the past year alone. A further increase in staffing may be required in the fu­ture, depending on the degree of growth in reporting, especially from the health authorities for mental health and addiction services, but we would come back to you at that point.

As mentioned, we’ve undertaken an extensive degree of engagement with First Nations, Métis, Inuit and urban Indigenous leadership and organizations, which is a critical element in fulfilling our legislative mandate. This engagement, as well as the need for us to become a culturally stronger and safer organization for clients, service partners and staff will continue and grow.

To contribute to this ongoing process, we’re requesting a reallocation of savings from the Burnaby office closure to establish an in-house Elder knowledge-keeper — 0.6 of an FTE — to be complemented by a decentralized roster of Elders and knowledge-keepers on retainer, as well as funding for specialized legal services in relation to Indigenous child welfare matters.

That concludes my formal presentation, and I’d now be pleased to answer any questions. Thank you for your time.

J. Routledge (Chair): Thank you so much for your very thorough report.

Now I’ll open it up to questions from the committee. Our first question is from Greg.

G. Kyllo: Welcome, Commissioner Charlesworth. With respect to the health authorities, I’m just wondering. You’d indicated that they have not previously been reporting any incidences. I’m just wondering. Was there a statutory change? Was it regulatory? Was it legislative? Is there a mandatory requirement that they start reporting at a set point in time?

The other part of that question would also be: what about the First Nations Health Authority? Is there any obligation for them to report?

J. Charlesworth: Thank you for that question. The provision for health authorities to complete reportable circumstances — as we call them, reports — is in our legislation. However, for a whole variety of reasons — probably, most likely, because there was so much focus on Ministry of Children and Family Development — we have not followed up or enforced that aspect of our legislation.

In the last couple of years, we’ve been working — it was started by my predecessor, actually, Bernard Richard — with the health authorities to set in motion that they would be providing those reports pertaining to youth mental health and addiction services. That’s been underway.

It’s obviously quite complex because it’s a new process for them. However, we anticipate the start of that with Vancouver Coastal Health Authority in April, and then the rest of the health authorities, we’ve agreed, will roll out over that time. That would include provincial health services authority and First Nations Health Authority as well.

G. Kyllo: Great, thank you very much. If I may, just a kind of follow-up, Madam Chair.

[11:40 a.m.]

It just seems very surprising that the health authorities have not been reporting out. Do you have any anticipation on the increased volume that the reporting will have on your organization?

J. Charlesworth: That’s a very good question. I’m looking to Alan because Alan has been involved in the conversations most directly with the health authorities. So I will ask Alan to step into that.

A. Markwart: Actually, we don’t have an estimate. It’s hard to say. You could ballpark a guess of perhaps 10 to 20 percent, and I would expect that it will kind of follow the path of what’s happened with MCFD services. With MCFD services, we’ve seen a continuous improvement in their reporting as they’ve become aware of the need.

I would think that in the initial phases, the health authority reporting might be less than what we might expect, but it will improve over time. It’ll probably see some continuous growth over the first few years. It’s wait and see, really. You can imagine that with youth addiction services, the simple matter of overdoses, for example, could be of considerable volume.

G. Kyllo: I would anticipate that the health authorities are already tracking and reporting on this information. They’re just not sharing it yet with your organization. Would that be correct? Or do you feel that there is no internal reporting within the health authorities to actually track the number or severity of incidents, cases, for children and youth?

A. Markwart: The health authorities do have a critical incident reporting mechanism. It’s computerized. It’s a matter of teasing out what falls into our mandate, which is very specific. There is a definition of “critical injury” in the legislation, which would be much narrower than what would be reported broadly by the health authorities.

G. Kyllo: Would you anticipate that if they’re tracking information, there would just be additional criteria? They would have to make an assessment of whether it was reportable to the organization or not. Once that is implemented, it should be fairly easy. Now, you referenced the potential impact of a 10 to 20 percent increase in volume of cases. That’s pretty significant. I’m sure that it will have an impact on your budget, either within this fiscal or in future fiscals.

Could you share with us just to what level of work…? You indicated that some of the files may be open for a period of as much as seven months. For each new file, is there an ability to apply a cost estimate to those additional cases that might be coming?

J. Charlesworth: Well, just to be clear, the seven-month duration speaks to our advocacy cases. That’s the front-line advocacy work, which is distinct from the reportables that we receive addressing critical injuries or deaths.

Those reviews. Just to give you a sense, when we receive a reportable circumstance, our analysts initially take a look at it and say: “Is it a reviewable service under our act?” That’s where we get some that are not in mandate. We track those anyway, because they can be useful information for us in aggregate to see patterns and themes, which is an important responsibility for us. But for those that are in mandate, we could be involved for a very short space of time, taking a look at that file, the background information in integrated case management, and figure out: “Okay, is this something we would need to follow up on?”

We have a number of choices at that point. Sometimes we identify them as a case of concern. We will flag with the ministry that this needs to be something that they’d take a closer look at. Sometimes we will identify it for advocacy. We’ll refer it over to our advocacy team.

Other times we do what’s called a comprehensive review. That might take three to five or six months of one of our analysists, one of our investigators, going in depth into all of the paper files — sometimes there are stacks of documents, paper files — and electronic files to better understand what’s happened. Then a comprehensive review report is prepared, and we share that with the public body for the purposes of information-sharing and quality improvement.

[11:45 a.m.]

Now, some of those go all the way to investigation, which can take a couple of years. That involves witnesses. That involves deep analysis. That involves experts. That’s what we’re often known for — those deep investigation reports.

I hope that helps. But it just shows all the different opportunities and points of intersection that we have with our reportable circumstances.

G. Kyllo: Thank you very much. I appreciate it.

P. Alexis: It’s very bold to give up office space. This is the first time we’ve heard this, where the reality is everybody is working from home, so what are we going to do about it?

Can you tell me a little bit about the process that you did as far as risks, not having an actual office as opposed to keeping some sort of physical presence? I just want to hear a little bit about that, because I expect that this kind of conversation is happening in many entities throughout the province. I just want to know a little bit more about that.

J. Charlesworth: Yes. I love this question, actually.

I’ll just put in a little bit of a backdrop. Frankly, we’ve had concerns about the Burnaby office for some time. Our questions about whether it was the best place for us to be physically located pre-dated the pandemic.

The reason for that is that for our offices, we want them to be accessible to children, youth and families. This was not an office that I would say…. Even though it was near a SkyTrain station, it wasn’t accessible, warm or welcoming, so people didn’t show up. One of the reasons you would have an office, a storefront, is for people to be able to access the services in person. So that was one of the concerns and considerations we had.

Then fast-forward into the time of the pandemic. Staff worked from home. We pivoted very quickly. We created all sorts of opportunities for people to have lots of ways of being engaged and in regular communication, all that kind of thing, and lo and behold, we found that staff really, really liked it and we felt more connected to one another. It was kind of an odd outcome.

You know, when you have a headquarters in Victoria and you’ve got satellite offices, oftentimes they don’t feel connected. But because we were all in that space of having to work virtually and we implemented lots of new procedures, people found that they were feeling more connected.

The other thing. I think this happens in the Lower Mainland more so than other areas of the province. Our staff were commuting, some of them, an hour and a half each way to get to the office. None of our staff were actually physically living in Burnaby. This was a huge thing for their health and well-being, to not be commuting for hours a day. They preferred that, and because we saw absolutely no dip whatsoever in productivity, engagement, participation and outreach, we thought: “Okay. This is the time.” We looked upon that.

Then the other thing that we felt was really important — this gets to the engagement part — was: “Well, what’s the alternative?” People aren’t coming to us. We have to go to them. So once we’re through the pandemic, we will be in the Foundry centres, in the youth hubs. Like we do right now, we’re in the custody centres. We’re going to the youth, holding clinics and sessions and being more of a presence where the young people are.

So we figured it’s a win, win, win. We were able to get out of the lease without penalty.

I hope that helps. But it’s kind of an interesting journey that we’ve been on.

P. Alexis: Thank you so much. It’s really fascinating. Certainly, in my community, 70 percent commute every single day. It’s significant to hear these stories, because that is the story of the Lower Mainland. Everybody drives or takes transit to the workplace. We’ve seen significant shifts in behaviour as a result of the ability to work from home.

Thank you for that. I just wanted a little bit of understanding.

J. Charlesworth: The other thing I’d just like to add, because I think it is an important conversation we’re having now, is that it has enabled us to decentralize as well. What we’ve noticed…. We’ve said we’ve kind of got a hub in the Lower Mainland; Kelowna now, where we didn’t used to think of ourselves as having a hub; Prince George; and the south Island here.

[11:50 a.m.]

What’s happened is, and I think that it’s correlated…. Because we are open to decentralizing and people being attached to four centres now, we’ve actually had a significant increase in the number of applications for positions. We’re curious, post-pandemic, about…. When we have people more distributed around the province, how does that help us be more connected to community?

An interesting outcome. We’ll be monitoring and will share more stories later on.

J. Routledge (Chair): Thank you.

The next question is from Grace.

G. Lore: Really nice to hear from you, Commissioner.

My questions were largely covered by MLA Alexis. I just want to say, to echo her, that it’s bold. I was quite excited to read it. I think the pandemic has posed so many challenges, and we’ve heard them from all these independent offices over the last couple of days.

It’s also offered little bits of opportunity and chances to experiment a little bit and forced us to be a little nimble. I think it’s really exciting to think about taking up that opportunity that appeared before us and recentering around that service provision with those resources.

Thank you for coming to us with this kind of detailed submission — and one that’s a little bit interesting and bold.

J. Charlesworth: Thank you.

H. Sandhu: Thank you, Commissioner Charlesworth. Great presentation. Lots of details and very nicely explained.

I’m just curious. Maybe my question…. I’m not sure if it’s relevant or not. Coming from one of the health authorities as a health care worker, we do have APNs, Aboriginal patient navigators. I know, in my experience and with my colleagues, that we always involve them from the beginning.

I wonder: what role do they play to notify or report? If they don’t, can we add that to their role or have such positions so there’s that continuity of reporting and tracking of such cases?

The other thing I could think about…. I know, working with health authorities or any other sector, that FIPPA plays a big role. I wonder if that was the hindering part, when there was not enough reporting happening.

APNs do play very crucial roles from the beginning of the moment when we have such cases or patients.

J. Charlesworth: Thank you for that question. Actually, I’d like to offer a couple of things on that.

The health authorities, certainly, will be having to determine who best to keep to provide the information into those reportables and to ensure that we have a good sense of what’s happened for a child who’s experiencing a mental health crisis or substance use challenge.

I don’t know what the role of the Aboriginal patient navigators will be in that process. Having said that, I’m so appreciative of you flagging that role.

In a recently released report, the Detained report, which I mentioned, we expressly made a recommendation to enhance the role of Aboriginal patient navigators — they’re called many different things — within the health authorities for children and youth who’ve been voluntarily detained or, frankly, for children and youth who are experiencing mental health crises and are voluntarily or involuntarily admitted. There is a disproportionate number of Indigenous children that are being, we believe, admitted.

The young people themselves have said that they experience no culturally attuned care. We felt the Aboriginal patient navigators would be key resources for those young people.

Our hope is that that recommendation will be taken very seriously. We’ve seen lots of evidence that those are pivotally important roles, and the young people having access to them is important.

I’m not so sure how it will show up in terms of those reports. But I think they are vitally important to the well-being of our Indigenous kids that are in hospital.

H. Sandhu: Madam Chair, I have a follow-up comment on that. I can share that APNs have been…. Again, they have different names with each health authority, but they do play a crucial role.

[11:55 a.m.]

What’s amazing to see as a health care worker is the trust from that moment when they walk into their room. We also learn lots. The amount and depth of knowledge they have about the available resources and how to navigate the system is phenomenal.

I wonder if we could utilize that very good and exceptional resource we have and their wealth of knowledge. We’ve learned a lot from them and the approach that they have. Then again, on the receiving end, the trust that’s built from the moment they walk in is phenomenal.

J. Charlesworth: Thank you. I couldn’t agree more, based on our experience.

J. Routledge (Chair): Well, I see, in the chat, we have another question. We have time.

Greg, would you like to go ahead and ask your question.

G. Kyllo: Yes. Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Just a follow-up. With the 75 FTEs that you have and the significant number of cases, I’m just wondering what software you are using for managing all of the different case files that you have.

J. Charlesworth: We have an in-house system. It’s called CITAR. To be honest, I don’t even know what CITAR stands for anymore, but it is a system that has been tailored to the needs of the RCY.

Both our advocacy team and our reviews and investigations team use it. It’s been continually updated. We’re actually in the process of updating significantly for the advocacy side, to enable us to pull out data trends and to be able to report on that.

We don’t use an off-the-shelf, propriety system for a whole variety of reasons, just because of the nature of the work that we do and the confidentiality.

Alan, would you like to offer anything more on CITAR?

A. Markwart: I think you captured it. It’s an in-house system. It’s the case information tracking and reporting system. That’s the acronym.

J. Charlesworth: Ah, there we go. Okay.

G. Kyllo: Do you have an estimated annual cost? Do you have a full-time IT manager who just looks after the management of the system? Is it very comprehensive?

J. Charlesworth: We do have….

Okay. Over to you, Alan. That’s in your shop.

A. Markwart: Bearing in mind that we have a corporate shared-services arrangement with the Office of the Human Rights Commissioner, our IT shop provides services to both the representative’s office and the Human Rights Commissioner’s office. There are three FTEs in total. There is a chief information officer and two staff to go along.

J. Charlesworth: Just to be clear, they’re not the ones…. That’s not full time managing CITAR, our tracking-and-information system. That’s the whole range of freedom of information, protection of privacy, IT, support services to staff and management of our systems.

The system enables us to harvest information on an aggregate basis and to query the system. It allows us to do lots of things to better understand what the patterns and the trends are, which I think is so important for us in order to help inform the system and to give feedback to the system.

That was one of the things we’ve been experimenting with in this last year. How do we take this wealth of knowledge and translate it into useful information for decision-makers and planners?

G. Kyllo: Thank you very much. I appreciate that.

J. Routledge (Chair): With that, I would like to thank you, Dr. Charlesworth, and your team for engaging with us today about your really important work. It’s so remarkable the difference that you make by speaking for and on behalf of some of the most vulnerable people in our society.

I know that I, myself, as an MLA, have met some remarkable young people who have a tragic history yet are thriving and have hope for the future. A lot of it is because of the work that you do on their behalf. So thank you for that.

J. Charlesworth: Thank you so much.

J. Routledge (Chair): It’s now the end of our morning meeting. I would like to entertain a motion to adjourn.

Thank you. And we have a seconder.

Motion approved.

The committee adjourned at 12 noon.