The committee met at 1:06 p.m.

[J. Routledge in the chair.]

J. Routledge (Chair): Welcome, everyone. My name is Janet Routledge. I’m the MLA for Burnaby North and the Chair of the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services.

I’d like to acknowledge that I’m joining you from the traditional unceded territory of the Coast Salish people, the Squamish, Musqueam and Tsleil-Waututh Nations. I thank them for their stewardship of the land.

Today we are meeting again with Clayton Pecknold and his team, the Police Complaint Commissioner. We met with the commissioner earlier, and the committee had some follow-up questions. He has received the questions in advance.

I do understand that you have spent the morning in other meetings and you may not have had a chance to fully digest them. That’s fine. Answer to the best of your ability today, and we can have further exchanges in writing.

I guess, also, for context in terms of our questions, I want to preface it by saying, you know, your budget request is a big ask, and a lot of it is trying to anticipate what is largely uncharted territory. So I hope you’ll take our questions in the spirit of: we want to work with you in order to make sure that you get the resources that you need to fulfil your mandate and, at the same time, it doesn’t have an undue strain on the public purse. That’s where we’re coming from with our questions.

I know that in previous sessions, some of the commissioners who came back to meet with us chose to give some opening statements that were meant to address the questions and the theme of the questions in an integrated way, rather than sort of firing different specific questions at you.

Is that something that you would like to do?

Review of Statutory Officers

OFFICE OF THE POLICE
COMPLAINT COMMISSIONER

C. Pecknold: Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair. I think that might be helpful to the committee.

I, too, would like to acknowledge that I am speaking to you from the traditional unceded territory of the Lək̓ʷəŋin̓əŋ-​speaking peoples and of the Songhees and Esquimalt First Nations.

With me virtually is deputy commissioner Andrea Spindler; executive director Dave Van Swieten from our corporate services; and Amie Foster, who is our executive director of business operations.

Thank you very much for the opportunity to answer further questions. You’re right. We were tied up in another committee. We’ll do our best to answer them, and if there’s something we can’t cover for you, we’ll certainly provide it in writing.

Thank you for the context. I do want to emphasize that I completely understand. The committee needs to fully un­derstand our request.

[1:10 p.m.]

I acknowledge it’s a significant request. It’s a significant change management issue for the organization as well. We’re very happy to take you through some of our thinking around it and answer some questions.

I think you used the term — I don’t want to misquote you — “uncharted territory.” I think that’s absolutely correct. This is, as I understand it, one of the largest potential organizational changes for our office since its inception.

I will take you through some things, and perhaps we can follow up with any questions you might have. I thought I might just give you a sense of what planning went into our consideration of this budget request.

The committee may know that we presented to this committee — of course, it was a different makeup at the time — in the fall of last year. Well, I guess it’s not last year. It’s the previous year now.

We presented our budget, and we indicated in our budget request that we would have to do some planning, at that time, around the eventuality that Surrey would transition to a municipal police force. Some notional funding was provided to us to do some of that planning. Nominal funding, I guess, is the word. As you will know, it was reported out in your report to the Legislature that we were doing this planning.

After we came to the committee…. We also benefited from the receipt of the report of the Special Committee to Review the Police Complaint Process, which made a number of recommendations directed at government, directed at the Legislative Assembly and directed at our office. Some of those recommendations had to do with how we would perform our outreach services and some other aspects of our work. Some of them, of course, are legislative. They’re in the hands of government.

That document was incorporated into our planning, and as we initiated our planning, we looked at, to our best ability, what a new municipal police force would look like in Surrey. We looked at the needs analysis and gap analysis of our mandate. Our mandate is laid out in section 177 of the Police Act. It outlines both mandatory and discretionary responsibilities.

We also looked at what we would need to deliver on some of the recommendations out of the special committee report. We looked internally, as well, organizationally. We did some organizational consulting with respect to what services we’d need as we would transition from what is a small organization of 21 to, potentially, a larger organization. I’m sure the committee would know that there is an order-of-magnitude effect on the systems of an organization when you go to that level of growth quickly.

We have a number of internal systems. We have the obligation, of course, to maintain our requirements under the Police Act, which are complex. We have various systems internally, with respect to business practices we must operate. We, of course, have IT systems, which you’re well aware of. Then, of course, there is organizational health, with respect to succession planning and making sure that people are properly supported and trained and the ability to generally run those systems.

Some of the recommendations, for example, out of the special committee had to do with us providing better education and training to police agencies. This would be especially important, I think, with the new agencies like Surrey.

All of those considerations clearly went into our request. We then monitored very carefully the report of the section 42 committee, which the director of police services struck to examine Surrey’s request to go to a municipal police force. We examined that carefully. We were consulted by the ministry along the way. Mind you, we were consulted generally on the concept and what our office would do. We weren’t specifically consulted on the structure. That’s not our goal. So all of that went into our planning of our budget, which has been presented to you and which you have.

In terms of the planning for Surrey, the latest information, of course, we have is the corporate report from November 30, 2020, provided by the city manager to mayor and council. That corporate report says that the current workplan for the transition of the Surrey police service anticipates that most aspects of the transition will be fundamentally complete by the end of fiscal 2022.

[1:15 p.m.]

Now, I certainly understand that there is some public discussion about this timeline. We’re not involved in that public discussion. We’re not involved in the decision about whether or not, ultimately, Surrey transitions or not.

Within that report dated November 16, 2022, is, of course, the five-year budget plan and the assumptions. We have liaised with the ministry to understand if we can operate generally on those assumptions. I think those are fair assumptions that were made, but we recognize, of course, there are the uncertainties.

That is why we’ve built out the budget to be a little bit iterative, especially for this year. We had planned to bring on resources in a staged phase through the quarters. We recognize that by the time fall of this year may roll around, there may be some changes in terms of timelines that are uncertain. We have the opportunity to course correct and to adjust our timelines in terms of when we would bring on staff.

You’ll note in our budget, for example, we delayed any request for capital for a location, even though we believe that we will require some level of physical facilities in the Lower Mainland. With the pandemic and the uncertainty and the iterative process that we need to go through as Surrey stands up this unprecedented potential municipal police force, we recognize that we have to, perhaps, adjust. So that has been built into our planning.

We certainly recognize that the committee will determine our envelope of funding, and we will determine how we implement that funding in terms of what resources we bring on and when.

If I could get your questions. I’ll just pull them up.

The other thing I would emphasize a little bit is…. There are a number of factors that we’ve had to consider in terms of the organizational structure, and that has to do more with functions as opposed to individuals. I realize that we can provide some answers to requests about what analysts do, but analysts, of course, have to be supported in terms of training. They have to be supported in terms of business operations support.

We have other obligations that flow from the act. We manage adjudications, in the sense that we manage the arm’s-length adjudications that occur, but we do not control those adjudications. I can go into that a little bit more. I understand that there are some questions with respect to our adjudications.

I should emphasize, of course, that the authority or the jurisdiction that we assume, we assumed immediately when the police board was appointed. The appointment of the police board was a decision of government. They’re appointed by Lieutenant-Governor-in-Council. They are now the legal entity.

Notwithstanding that there are, to my knowledge, I think, three senior executives hired at this point and some civilians…. Our authority with respect to receiving complaints is in force now. What I mean by that is…. I was probably remiss in not explaining this in my previous appearance. Under the Police Act, citizens may make complaints about what’s called service and policy. They are broad complaints about resource allocation, broad complaints about decisions around policies and a number of areas that can arise.

We are obligated to accept those complaints. We are obligated to send them on. That is in effect now. I don’t want to give the impression that we have any, because we don’t at this point. Of course, that’s possible. The point is that our jurisdiction is immediate, and we don’t have the ability to delay it. I think I may have explained that a little bit previously.

With respect to the questions around adjudications, we can give you a little bit more detail in answering some of those. We will go through that with the deputy commissioner. I thought I would first sort of knock off one or two, if you don’t mind, of the questions that I think I can answer quickly.

One of the questions had to do with the storage of electronic data and body cameras. The RCMP nationally and the federal government had announced funding support for the rollout of body cameras. I would just point out that that is a federal decision that affects RCMP officers. To my knowledge, there is no immediate intent of any police organizations under our jurisdiction — municipal police organizations — to take on body cameras in a large sense.

[1:20 p.m.]

In terms of the data, though, that comes our way, we do recognize that there is a growing expectation that there will be digital evidence gathered in investigations. Much of this digital evidence may come our way in terms of our mandate, and we have to consider storing that.

We have made plans or at least considered the present state of our data storage needs in consultation with our IT and our appropriate shared services. But I am not anticipating at this point — of course, public policy decisions could change — that we are going to see a large-scale rollout in the immediate future of body-worn cameras, which would change that dynamic at this point. So I hope that answers that question.

With respect to the adjudications and judicial reviews, I appreciate that this is a very complex piece of legislation. I was before the Special Committee on Reforming the Police Act today, and I’d actually provided that committee with the figure of how much percentage of the Police Act is actually covered by our legislation. The rough estimate right now is about 60 to 65 percent. So it’s significantly complex.

I would like to mention…. I think it’s fairly succinct in the way it’s written. The B.C. Court of Appeal in 2020 had occasion to decide the ambit of my discretion to order a public hearing, and the unanimous decision of the court in that matter was as follows:

“Section 138 of the act directs the commissioner must arrange a public hearing if he considers there is a reasonable basis to believe that findings or penalties are incorrect or that a hearing is necessary in the public interest. The commissioner therefore has no option but to hold a public hearing if he is of the view that statutory concerns have arisen.

“He has been assigned the role of providing civilian oversight to the police complaints process. The act contemplates that there will be times when, despite internal and external investigations and discipline proceedings and further reviews by retired judges, preservation of the public confidence in the process will ultimately require a public hearing.”

I mention that mostly to explain that there are various requirements in the act with respect to ordering some of these adjudicative processes. As I may have emphasized or not, these adjudicative processes occur at arm’s length. These are retired judges who are appointed in consultation with the Associate Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. We do not control their decision-making. They may need access to legal services, for example. We do not control their decisions with respect to that, and it occurs at arm’s length.

In addition, there are provisions in the Police Act that allow for police officers as a right to request either a public hearing or a review on the record. These matters then proceed at arm’s length from us and have a number of components which may require various aspects of legal support or legal representation, and we certainly have to manage those.

Before I ask the deputy commissioner to talk a little bit more about our various judicial reviews and adjudications, I would emphasize that if it wasn’t clear in our material, there are two aspects to this. There are the adjudications I’ve just referred to, which arise out of the act. But then there are also judicial reviews. Those reviews are often brought on by litigants involved in the process and that we have to respond to.

Now, that is not to say that that is a wrong thing. It is part of the rights of individuals to have access to the courts to challenge decisions if they feel it’s necessary. We merely point out that we receive and we must respond to those reviews and, if necessary, defend the legislation and the decisions.

Perhaps I’ll just ask the deputy commissioner to talk a little bit more about some of your questions on the judicial reviews and expenditures.

[1:25 p.m.]

A. Spindler: In relation to adjudicative reviews, as the commissioner mentioned, this is an independent, arm’s-length process that is initiated through the statute. So you’ll see in our budget submissions that we have indicated on how many occasions certain adjudicative reviews have proceeded through both this fiscal year and the preceding years, as these expenses have an impact in relation to that dedicated funding envelope for these purposes.

At this current moment, we have approximately 15 different adjudicative reviews that are ongoing at this moment. Some of those are in relation to appointing retired judges before a disciplinary process occurs, and others occur at the end of the disciplinary process, where the commissioner can call a public hearing or a review on the record. As the commissioner mentioned, there are some reviews that are as of right. For example, there were four reviews arranged this fiscal year, and half of those — so two of those — are where the officer had a right to such a review.

In relation to our judicial reviews, we, right now, have seven active judicial review applications that we are currently responding to. In relation to your question about the percentage of those legal challenges…. I take that to mean judicial reviews: how many judicial reviews are as a result of or that arose from adjudicative proceedings? That’s something that we can certainly look into our numbers further, and we can provide you further information in writing, in relation to that.

What I can say in relation to the costs associated with these adjudicative reviews…. They do vary, and they vary based on the complexity of the issues being examined by that particular retired judge and also the legal arguments that are being brought forward in relation to the matter under examination. So it can be very difficult to predict what these costs will be from year to year. They can and they do vary considerably.

We can also, in writing, do some deeper analysis for you, if this is information that you’re looking for, in relation to finding an average, but I will caution that these averages can vary based on the type of matter that is before a retired judge for consideration.

C. Pecknold: I wonder if…. With your permission, Madam Chair, we’ll continue to answer a few more of the questions. We can answer more. Or would you like us to pause at this point?

J. Routledge (Chair): Given that you have received some questions and you’re prepared to answer them, I think it would be efficient if you just go ahead and do that.

C. Pecknold: Yes, happy to. Thank you.

I will turn over some questions to Mr. Van Swieten. Then maybe we will come back to the deputy commissioner, because I think there were previous questions regarding the role of analysts and what they do.

Mr. Van Swieten, are you available to answer some of the questions on the STOBs?

D. Van Swieten: I am, indeed. Thank you, Commissioner Pecknold.

Some of the questions…. These are the ones that were directed out of the tables that I’ll be able to explain and help you understand. I think the first question that we land on is that there was a question about the COVID costs, specifically over the last 12 months, that have come up. We’ve looked into the financial system and the costs. They’re about $20,000 right now, year to date, based on invoices processed. These are for things like site preparation to make sure things are cleaned down and then cleaned up again once we’re done a process. They’re for personal protection equipment, like screens, and also for recording and broadcasting of any public hearings or other events that happen.

I’ll keep going with some of the other mechanical questions, and we can come back to some of this. One of the other questions was about STOB 63, about the 305 percent increase in STOB 63 and what were some of the explanations behind that.

[1:30 p.m.]

For each new employee that we identify and that we hire, there’s a set cost per FTE that we also include in the costing for bringing them on. For example, software licensing, minor equipment we have to purchase for them and other items like that.

I would also point out that within STOB 63 is the CTS replacement cost, the Police Complaint Commissioner’s share of that. That’s another $137,000. That’s included there. That includes things like the migration and technical support from the vendor. It also includes licensing costs.

In relation to STOB 85, there was a question about that increase. That is the STOB where the commissioner pays the Ombudsperson for the corporate shared services, which is my shop. The sharp increase in there is a model that we’ve been before the committee before to explain, and there’s some historical information. I think I can cover it in three or four bullets here that help explain that number.

First up, each year the corporate shared services department has inflationary costs — so the staff salaries increase — just like other organizations do. Those increased costs are split between the four offices in the shared-services model that is hosted. Each office pays their prorated share based on supported positions within each office.

The second category is corporate shared services growth. For each new position that is proposed by one of the four supported offices, there’s an amount of $10,000 added to that position that’s sent to corporate shared services. Eventually, if there are enough positions, it creates enough funding that we can add to our FTE complement and make sure that corporate shared services is staying in pace with the growth of our client organizations, the four independent offices. So that’s a second component.

This year there’s a third component that’s unique. I’d categorize it as one time for the next two years. That’s related to the CTS replacement, where we will be hiring a couple of staff dedicated to that CTS replacement. Of course, each office is picking up a share of that replacement.

That speaks to the increases that, basically, come through that STOB 85 number.

The last category is on expenditures related to the capital dollar. I believe there was $390,000 that has been requested. Again, for each new staff member that starts with us, we do have to buy them a computer, and occasionally there’s going to have to be a desk or a chair or something that fits in that category. So we have an amount that’s equal to about $3,000 per FTE to cover that.

We’ve also got…. As Commissioner Pecknold alluded to, a lot of the evidence files that come through the office are video in nature, and they take a tremendous amount of storage space. So looking forward at our current projection, the size of the storage we need, and then future projection, we’re in need to buy additional server space for that.

Finally, of course, the CTS cost, which we’ve been before the committee to discuss earlier, is $274,000 in the capital costs. You’ll see some of this detail broken down in table 4 of the templates that were submitted to the committee. This just gives, perhaps, a bit more flavour to what those items are.

Madam Chair, that’s all the information I have now. I turn it back to you.

C. Pecknold: Actually, if I may add. With respect to the COVID-related costs, the costs that Mr. Van Swieten noted clearly are what I might refer to as hard costs.

In addition, because of the shifting public health orders, which had to shift for obvious reasons…. Various proceedings would be scheduled and then, perhaps, have to be adjourned. Of course, that creates the necessity for lawyers to get involved, to find times adjourned. There would be associated legal costs because of that churn.

I don’t think we’ve captured it in specific numbers, but that’s certainly built into the overall judicial costs. That has, certainly, been a bit of a challenge. There’s just no two ways about it.

[1:35 p.m.]

Carrying on, I believe there were some questions about how our analysts work, from a previous request. I wonder if Deputy Spindler could go through that, and how they’re trained, I believe.

A. Spindler: Certainly. Our investigative analysts are responsible for providing impartial civilian oversight over police misconduct investigations that are completed by what are police investigators within a particular police agency.

This requires an analyst who does this work to become a subject-matter expert, essentially, in the police complaints process and the legislation governing this process. As indicated by the courts, this legislation is highly specialized and very complex. It is incredibly difficult to parachute someone into the organization and expect them to perform at the capacity and competency that is required of them.

They are responsible for ensuring these investigations are thorough, professional and partial. This includes providing advice to investigators and engaging in the analytical review of investigative materials. The nature of this oversight work is that it is contemporaneous, in that an analyst must be up to speed on all aspects of multiple investigations assigned to them at any given time.

On average, an analyst will be responsible for approximately 20 active investigations, in addition to their other responsibilities. They will need to know everything that is going on within that investigation and provide investigative advice to that investigator, and they’re reviewing materials in relation to ensuring that the investigation is thorough and competent and also to ensure that all relevant steps are being undertaken.

These investigations can vary significantly in complexity in both the nature and seriousness of the misconduct, but also procedurally. The allegations that this office receives can vary in complexity. Some matters can be diverted and streamed through alternative dispute resolution–type processes. But there are other allegations that require full investigation and that require investigative analysts to dive significantly into investigative materials.

Allegations also can include, at times, allegations involving criminal conduct of officers. That requires analysts to be cognizant and to be conversant in relation to criminal matters.

Approximately half of all the allegations of misconduct that come from complaints relate to an abuse of a police officer’s powers or allegations of such, such as unlawful arrest, detentions or police stops, excessive uses of force, detentions or searches. So in addition to the requirement of having a solid understanding of police powers, analysts also have to be in tune and pay attention to any particular underlying issues such as issues of racism, discrimination or other types of racial profiling that may occur.

They also have to offer substantive advice to executive management and engage in principle decision-making with respect to substantive issues under the Police Act. They are assigned a broad range of issues that require under­standing relevant legislation, police operations and police powers, and a thorough understanding of the complaints process.

In relation to the training of analysts, the hiring process takes approximately two to three months from the time a position is posted to when a person can be hired and brought into the organization. There are both formal and informal orientations to this training.

Depending on their backgrounds, they will be paired with a colleague who can assist them in their day-to-day understanding of the work, and they will take on a caseload that will grow and become more complex as their experience grows. It traditionally does take an analyst upwards of two years to fully realize all of their responsibilities that are required for that position.

[1:40 p.m.]

The training focuses on four main areas: the actual Police Act legislation; police operations, policies and procedures; the law around police powers; and also having an understanding of the administrative law, particularly in relation to statutory interpretation.

As I mentioned earlier, analysts are required to become subject-matter experts in these areas, as we have been tasked with supervising the police disciplinary regime regarding police misconduct. This work has become increasingly complex and legalistic.

Much of an analyst’s development comes from on-the-job training — that is, training that they are not going to get from simply reading the legislation or looking at a flow chart. They have to get exposure to different types of matters and, through a structured and supportive process, they can then broaden their experience and expertise in increasingly complex matters.

Commissioner Pecknold, back to you.

C. Pecknold: Thank you very much.

The only thing I would add is that we are, as you know, administrating a discipline regime that has both timelines and requirements but also must be procedurally fair both to police officers, of course, and to complainants as well. A good portion of what analysts do is making sure that they are paying special attention to keeping complainants informed of their rights, that they are explaining the process. So that comes with some important skills that we try to hire towards but we also train towards, such as trauma-informed practice, to name one.

The organization is, at this point, about two-thirds civilian in terms of civilian versus former police officers. We strive to hire strongly from a civilian side of the equation and keep that balance high. There are certain positions where, because of the seriousness of the conduct or the complexity — because it relates to associated potential criminal investigations and can involve highly complex areas of criminal law — we do hire specialists with some background. That’s not really something that can be picked up very easily, so we have to focus on acquiring those backgrounds as well.

We also, moving forward, especially with the potential to increase, want to make sure that our hiring is reflective of the community that we are going to be serving, so we are looking very carefully at our processes for hiring to make sure that we can be accessible and a desirable place to come and work for Indigenous persons, people from racialized communities. We want to make sure that we’re reflective of the community we serve, especially with respect to a diverse community in Surrey.

There was a question, I think, about contracting for analysts. That’s not really something that we see that we can do. Obviously, if somebody is contracted, they can look for other opportunities and, because of the complexity…. We do have the ability to bring in specialists. It says in the Police Act, for example, part 9, that I may appoint employees to fulfil the mandate and the statutes. But it also says that I can appoint specialists. We do that on occasion if we need a specialist. What comes to mind is perhaps something to do with technology or something to do with a specific use-of-force issue or something like that.

We also contract with services. For example, we have a contract with an Indigenous cultural safety adviser and that sort of thing. Those judgements are made sort of based on the function that we’re looking for, what’s available in the marketplace and what makes good economic sense as well, of course.

I think I’ve covered most of them. I apologize for being a little disjointed. Like I say, we were at another committee this morning. I think I will pause there at this point. I’m sure we’ve probably missed one or two things, but we’re happy to take the questions.

J. Routledge (Chair): Thank you, Commissioner.

I will turn it over to committee members to ask questions in response to what you’ve provided for us today.

[1:45 p.m.]

B. Stewart (Deputy Chair): Thank you, Commissioner and Deputy Commissioner and Dave, for your comprehensive answer. Actually, it is a little bit all over the place. I guess when I look at this and I hear your explanations to some of the questions, there’s…. The driving issue in this is, obviously, where Surrey police is at. It’s driving the increase in staffing, training, IT — the whole ball of wax.

What I didn’t really hear…. I heard about the report that you said you received from the city manager on November 30 of 2020, which was an update, and they hope to have things wrapped up or complete by the end of fiscal 2022. I guess what I’m looking for is some…. Obviously, you’re trying to dissect and understand that.

Can you give us a better sense as to…? I mean, rather than just blindly kind of going ahead as if this is going to unfold the way that it’s reported…. Well, it’s more than in the newspaper. But I’m just talking about…. Have you got more to add on that so that there’s a degree of certainty for the committee members to knowing that…?

It’s my understanding that this small police board was set up to hire a chief to give a plan. I guess what I’m trying…. That’s my understanding. I could be wrong on that, but they were to come back to council, report out that: “Here’s the plan, and this is what you need to do to execute on that.” Now, I don’t know what’s in that November 30 document. But maybe you could help us better understand that.

C. Pecknold: Right. Well, thank you. That is, of course, an excellent question.

It is not my understanding that the board is creating a plan and then it will be: are we going ahead or not? There may be information to that effect. But that’s not…. We can certainly supply the corporate report. But in our discussions, all the components are being planned for. I would expect — I don’t have any inside knowledge, and nor would I be given this — that they will be negotiating a collective agreement, for example. I have no doubt that that’s underway, because they’ll be having to hire.

Our planning assumption, based on all our information, is that the decision has been made, the police board has been hired and the executives have been hired, and they are now building out the systems. The information we have, of course, is that the goal, based on that report, was it would be substantially complete — and that’s what the document says — in 2022. I recognize that that may or may not occur, depending on issues that come up.

When we looked at how we would phase our hiring throughout the next fiscal year, recognizing that 2022 to the city of Surrey is a calendar year…. They operate on a calendar year. We operate on a fiscal year. We looked at early hiring in April, delaying some hiring to June, and then delaying hiring to September, Q3, and then further hiring in Q4, recognizing we would have more information by the time we came to see you, for example, in the fall.

We fully recognize that in the fall, we may have updated information, and we may have to push out some of that later hiring to further time frames. But we wanted to make sure that the first initial hiring was with respect to those resources that we knew would take the longest time to build up their expertise, as the deputy mentioned, and also to make sure that we brought in the right resources to support the systems we would need.

We operate on a delegated authority model. All deci­sions flow from the commissioner. Some are non-delegable, but many are. So we have a delegation matrix, and it goes out through the organization. Part of that, of course, is a requirement that we have the right supervision in place, and, as the deputy has mentioned, the right training in place.

It's not my understanding, though, to be clear to answer your question, that this is a planning phase of the police board and then future decisions. We’re happy to provide that document, but that it is not the information that we have. We are basing this on the fact that the decision has been made, that a Surrey police board is appointed and that they are in the process of planning the organization, hiring and building the organization out.

[1:50 p.m.]

J. Routledge (Chair): Thank you.

Do we have other questions?

P. Alexis: I want to go back to the fact that you said that it’s already in effect. I’m just going to go back to my notes so that I’ve got it clear. “The authority to receive complaints is now in effect. No ability to delay it.” Then I think I wrote down: “Service and policy.” Can you explain that to me, please?

C. Pecknold: Yes. I am sorry. I should have gone into more detail.

I should emphasize this: we deal with complaints about police officer conduct. We deal, in a smaller way, with what are called internal discipline matters. For example, if there’s a performance issue with respect to a police officer, then there’s a requirement that it be examined internally. We also deal with requests for orders of investigation. A police organization may say: “We’re asking that you independently order this investigation.” Or I, as commissioner, can independently, on my own initiative, order an investigation because something has come to my attention.

Although our workload is driven a lot by complaints, it’s also driven by orders for investigation. It’s also driven by — and this is not something that would immediately be involved in Surrey — what are called mandatory external investigations. So if a person suffers serious injury or harm, or they die, then it is mandatory that I must order an investigation into that under the act.

The category that I was just describing is called service and policy complaints. A citizen can make a complaint about the services and policies of a municipal police service at the board. Now, the board is responsible to manage those complaints, but they’re quite broad. They can deal with the adequacy of various programs and policies, and they can deal with resource allocations and things like that. We report out on the numbers; I can probably get the numbers. I’m not suggesting that we have any at this point. Of course, the public would have a right to them, but we don’t have them.

In terms of those, we tend to manage them, analyze them, refer them to the board, consider whether the board’s response was effective or not. We may refer it back to the board. Complainants may request that we review something. Or we may make recommendations to the director of police services, to government, that they do something. It’s another avenue of redress for the public.

That’s probably not as technical an answer as the deputy could have given, but that’s what it is.

P. Alexis: I understand what you’re referring to now. Thank you for clarifying.

J. Routledge (Chair): Anyone else have a question? Okay, perhaps I could ask a question.

I think right now we are living in a time in which there is a lot of public attention with regard to racial profiling, police brutality. This is what the public is paying attention to now. In terms of hiring more analysts and the kind of training that they would need to receive, you had talked about how complex that is — the requirements.

I’m just wondering. In what way is it taken into consideration that a lot of the complaints might be of that nature? I don’t want to presuppose what your answer might be, but I’m just wondering what that does in terms of the staff requirements that you have.

C. Pecknold: Actually, that is a very good point. The present dialogue — on police accountability, the review of the Police Act, concerns about systemic racism and racism generally — certainly means that we’ve had to look very carefully, and in response to the special committee reports, at our access to our organization, our outreach activities, how we are reducing potential barriers to access the police complaint system. For example, considering our language in our outward-facing material, making sure that’s in — or working towards ensuring that’s it’s in — a diversity of languages.

[1:55 p.m.]

In terms of hiring, we’ve done a review of our internal hiring strategy to make sure that we’re going more broadly and, perhaps, non-traditionally to seek new analysts, especially with respect to how we on-board, how we recruit, where we recruit. Certainly, we want to recruit from a broader diversity of community.

The advice we have, clearly, is that you don’t necessarily just add it to the job description. You have to think deeply about what skills you want. We are training internally in GBA+, in trauma-informed practice, in San’yas cultural safety training and mental health training because often many complainants who come to us are having challenges to their lives that need special attention and relationships, or at least communication skills, with respect to those needs.

We’re talking about a complex process. We recognize that there are members of the community, perhaps suffering vulnerabilities, or members of the Indigenous community, for example, who don’t wish to engage our process because it’s highly legalistic. How we communicate, how we reach out and how our employees manage those is critical. We need to think it through in terms of our hiring processes.

Maybe the deputy has a little bit more on that.

A. Spindler: You’ve brought forward, I think, something that a lot of agencies and organizations are really having to look at internally — their processes in relation to not only recruiting from more diverse areas but also looking at that on-boarding process and bringing individuals who have different lived experiences and who bring significant value and perspective to an organization such as the OPCC in relation to examining these issues, such as racial profiling or racism in relation to, say, police stops or police uses of force.

It’s very important that we look at not only the recruitment but also how different individuals are on-boarded through the organization and all of our internal processes in relation to how we respond to the diverse communities in the province of B.C. That’s where we need to be focusing in on our outreach efforts and bolstering the staff who can assist and connect with those complainants to provide them with culturally appropriate supports so they can look at accessibility to the complaints process.

Also, in relation to our staff and our office, many individuals who are looking to file a complaint with this office may be in a moment of crisis themselves. So it’s also about giving the tools to our staff to be able to manage those conversations effectively. That’s also something that we’re looking at in relation to the training of all of our staff within this organization — to be able to provide that assistance to people who do want to access the complaints process.

M. Starchuk: Thank you to all of you for today’s notes. At a certain point, I was wondering if you were able to see what I was writing down. My notes are reflective of: “What would a job posting look like? What would the qualifications be?” You’ve almost filled out everything that’s there.

What I’m hearing is that a lot of what’s coming forward is experience and the mentorship that falls within the experience. Your ratio is two-thirds civilian. That’s inside of there. I think I have an understanding of the time frame that’s there.

[2:00 p.m.]

I’m curious as to whether or not…. I think the Chair had kind of hinted around this. I think in today’s day and age, with these things — everybody’s carrying one — the work of your office will highly anticipate going up because of the social media aspect of it. Everybody wants to put their phone and their camera forward to create the problem that’s there at times.

When we take a look at how your hiring process is and the time that it takes to get that person to the point of being very competent and to be able to handle all of those things that are there, how does that correlate to other provinces and their systems that they have?

I’m not saying that there’s a reinvention of the wheel, but just for common practises, is what we’re doing in our province comparable to other places with how that gets itself in place?

C. Pecknold: Well, that’s an excellent question that I’m not sure I know. I know that the deputy has more experience, for example, with our counterpart in Ontario, which I think would be, I’m guessing, the next closest — what’s referred to as the OIPRD. But I don’t have an in-depth knowledge of their organization.

Andrea, do you?

A. Spindler: When you look at similar agencies across Canada, I would say Ontario and B.C. are probably the most comparable, so to speak, in relation to the mandate and the extent of oversight, because the level of oversight in British Columbia is quite significant compared to other provinces. It can be difficult to do a direct comparison, but Ontario is a good model.

In Ontario, there are a lot of good lessons to be learned in relation to it — the OIPRD — particularly in terms of their diversity around their hiring.

Internally here, we’ve reached out to other organizations in B.C., other independent offices and looked at getting advice from them in relation to this conversation around making your organization more diverse and inclusive. We have had those conversations with other agencies in this province.

But certainly, it is something that we could look to in relation to other provinces. I would say Ontario would probably be the most comparable agency with the OPCC.

C. Pecknold: Thank you. The only thing I would add is that some of the complexity is driven by the uniqueness of the legislation that we have here in B.C. This legislation was brought in, in 2010, after a very comprehensive audit and review by the late Mr. Justice Josiah Wood, who made the decision or, at least, made the policy recommendation as to how it would work. Would the investigations be conducted by an agency, or would we provide oversight over the investigations and they’d remain with the police? That was the policy decision made at that time.

J. Routledge (Chair): Thank you. It looks like we have time for a last question from MLA Stewart.

B. Stewart (Deputy Chair): Okay. Thanks very much. Commissioner, I just wanted to ask you….

In some notes, I read that there was a comprehensive strategic plan being done last year, and it was being worked on. I didn’t see that in the documents that you supplied us, and I’m assuming it’s complete because there was some reference to it in terms of the funding and waiting for that to be complete. I see the service plans there, but it said… A strategic review is the way it was referred to.

Second thing. The other document that you mentioned was the Surrey one that you received that you agreed could be shared, and I would be interested in just reviewing that, if we could.

I want to ask the last question. The question, actually, is about the supplementary funding that you mentioned in your document in your funding here. It says that since 2011, adjudication costs have exceeded the initial approved dedicated funding in all but two years, which is summarized in our questions.

I guess the real question is: what’s wrong with the system that we can’t figure this out or budget for it? There were a lot of questions about how you estimate this thing.

[2:05 p.m.]

Are we going to do more of the same where you’re going to come back to the committee each year with a request after the fact, or is there a way to fix this?

C. Pecknold: The last question is a very good question. I’ll do my best to answer.

The previous question…. I just want to make sure I’m talking about the right documents. We did have an intent for an internal strategic plan. That got delayed because of COVID, frankly, so we focused on doing the planning for Surrey. We incorporated the recommendations of the special committee into our service plan. So that is essentially our plan — the service plan as it’s written there.

That’s the planning that we were referring to. We haven’t done, as I intended to when I was first appointed, the broad strategic plan because of the recommendations and the need to put that into our service plan. So I’m not sure if that’s the plan that Ben has referred to, but if there’s something else, we’ll see if we can get that to you.

In terms of the system, it’s so varied and dependent on access of individuals and the complexity and their right to access the courts to challenge some of these decisions. If you were to step away, from 30,000 feet, I would say the same thing that I said to the special committee today — that if we reduce some complexity in the legislation, we reduce the opportunity for disagreement and conflict which can result in legal challenges. The adjudicative process that we manage, though, is arm’s length, as I’ve mentioned. And other than being represented, we cannot control the decision-making that occurs with these appointed adjudicators or the public hearing counsel that’s appointed.

Could, through a legislative review, some changes to the act be made that would allow these things to mitigated? Yes, I believe that could be done. That would require legislative change.

In terms of access to the courts’ judicial review, we have been…. All the ones that are outstanding right now — we are responding to those. We did not initiate them. The only thing I would add is that the only matter that I’ve initiated since my appointment was to intervene in a case with the IIO where an important issue of police officers’ cooperation with the IIO and with us was at issue. I chose to intervene in that matter at the Court of Appeal. That’s the only litigation that I’ve initiated myself.

J. Routledge (Chair): Okay, thank you. I don’t see any other burning questions that want to be asked at this time.

I want to thank you very much, on behalf of the committee, for coming back. I can say, for myself, that I have a much fuller appreciation of what your mandate is, how you fulfil it and the conditions under which you do it. Thank you very much for joining us.

C. Pecknold: Thank you for the opportunity. If there’s anything else, we will certainly provide it to you.

J. Routledge (Chair): Thanks so much.

Shall we just take two minutes? Is anyone disagreeing with two minutes? Okay, let’s take a two-minute recess.

The committee recessed from 2:08 p.m. to 2:13 p.m.

[J. Routledge in the chair.]

J. Routledge (Chair): Welcome back, everybody. We’re back in session. My name is Janet Routledge. I’m the MLA for Burnaby North and Chair of the Select Standing Committee on Finance and Government Services. This afternoon we are meeting with the Human Rights Commissioner, Kasari Govender, and her staff.

Welcome, Commissioner. You presented your proposed budget to us last week, and the committee has a few questions. I understand that either some of the specific questions or general areas that we would like to get some more information about you have received already.

I also understand that you may have been appearing before a committee this morning and may not have had much of an opportunity to digest it all, so we’ll take that into account. If there are questions you can answer this afternoon — we have roughly an hour — that would be great. If not, you could follow up in writing.

[2:15 p.m.]

What we will do, if this works for you, is give you an opportunity to, since you’ve received the questions, answer them in your own way and your own pace, putting the answers all together, if that’s efficient for you. If people still have questions, then we’ll follow up. I hope that’s clear.

OFFICE OF THE
HUMAN RIGHTS COMMISSIONER

K. Govender: All right. Thank you, Chair, for the opportunity to come back and, hopefully, help resolve any outstanding questions or curiosities.

I am happy to do as suggested and to go through what I understand to be the questions. Please feel free, if I am going beyond what you were hoping to hear from me….

I guess I would start…. Perhaps I’ll start, actually, with a little bit of role clarity. I understand that there was a question about what the difference is and what the roles are of the Human Rights Tribunal versus the commission. That might be useful to start with, from a foundational perspective.

The Human Rights Tribunal is a body that is within the administrative law system. It reports to government through the Attorney General. It is a body that is charged with adjudicating human rights complaints. That means that under the human rights code, there are certain areas that are prohibited forms of discrimination.

For example, in the area of employment, you can’t discriminate on the basis of race. So if somebody felt they had been discriminated against on that basis, they could bring a complaint to the Human Rights Tribunal and seek a resolution. That might be through a settlement. It might be through mediation. It might be through a hearing and a decision, much as a court would do a decision. So there’d be a live hearing.

They are able to provide systemic remedies to decisions. For example, there was a case about racism in the context of policing, and one of the remedies they ordered was in regard to an increased training component.

Other than that limited way, they don’t deal with systemic issues. They’re not there to prevent human rights issues from occurring in the first place. They do none of that work. They don’t have an education function. They don’t do big public inquiries. They don’t work on systemic issues beyond the parties that are before them.

Our role, of course, is the flip side of that. It is entirely based on systemic issues. Our goal is to address human rights issues in a way that will prevent future human rights issues from arising.

Importantly, the Human Rights Tribunal is bound to make decisions within the four corners of the human rights code, which is only on employment, the provision of services that are usually available to the public, housing and a couple of other smaller areas. But those are the main areas.

Because my mandate includes international human rights law, I deal with all human rights. The scope of human rights that we can deal with at our office is much, much broader and goes beyond the realm of discrimination. Although much of our work is focused on discrimination and equality issues, it goes far beyond that to look at freedoms, for example. It goes beyond that to look at economic rights — the rights around poverty and housing, for example.

We have a much broader mandate in that way, and we do not adjudicate individual complaints. They don’t deal with any of that broader mandate around human rights, and they don’t deal with trying to prevent human rights issues from arising in the first place.

I think that’s one key piece I’ll put out there foundationally. Maybe, other than that, I’ll just go through my notes and see if I can answer some of the more specific questions.

I understand there were some questions on COVID around: what is the impact on our work now, and what is the impact going forward?

Our impact now is that we have…. It is very hard to estimate exactly how much of our staff time has gone towards COVID because, as I’m sure many of you on the call can relate, everything is viewed now through the lens of COVID. So it’s a little bit hard to separate. We’ve estimated that it’s diverted about a third of our time, of all staff time, but again, that’s a very difficult number to come up with. It has influenced the way we work, as well as our workload, and certainly has influenced the human rights issues that we work on and the urgency of those human rights issues.

You heard me talk quite a bit last time about the rise of hate and white supremacy during this time. You heard me talk about masking and some of the human rights issues that have arisen directly in regard to the orders around public health. You heard me talk about homelessness and the rise of poverty and unemployment. Those are just some of the examples.

Actually, reflecting on those examples, these are not issues we anticipate going away overnight at the end of this pandemic. We have returned, for example, to mid-’80s levels of women’s participation in the workforce. We know that that has significant implications for gender equality in the province that will not snap back overnight and that will continue to have implications for gender equality and, therefore, the work that we do.

[2:20 p.m.]

That’s true for poverty. That’s true for the rise in racism and hate. I think once we’ve uncovered this level of racism and hate in our province, it’s going to be hard to put the lid back on. It’s something we’ll work very hard on addressing but that, again, will not disappear overnight.

The worsening opioid crisis and the isolation and impact faced and harassment faced by people with disabilities will also not disappear. So these issues we expect to have long-lasting implications in our work.

We are not a direct service organization, as you know, but our office typically interacts with a number of public inquiries every week. We get those, of course, through telephone, email and social media. We saw a dramatic increase in the number of public requests for information from the beginning of the pandemic, in April. Specifically, a significant spike in the number of requests, of course, that are pandemic-related has just really gone up over this whole time. The average calls on topics have increased by 233 percent since April, and COVID-specific emails have seen a 775 percent increase since April. So a significant impact on our engagement team.

In terms of the budget, a shift, of course, from in-person to virtual engagements has had a positive impact on our travel budget. We haven’t spent much of that. But we’ve redirected that towards IT in order to address the IT needs that we’ve had in order to communicate with our fast-growing, diverse team. Of course, we’ve been doing much of our hiring over this time of virtual engagement, so it’s put a unique pressure on this level of communication.

We have reallocated some of that travel money to res­pond to budget pressures resulting from emerging projects that result from COVID, such as the guidance we put out on masking. We did translations into many languages, which is quite costly. That was just one example of the way those funds have been redirected.

Then, finally, one of the other impacts of COVID on our budget has been some delays in hiring as a result of the pandemic. A number of reasons for that. I’m sure you can imagine some of them. One of the more positive ones, I think, has been a huge number of people applying. I’m not sure if that’s COVID-related, but it’s possible. We’ve had upwards of 300 applicants for positions. So a huge, huge number of people that we are moving through as well as just delays in communication and other delays. That’s slowed down some of the budget spending.

I’m just remembering. I don’t have it quite organized in my notes the way you asked it. So I’ll just see if I can…. I know that there was a question about looking at, basically, why the increase, I think, that we’re asking for. I want to start that by being really clear that this is not so much coming back for an increase as much as it is the building of an organization.

We anticipated from the beginning this would be part of the trajectory of building an organization. We understood from the committee at the time that they shared that understanding that the start-up budget would be exactly that, a start-up budget. Of course, starting an organization from scratch requires a growing budget, and the first three years or so is the ramp-up of bringing on a full complement of staff and our staff team.

We have built the organization on that anticipation of growth that we shared with the previous committee, although, of course, we haven’t committed any funds beyond what we have. We have certainly built the scope of the organization according to this being part of the build-up. And then we essentially level out after this year. We actually go down a little bit because there are some expenses associated with building the organization that we won’t continue — for example, extra HR staff to help us facilitate that. We won’t need that level of support, going forward.

I hope that helps address that question. I think there was a question about what the implications would be if we did not get the budget we required. Is that one of the questions that I should be answering at this point?

J. Routledge (Chair): I think that’s a good one.

K. Govender: Okay. Great.

The implications of not getting the funding would be multiple. I mean, essentially, it would hinder my ability to fulfil my legislative mandate, in my view. We’d have to reduce the scope of our project work, but I’ll give you some more specifics about what that means.

[2:25 p.m.]

The final positions that we have left to fill are positions required to respond to public requests for information. That’s within our engagement team. Special program ap­provals — I’ll talk a little bit more about that in a moment. That’s within our policy team. Indigenous-specific engagements — again, within our engagement team. And public inquiries, within our legal team.

Without any increase in the coming fiscal, we will not be able to hire for these remaining positions, and this will have the following impact: the public requests for information will experience significant delays. As I’ve noted, we have faced a significant increase over this time. Certainly, some of those are COVID-related, but we also anticipate that as we become more and more well known, those calls will also be a driver of those calls. A budget decrease would mean limited staff available to answer calls and emails, including significant delays of weeks, not days.

Special programs is a function that we have under the legislation where we have to examine applications that are made to us by employers and other duty-bearers. By duty-bearers, I mean employers, service providers and housing providers. These primarily come from employers, and they are requests, usually around employment equity.

They can apply, basically, to be able to put into place a program that will help meet the goals of the human rights code but may, in the process, treat people differently. For example, an Indigenous-specific hire for an Indigenous university program — you know, Indigenous studies or something in the university. They might apply to have their program facilitator be Indigenous, and they don’t want to have a human rights complaint on that basis, of course. They apply to us for an exemption from the human rights code for that purpose.

That’s called special programs. We expect to face significant delays in that regard if we’re not able to bring on additional resources. Again, that is a growing body. That used to be held by the Human Rights Tribunal and has been passed over to us.

The scope of our inquiries will be curtailed. The impact of comprehensive human rights inquiries can be profound. I’m sure many on the call will remember, for example, the Oppal Inquiry into missing and murdered women here in the province or the inquiry into the man who was killed by a Taser. These are important public policy issues that need to be aired.

I wanted to give an example of the Ontario Human Rights Commission’s recent inquiry. For those who might have heard me in my earlier appearance today, I talked about this inquiry as well. The Ontario Human Rights Commission is doing an inquiry into racial profiling by the Toronto police service. They found, among other things, that Black people in Toronto are 20 times more likely to be killed than white people by the police — to be fatally shot. That’s just one finding I thought I’d use just to demonstrate what an important inquiry this is and what important public policy interests are at stake.

The inquiry has resulted in commitments from the police service and from the city of Toronto and the province to take concrete policy and practical steps to address these issues. Such an inquiry is very resource-intensive, and we would not have the ability to undertake something of that scope without additional resources.

Finally, we’ve been unable to hire our manager of Indigenous engagement, which is one of the positions that’s still outstanding, which of course would compromise our ability to fulfil our obligations under DRIPA, among other things.

In addition to that, some programs require additional hard expenses, and these will be compromised with a reduced budget. Multilingual and accessible program delivery will be reduced. Translation and accessibility considerations are an expensive and important piece of the work, and we are pleased that we are able to provide those kinds of services, but that will be compromised if don’t have these additional funds.

Meaningful and ongoing engagement across the prov­ince in the form of our project I described to you last time, called our baseline study, to establish what the state of human rights is in the province, how we can report back to British Columbians about what that is and also ensure that we have a baseline to understand progress we make over time on human rights…. That is a resource-intensive project because it requires significant on-the-ground engagement, community engagement, and we will have to reduce the number of communities and the breadth of that work if we don’t get these additional funds.

Perhaps I can turn now to evaluation. I think there was a question about performance matrix, and I noted, I think, before that we have integrated evaluation into our strategic planning from the outset.

[2:30 p.m.]

It really ties in well to that baseline project I just mentioned. I want to note that we are thinking of this project through a number of different types of indicators. We have commitment indicators. That means commitments made by duty-bearers as a result of our work, of our advocacy, our education. There are process indicators, which are really about relationship-building and how well the process is aligned with human rights approaches and decolonizing principles.

We have the more traditional output measures. These things are what we are already collecting and including. We’ve included them in our first annual report, which you have in front of you. That’s the number of engagements, volume of calls and emails, interactions with our website and social media, and so on. And outcome-focused measures, measures looking at the effectiveness of the results and whether or not those would be achieved.

I wonder if I could pass over now to my deputy, Stephanie Garrett, to help fill in some of this. She has a lot of expertise in evaluation and is leading this work for our office.

S. Garrett: Thanks, Kasari.

As Kasari has mentioned, evaluation has been baked into our processes from day one. What that has meant is we’ve had the opportunity to go through a facilitated process to establish a theory of change. That is available within our strategic plan, which you have in front of you.

Through that process, we developed a really innovative, multi-dimensional approach to evaluation that takes into account the core elements of a human rights–based ap­proach and the evaluation elements of that.

That includes the collection of demographic and other disaggregated data; multimodal approaches and methods from traditional, like surveys and polling, to participatory processes through community and co-creating indicators for our office with the stakeholders who are impacted by our work; decolonizing approaches, as the commissioner has mentioned, related to how we build respectful relationships through reciprocity, relevance and other elements; and, finally, through key traditional and well-evidenced processes in international development and social sectors around efficiency, sustainability, impact. We’ve taken all of those together.

This isn’t a process that occurs immediately, at the outset. This is something that we did a phase 1 approach to, in our first year, through our strategic planning at a high level. We’re working with external consultants who are lead evaluators — actually, the president of the Canadian evaluators association — and a team who are supporting us, currently, to get down into the details of the specific measures that we’re going to be using and around the key performance measures, metrics and targets that will be associated with those.

We’ve done quite an extensive planning process. I would say one of the benefits of this is not only internal to our organization but in that we hope, as one of the deliverables of this, we will be able to put out a resource for British Columbians and organizations who are duty-bearers, whether they be service providers and players or landlords, on how they can evaluate their performance from a human rights–based approach as well.

K. Govender: Thank you, Stephanie.

I’d like to turn to…. There was a question about education initiatives and what our plans are around education going forward. So I thought I would headlight four different areas that we have planned for the year ahead.

We have a public engagement campaign, building on the success of the “Am I racist?” campaign, which I talked about last time — that is the campaign that we have on the side of bus shelters and buses — as well as significant web components for education purposes.

I will say, actually, following up on the evaluation conversation that we just spoke to, that some of the feedback we’ve received in regard to that campaign was…. There’s a high school teacher in the Fraser Valley who is going to be using the website materials in her classroom. There are faculty at Vancouver Island University that are distributing our web pages within their department, using it to facilitate a conversation on human rights. The Centre for Student Involvement and Careers is working in partnership with the Equity and Inclusion Office at UBC to develop an online module for first-year students relying on our website content.

That’s some of the success that we’ll be building on to launch another public awareness campaign, likely in the fall.

[2:35 p.m.]

We will be developing foundational public legal information — web, print and video materials — for rights holders and duty-bearers, including some of the foundational human rights materials such as…. What are the basic obligations of employers towards employees around disability and pregnancy? What are service provider obligations around guide dogs? Answering all of these kinds of questions.

We’re going to be building on our series of short shareable video products to communicate some of those same messages.

We are also developing workshops. Again, for rights holders and duty-bearers. That includes both online learning components — there are some IT needs there to develop some of the adult learning components — as well as live virtual workshops and materials aimed at youth.

We have a storytelling project that’s aimed at building empathy through the means of telling the stories of those who have lived through some of the crucial human rights issues and advocacy in our province.

Those are some of the education initiatives. I’m not sure if I should pause there for a question or move on to some of the more budget-specific questions that were asked about our capital budget and budget comparisons with other entities.

J. Routledge (Chair): I think you should just keep going and answer those other questions. I know I have a number of…. I’m quite interested in what you’ve said already, but I’m aware of the time. So I think you should keep going.

K. Govender: Sure. I will continue, then.

You’ve asked about the budget processes or where we’re at for our capital budget on our expenses for the Vancouver office. We anticipate…. We had a $1.2 million capital budget. It’s maybe important to note a couple of things here.

First of all, we sought the go-ahead from the committee before proceeding with the leasing of this, along with the renovations that were required, and we received that go-ahead. We have done all of this through the real property division. So the lease is not held by us. It is held by the real property division, which is, obviously, through government.

We anticipate spending $1.177 million of the $1.2 million, but that's still projected. There are still some expenses. This is based on reporting that the real property division did in January. So we have a couple of months left of this, just to tie up loose ends. We’re just under budget on that.

Dianne, do you want to add anything on these questions here?

D. Buljat: We’ve received regular updates from the real property division. Their forecast of the expenses for the project have been consistent throughout.

I’m fairly confident we would not exceed those. I am actually thinking, at this point, they might reduce somewhat, but it wouldn’t be substantial. So we expect to be within our forecasted budget for that.

K. Govender: Thanks, Dianne.

I’m nearing the end of what I think are the questions that were passed on to me. I do want to speak for a moment about the budget as compared to the Ontario Human Rights Commission. I might be fairly brief on this, because we were quite extensive in our letter. I’m not sure about the outstanding questions. I’m happy, obviously, to hear those more specific questions.

I did want to just emphasize that what we did here was try to make it more of an apples-to-apples comparison. It really is quite tricky to compare it to an organization that is embedded within government. Government has many of the expenses on their books elsewhere, rather than the Ontario Human Rights Commission itself. We excluded a number of line items there and actually showed that our expenses come in under where the Ontario Human Rights Commission falls.

There’s a couple of important pieces there that I do want to emphasize, in addition to trying to make it apples to apples, just in terms of numbers, to zoom out a little bit and say…. Systemic work is not easy to parse out on a per-capita basis. It really is about the issues, the history and the context.

[2:40 p.m.]

As you would have seen in our letter, we’ve highlighted some of the ways that make B.C. unique. We did have a chance to speak about some of those issues the last time I was here before the committee. I think it’s significant. For example, something we didn’t include here….

My background is as a constitutional lawyer. I can tell you that the vast majority of cases that come out of the Supreme Court of Canada and that deal with the significant human rights issues of our day, particularly those concerning constitutional law, come from B.C. and Ontario.

We are the top provinces to produce these kinds of human rights issues, and I think that speaks to why we are the two provinces that have built more systemic-focused human rights commissions and why you can’t really parse that out on a per-capita basis. We may have less people here, but we seem to really generate…. We have a lot of diversity. We have a lot of human rights issues here, and they surface in the form of the kind of work we do, as well as in the significant cases before the Supreme Court of Canada on these issues.

The second one. Well, I think I’ve touched on that systemic work and the history. You’ve asked, as well, about how our budget compares to the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal. Due to some time constraints, we weren’t able to dig too much deeper into this.

I do want to give a bit more context, though. The way that the administrative law system here in B.C. works is that every tribunal is administered separately. They’re all connected through the Attorney General but not as administrative structures. They’re separate entities. In Ontario, they have been united into one entity. That’s why it’s particularly hard to pull out the budget of one organization. It also works very differently, in terms of its structure.

Again, our roles, similarly, are very different. As I mentioned at the beginning, our role from the Human Rights Tribunal here is very distinct. It’s the same dynamic with the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal, the same difference: they are entirely focused on individual resolution; we are entirely focused on systemic resolution. It’s important, when trying to compare or look across what our work and our budget is — what the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal does or what the B.C. Human Rights Tribunal does — that both tribunals are notoriously underfunded.

The B.C. Human Rights Tribunal doesn’t serve complainants or respondents. It’s well known in the human rights bar, on both sides of the bar, that the kinds of delays that they experience, as a result of underfunding, are not serving British Columbians. That budget, in my view, should be raised to deal with that. Again, for comparison’s sake, I think the key piece here is that we do very different work — complementary work but very different work.

Finally, I was asked, I think, about my relationship to the public health office. I wanted to note here that one of the most important ways to guard against bias and discrimination is to ensure that all law, policy and practice is based on strong evidentiary foundations. Of course, as a commission, that means that all of our recommendations for changes to law, policy and practice also need to be based on those strong evidentiary bases. That’s what has really motivated me to build strong relationships with offices like the public health office.

Similarly, Health and other leadership entities must ensure that their decisions are informed by human rights considerations from an ethical, practical and legal perspective. Part of building these relationships is about ensuring that human rights law is adequately and effectively integrated into these other public policy decisions.

Those are the questions, as I understood I got them. But of course, I am happy to answer any outstanding ones.

J. Routledge (Chair): Thank you very much, Commissioner. That was a very, very thorough explanation. I know I got a lot out of what you said.

I see that we have a question from MLA Kyllo.

Go ahead, Greg.

G. Kyllo: Hi, Kasari. Thank you very much for your updated presentation.

I’ve got a series of questions just around FTEs, largely. Do I understand that you’ve yet to move into your new facility?

K. Govender: We are yet to move into the new facility. We were originally scheduled to move in, in the fall. According to the public health guidance, because we are able to work from home, we have been working from home. There have also been delays, because of COVID, in some of the construction. The delays are twofold there.

[2:45 p.m.]

G. Kyllo: Okay. In last year’s service plan, you guys were approved for 26 employees. I think you indicated that you had some challenges, with, maybe, on-boarding some staff. Could you give an idea of what your employment number was, let’s say, at the start of fiscal — say, April 1 of last year — what it is today and what the timing was for the on-boarding of additional staff?

K. Govender: I can do some of that, and then I might pass it over to my deputy, Stephanie, in order to give some more details there.

I can’t, off the top of my head — Stephanie might be able to do this — give you the number, as of April 1 of 2020, of our staffing. But I can say that now we have 20 people, I believe. Yes, 20 people that are full-time. That’s not including folks in temporary positions who are filling leave positions. We have eight outstanding….

Actually, maybe before I dive into this, I’ll just find my notes. Just give me a moment here.

S. Garrett: I can share that we have an organizational chart we update monthly. So as of May, we had nine FTEs.

G. Kyllo: I guess the question flowing from that is that the budget forecast anticipated the 27 positions fully funded. If those positions were not filled as of April 1, the start of the fiscal, and they came on throughout the course of the season, would there be additional savings that would then be returned to government this fall? How are those allocated? What are you guys actually on track for as far as your actual employment costs for this year?

K. Govender: Great observation. That’s absolutely right. We do anticipate having all the positions filled by the end of this fiscal, but of course, they were not filled by April 1 of last year. So we did not spend all of our budget this year, but we are now set to spend all of the budget that we might have for next year — that we were projected to have for next year.

Then there are the outstanding roles that I mentioned — potential implications of not getting the funding. Those hirings have not started, of course, in anticipation of what we get from this committee.

Perhaps, Dianne, I can pass it over to you for more specifics of the budget there?

S. Garrett: If I can just jump in for a second as well. We offset the hires with temporary assignments, co-ops and other measures, and professional services through consultants. We still needed the work done. The requests and demands on our office have been as if we were fully operational from day one, so we’ve used creative approaches to ensure that we were still able to maintain within our budget while fulfilling as much as we could operationally while we were working through our hiring.

G. Kyllo: Thank you for that. Where would I find that? I’m looking at the February 1, 2021, budget submission template. There are a couple of expense accounts. One is code 65, which is office and business expenses. It is $401,000. There are building occupancy costs. I am just wondering where the additional fees associated with the outsourcing would be and if you can maybe provide any additional detail.

I guess some broad strokes. You were funded for employees at 26 at the start of the year. You indicated that at this point, you’re at 20. If it’s the intention that the savings of the funds that weren’t expensed for employees…. If those funds have been used elsewhere, is that something that you’d be able to provide a bit of information to the committee on?

K. Govender: Yes. Just for clarity, we have 20 currently, but we do have eight additional full-time positions that we’ve committed to before March 31. I just wanted to add that level of detail. Dianne, can I ask you to provide the rest of the detail on Greg’s question?

D. Buljat: Yeah. Thank you for the question, Greg.

STOB 65 actually included a number of one-time start-up expenses for the office for the purchase of furniture and equipment. That said, we do forecast some substantial savings in that area. There are two things. Staff are at home and not spending as much on various things, which all the other offices have experienced. But there are also some savings in the start-up expenses. We will not be spending as much money.

[2:50 p.m.]

As all of the offices…. Nothing new. Any unexpended funds go directly back to the CRF. We are not able to carry them forward to the next year. We can’t do much with it.

The other question you had…. I believe it was STOB 60. Can you confirm, Greg?

G. Kyllo: Yes, sure. There was 65, and then the other one was 75, building occupancy costs of $585,000.

D. Buljat: Building occupancy costs is both leases. The office had a temporary lease and a permanent lease with the real property division. It was done by a procurement. They were successful in having the same landlord provide both spaces. The temporary space was vacated in October. It is lease payments from April to October, and then the permanent lease payments started in November.

The landlord provided four months of fit-up for space at no cost in the rent. Included in the budget delegation for the current fiscal year were numerous one-time start-up costs that are operating in nature versus capital in nature related directly to the project.

G. Kyllo: Great. Thank you.

J. Routledge (Chair): There are a couple of other people who want to ask questions. If we have time, I’ll come back to you, Greg.

M. Dykeman: Thank you, Chair. I have a very quick question. It’s for clarification.

My understanding in reviewing the documents ahead of this meeting is for 2021, your forecast was for 26 FTEs, and then, looking at the proposed budget for ’22, ’23 and ’24 going forward, in order to meet the identified various legislative tasks that you have, you would require 36 to be at full operating capacity. Have I understood that?

K. Govender: I’m sorry. We’ve changed a couple of the classifications. The finances are the same, but I just want to make sure I’m up to date on the classifications. I’ll defer to you, Stephanie, on this.

S. Garrett: Yes. Absolutely. That’s correct. There would be 35 FTEs, plus the commissioner. So 36 in total, including the commissioner.

M. Dykeman: Okay. Those additional ten are meant to meet the various lists that were provided from outreach in Indigenous areas. Can you just give me a short rundown, really quickly, on any further gaps that were not in your original answer of why ten? What would happen if it was eight?

K. Govender: Some of the positions, there’s more than one. I gave a couple of examples from the engagement team. There’s research and policy. I believe both require some additional support, so we have some across a team. I highlighted the manager of Indigenous strategy and a manager of inquiries, as well, that are not hired at this point, and I spoke about the implications of that. I think that covers it. It’s not quite ten.

We are at 28 positions by the end of this fiscal that would be committed, including myself. Again, we were able to reorg it so we can fit within our existing budget within those FTEs. We haven’t overspent of what we were allocated. But the actual numbers are 28, and then we will hire those additional six and the positions are manager of Indigenous strategy, a few in the engagement education team, a few in the policy and research team and then a manager of inquiries.

M. Dykeman: Just so I’m clear…. It’s still the same question. To clarify back — and then I will complete my comments, Chair — you are not staffed to fulfil those parts of your mandate without these staff. You don’t have somebody else filling the function right now. They’re simply not getting filled, that mandate part.

K. Govender: That’s right. We have been very much in start-up. Much of what we anticipate…. We haven’t started a single intervention or an inquiry yet, for example — two significant pieces of our mandate — because we have been getting staffed up. We simply haven’t had the resources. But as I say, I anticipate, from my start in September 2019, about three years all together to be at full staff capacity. I anticipate being able to fully roll out our full mandate, and we have not been able to fulfil a full legislative mandate.

[2:55 p.m.]

Nor do I think that’s what is anticipated in starting a new office. It would take some time to get to that point. I think I spoke last time — forgive me if I’m repeating myself — that there is somewhat of a dual mandate under the legislation, both to start an organization that’s sustainable and healthy and fulfils the legislative mandate and to actually do the legislative mandate.

I think we were able to do more of the doing than some originally anticipated, partly because of the urgency of COVID to actually get that done. But we anticipate being able to fully fulfil our legislative mandate if we are able to get this full staff complement in the coming year.

M. Dykeman: Okay. Thank you.

Thank you, Chair, for the follow-up.

G. Kyllo: Thanks, Kasari, for providing such great responses to our questions. I’m just following back up on the FTE piece. Is there an estimated underspend this year for the office that you anticipate sending back to treasury?

K. Govender: I do anticipate some underspend. We are not sure yet exactly what that will be. I’m sure you can anticipate that every month and moment of start-up during a pandemic is working as fast as we can run. We are continuing to do that before the end of the fiscal, and that will include some spending and getting some last key components in place from this fiscal. We do anticipate, perhaps, some surplus. But I should say that for the most part, we anticipate being on budget.

G. Kyllo: Okay. Thank you very much. Are you able to provide the committee with an updated year-to-date financial picture of where you’re at, to date, so far this year as it relates to the budget?

K. Govender: Dianne, can I defer to you on that question?

D. Buljat: I can provide an updated forecast, yes.

G. Kyllo: Forecast or actual expenses year-to-date? That’s what I was looking for.

D. Buljat: Yeah, I can provide that as well.

G. Kyllo: That would be fantastic.

D. Buljat: You just have to be aware that many of the expenses are delayed going through specifically around this project, as well, so you have to interpret the information as it’s supplied.

G. Kyllo: Okay. Thank you very much.

You’d indicated that with the $1.2 million that was established for the capital…. I understand that’s for tenant improvements, largely. There was some conversation, I think, and maybe some questions from a previous committee asking about the ability to potentially have the landlord undertake the TIs and incorporate those expenses actually into the lease rate. I’m assuming that that was not possible in your undertaking to spend roughly the $1.2 million on improvements to the existing space that you’ve leased.

K. Govender: To be clear, we are not the ones who negotiated the lease. That was the real property division, through government. They negotiated it, and they hold it. We don’t have all of that perspective into the lease.

Dianne, do you have anything to add to that?

D. Buljat: Just to add that this is the standard process government follows for their rent. The projects are done separately on government’s book. Rather than paying financing costs to the landlord, government holds those costs.

G. Kyllo: Fantastic.

If I may, Madam Chair, where would the ongoing lease costs…? Where would I find those? Would those be under the building occupancy cost, as far as your ongoing lease payments and heat and light?

D. Buljat: Yes. The way that government does…. It’s different when you’re doing a private lease than when you’re doing a government lease. What happens with a government lease is we get a monthly chargeback. That charge­back includes various components. It’s the rent, it’s the property tax for the landlord, and it’s operations and maintenance as well as a service fee for the real property division.

G. Kyllo: That would be in the….

D. Buljat: It would be STOB 75.

G. Kyllo: It is STOB 75. Okay.

D. Buljat: It is absolutely STOB 75. This year, in addition, as I have mentioned previously, there are some one-time items related specifically to the project. Those would also be in STOB 75.

G. Kyllo: If I may, what types of fees or expenses would those entail?

[3:00 p.m.]

D. Buljat: Real property division charges a number of fees when they’re doing a project. There’s a leasing fee, a labour recovery fee. There are some moving costs, and there were some temporary space fit-up costs that didn’t fall in the capital realm and needed to be put through as an operating expense because they were under the threshold, from an accounting perspective.

G. Kyllo: Okay. I see that initially, the approved budget was for $585,000, and I think you’re anticipating now that the cost would be about $486,000, about $99,000 in savings. But in future years, it looks like it’ll be roughly half a million dollars a year for the lease of the facility.

D. Buljat: There is a standard. I went to our property division, and you don’t receive your budget information on how much you’re going to be charged in the following year until October prior to that fiscal year. So when I was planning this budget — we’re planning it three years out — I asked what the standard amount was that I could put in there, and I was told to put in between 2 and 5 percent as an increase year over year.

That increase is partially rent. It’s partially the landlord’s property tax and partially the increase on some of the other costs that are included — O and M, which is the cleaners, the lights, power, hydro, the management of the building, etc.

J. Routledge (Chair): Thank you for that. I see no further questions. I will wrap this up by thanking you for coming back to answer our questions and to give us a deeper insight into your role.

Speaking for myself, I think that the way you all de­scribe the details of trying to become operational in a time when human rights and systemic discrimination are so top of mind and so urgent…. Trying to become operational at the same time that you’re trying to start up a new office in COVID is really significant.

I really appreciate your explanation of the difference between your role as a commission and the role of the tribunals. It gives me a lot of insight. Thank you so much, on behalf of the committee. We’ll let you go now.

K. Govender: Thank you for the opportunity to answer your questions. Good luck in your deliberations.

J. Routledge (Chair): I am going to suggest we take a five-minute recess and then come back to deliberate.

The committee recessed from 3:03 p.m. to 3:12 p.m.

[J. Routledge in the chair.]

J. Routledge (Chair): Welcome back, everybody. I will now entertain a motion to move in camera. Moved and seconded.

Motion approved.

The committee continued in camera from 3:12 p.m. to 4:01 p.m.

[J. Routledge in the chair.]

J. Routledge (Chair): I’ll entertain a motion to adjourn.

Motion approved.

The committee adjourned at 4:02 p.m.