EFCL Board Package Oct. 2011 - District B Report

EFCL District B Report
October 14, 2010

The big news is that the Edmonton Minor Hockey Association (EMHA) has decided that they will no longer sell or require membership in a community league to play hockey. There will be discussion about this at the upcoming EFCL RGM. The EMHA has indicated they may be interested in collecting a fee to support hockey programs or facilities in communities, but the days of requiring memberships are over. There are approximately 4,000 community league members who play hockey. (see item 10.4 in the board package).

UPCOMING

EFCL RGM is October 25, 2010 at Duggan Hall – Don't miss it. Hockey memberships will be discussed and much more.

President’s Dinner – November 12, in honour of the terrific contributions of Community League Presidents in Edmonton the EFCL is hosting an appreciation event on November 12, 2010.

FROM THE OCTOBER 14, BOARD PACKAGE – Download it here

6.1 EFCL Policy Manual – the EFCL hired a summer student lawyer to gather up and organize its policies into a one-stop collection of all EFCL policies. It will be available for download soon.

6.2 Direct Deposits for Community Leagues – set up direct deposit FROM the EFCL to make it really easy and efficient to receive deposits from the EFCL for membership revenue.

6.4 LRT Alignment Notice – the EFCL is asking the City to provide one month notice from the time the plans for the new LRT alignment are released before the matter is considered at council on Dec. 8, 2010 to give community folks time to provide input.

6.6 Casino Report – the provinces report on casinos is out and it recommends changes that would see Edmonton casino funds go down. However, the minister has not accepted the report and has sent it back for review. The risk is still there, but the report is under review now and the status quo will apply for a while yet.

8.1 Complete the Quilt – Community League Day was a tremendous success, with 91 leagues participating this year! Your league will now have a chance to contribute to the Community League quilt that was created for the 2010 Community League. This is your chance to join the 43 leagues who have already created sections for the quilt celebrating their communities. Watch for news in the EFCL newsletter.

8.3 Executive Director’s Report – (Allan Bolstad)

CL Capital and Operating grants proposal – as a direct result of the Tripartite licence negotiations and a report by the EFCL about the Community League infrastructure deficit out there (leagues that need halls and other families fixed or built) we made a joint proposed with Community Services to the Community Services Committee for the following:

• $3 million in a new Community League (CL) capital projects fund
• $1.35 million in additional funds for (CL) operating grants

This proposal was reduced by the City to the following:

• $1.5 million for CL Capital Projects
• $700,000 for increases in CL operating grants

In addition the proposed has moved from the “funded” column to the “unfunded” column which means this allocation is in serious competition with many, many other projects for a limited pot of $6.9 million.
Please urge your councillors to support these desperately needed increases for community leagues across the city. One community league hall was recently found to be in nearly condemned condition – this fund is really needed to prevent facilities from becoming a big mess.

Tripartite License Agreement Negotiations – work continues on this front. Dwayne Robertson (President of ACES) and I got together to review the proposal on our own before the last meeting of the committee and then continued our line-by-line review of the licence with the Tripartite Committee.

• it will take at least three meetings (we’ve had two) to go through the agreement clause by clause
• there is some legal jargon still in the agreement – we have been trying to reduce jargon and we are pushing hard for an agreement community leagues can understand – this is an uphill battle
• we are making good headway on many points
• we are still trying to get the City to reduce its involvement in small projects to cut down on red tape and reduce the hassle for the City too
• the role of the EFCL is being reduced dramatically from the original agreement to an appropriate role as a backstop for leagues

Living Local Symposium – the EFCL is proposing to hold a symposium with the City to discuss what living local means and how we can support community concerns that activities and reasonable facilities are located close in their communities

• the symposium to could take place as early as spring or next Fall

8.4 Community Development Officer’s Report  – there is some very interesting work going on here on cultural integration, REACH, joint use and many other topics. Please read this section of the board package if you are interested in these topics.

Pool Allocation Meetings

Pool Allocation Meeting with Area Councils - EFCL attended a meeting with Area council 1,2, 17 and Clareview representatives to deal with a number of issues surrounding the Pool allocation process. Contrary to the notes in the board package the outcome was this (I sought a correction at the meeting):

• Leagues in the NE will receive agreement letters and not long contracts for rental periods
• Recognition for the contributions of Area Councils to the development of pools is being considered
• prices for pool rentals for our region have gone down
• the model we use in the NE is being replicated in other parts of the city

EFCL Pool Allocation Meeting – many people attended this meeting from all over the city

• the model we use in the NE is being used in other parts of the city
• the city is going to come back at some point with some sort of City-wide offering for Community Leagues – leagues asked for this and the City seemed quite interested – we will see.

8.5 Planning Report – the planning committee is very busy, here are a few highlights:

• Family Friendly Housing Workshop – well attended
• Vision for what row housing should look like
• Feedback sought on
• Medium scale residential overlay
• RA8 – 6 storey high-rise higher floor/area ratios
• Large site zoning process
• Transit-oriented development guidelines
• EFCL organizes Nov. 3 meeting between community leagues, city and developers about pre-application process

10.4 Edmonton Minor Hockey Association has decided that the days of requiring community league memberships for hockey players are over.

Hope to see you at the RGM at Duggan Hall on Monday, October 25 at 5:30 pm. Dinner is included!