City set to provide letters of support for seven requests from Monday Council session

City Council rattled off a number of letters of support to a range
of community groups at Monday's Council meeting

The keyboards will be smoking at City Hall this week, as city staffers take care of a string of Letters of Support that were approved by Prince Rupert City Council on Monday evening.

In total the City will be forwarding seven letters of support to  a range of local groups and organizations, a number of them part of applications towards the Port of Prince Rupert's Community Investment Fund, with others set to be directed to other forms of funding.

Among the seven letters of Support requested an approved, five were included in the Original agenda for the night:

North Coast Regional District
Gitga'at First Nation
Fellowship Baptist Church and Preschool
Transition Prince Rupert
Friendship House

There were also two late additions introduced by Mayor Brain and relayed at the Council session, however the details as to what the City was supporting with their letters were not provided to the Agenda.

Those letters of support were approved for:

The Prince Rupert Child Care Services
Prince Rupert Gymnastics Association

In our preview of Monday, we had noted how many of the deadlines for the letters in question had expired last week and  towards that theme Councillor Adey sought out some clarification on the process, taking note that most of the deadlines had passed on Friday for the requested letters.

In reply, Mayor Brain noted that the groups had contacted the city prior to the deadline, but that the city's schedule did not call for a session until after that date had passed. He observed that it was probably OK that it came after fact with  the letters still to be provided as they would be included as part of the information provided to the Port.

He also noted that the City is looking to remind community groups and organizations to plan a bit further ahead on their applications plans to seek out the city's letters of support in enough time to be included as part of an earlier Council agenda for consideration.

As part of his contribution to the discussion, Councillor Mirau called attention to the need for additional information that will be required in the letter of support for the Gitga'at First Nation.

You can review the process towards approving the letters by way of the City's Video Archive starting at the five minute mark.



Of the two late additions, the request for a letter of support for the Prince Rupert Gymnastics Association let another opportunity slip by for Council to provide an update on notes from the first meeting of 2020.

That towards delivering some more background on their own involvement with leasing opportunities related to their interest in the Canfisco warehouse on George Hills Way.

As we noted last month, that surprise revelation of the City's latest moves into property management came by way of a notice to the public tucked away in the weekly paper.

With the Mayor making note at the time of Council's apparent excitement at the opportunity.

"Council and staff saw this unexpected opportunity as a way to obtain a new strategic waterfront asset and protect the community uses that currently benefit that area ... We believe having a new indoor space next to the revitalized Rushbrook Trail, the boat launch and Cow Bay down the road will be a great addition to the waterfront and fits into our newly formed 2030 Vision" -- Mayor Lee Brain on the city's interests in a warehouse on the east side waterfront

That brief statement still serves as the city's only comment on the topic.

Council has now let three consecutive meetings pass by without any actual discussion as to how the decision to take on the warehouse leasing options was arrived at and what kind of discussion may have taken place surrounding it.

Something that in most other communities, probably would have taken place in a public session long before taking on the leasing opportunity at the fish plant on the east side and then sliding the notice into the local paper.

Considering how Monday's council session only lasted sixteen minutes, the Council members certainly can't say that they ran out of time to expand on their investments  ....

For more notes related to Monday's session see our Council Timeline Feature, while other items of interest on Council Discussion themes can be found here.

Cross posted from the North Coast Review.