Committee of the Whole

3:03Good afternoon. It's Tuesday, May the 7th, 2024, and we are meeting as committee of the whole.

3:08So welcome to our meeting. And I did not get any regrets and I'll just start with asking

3:14if there's any disclosure of pecuniary interest or any general nature thereof. Nothing for

3:22in camera or out. So thank you. I'll consider that matter closed.

3:25I'm looking right off the top to move into closed session. And there is on the agenda,

3:33there's listed two items, and I'll just read them out right now. The service rationalization

3:38review, which is centralization of back office support functions, a follow-up review. Section 2392

3:45BD and F of the Municipal Act, personal matters about an identifiable individual, including

3:51municipal or local board employees, labor relations or employee negotiations, advice that is

3:56subject to solicitor client privilege, including communications necessary for that purpose.

4:02And then the second one is 1859 Victoria Road, South Ontario Land Tribunal update. That's section

4:082392 E and F of the Municipal Act litigation or potential litigation, including matters before

4:14administrative tribunals, affecting the municipality or local board, or local board and advice that

4:20is subject to solicitor client privilege, including communications necessary for that purpose.

4:26Those are the only two items. And wondering if someone would be willing to move to go into

4:30closed for that Councillor Alton, Councillor Quasen. Thank you. We'll move and second that. Is there

4:35anything further on those items? Seeing and hearing none, I'll call the vote. Is anyone against?

4:41Hearing and seeing none, that's unanimous. We'll move into closed session. And when we're done,

4:45we'll come back out for a high level summary if applicable. Thank you very much. Yeah, just so

4:57anyone knows those in the audience are watching online. The open session actually does not start

5:03until 2pm. So those that are in the gallery here or online, just as a heads up, two o'clock is when

5:11the open session starts. Thank you. Hello. I'm just going to call the meeting back to order now as we

1:29:30have quorum from moving out of closed session. Just on the open agenda, we had the two items. The

1:29:38first one was service rationalization review, centralization of back office support functions.

1:29:44Council had a discussion questions back and forth with staff in regards to that matter. And then we

1:29:49did give direction to staff on that. And on the second one, which is 1859 Victoria Road South

1:29:56Ontario Land Tribunal. Again, a discussion back and forth with staff and council. And we ended up

1:30:02giving direction on that matter as well to staff. And that's it for the closed summary. Our open

1:30:09meeting does not start until 2 o'clock. So we'll see everyone back here in about a half an hour. Thank

1:30:13you. Well, good afternoon, everyone. It is Tuesday, May the 7th, 2024. This is our committee meeting.

1:59:14And thank you everyone for showing up here in person or online. We appreciate that. We are going

1:59:20to kick things off with standing. If you are able, please to recognize our national anthem.

1:59:26Great. Thank you. And as we continue, just a moment of silent reflection.

2:01:07Great. Thank you. And our Indigenous territorial acknowledgement as we gather, let us take time

2:01:12to reflect on our privilege to live and work here in Guelph, a city that's built over rich Indigenous

2:01:17histories. We're guests here and we should reflect upon the responsibility to care for this land,

2:01:22the people who live here today, and the generations to come. If our actions today can move us towards

2:01:28reconciliation, we should take pause and make those decisions with intention and gratitude.

2:01:33This place we call Guelph has served as traditional lands in a place of refuge

2:01:38for many peoples over time, but more specifically, the Aniwanderach and the Honolashoni. This land

2:01:44is held as the treaty lands and territory with the Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation.

2:01:49And Guelph lies directly adjacent to the Haldeman Track and is part of the long-established

2:01:54traditional hunting grounds for the six nations of the Grand River. Many First Nations, Inuit and

2:01:59Métis peoples who have come from across Turtle Island call Guelph home today. And with that,

2:02:06is there any disclosure of pecuniary interest or any general nature thereof? Not hearing

2:02:12or seeing anything, so I'll consider that matter closed. Right off the top, we have some great news

2:02:18and great celebrations to have for some staff recognitions. And I have the honor of speaking

2:02:27on some of these issues here. And I just want to make sure with clerks that we have

2:02:32the PowerPoint ready and ready to go. Yeah, okay, great. One second. I just wanted to make sure that

2:02:53it was Chair Caron that is going to be speaking on the Leadership Academy. It's over to you.

2:02:58Thank you. This is a really exciting list and day and it's my pleasure to recognize the City of

2:03:04Guelph's third cohort to go through the City of Guelph Leadership Academy. This is a program

2:03:10that fosters the corporate value of learning as well as continuous improvement. Being recognized

2:03:16today are 15 supervisors and managers who participated in this leadership development

2:03:21program, each person dedicating more than 40 hours over 11 months to improve their skills

2:03:28and knowledge to benefit their leadership practices and contribute to an innovative,

2:03:33service-oriented and high-performing work culture at the City of Guelph. Program participants

2:03:40complete 13 courses and workshops and a capstone project that benefits the City's work to deliver

2:03:47responsible and responsive public service to Guelph's growing and diverse community.

2:03:52Participants must also deliver a presentation to the executive team. Oh, that would be very daunting.

2:03:59This work is done in addition to their regular jobs and that is no easy feat. With that said,

2:04:05I'd like to recognize the following City employees for their participation, hard work and dedication.

2:04:11We have Jeff Beecham, Viva Batista, Marcus Bell, Evan Bonahawks, Laura Carilano-Bragues,

2:04:20Kyle Gagne, Stacy Hare, Alex Jaworriski, Luke Jefferson, Ashley Casey, Jeremy Lauer,

2:04:30Glenn Lombard, Patricia Pizziola, Kristen Pressie, and Peggy Robertson. So on behalf of my fellow

2:04:38Council colleagues, congratulations on your success and thank you for the work you do on

2:04:43behalf of the City of Guelph. And so for those of you who are here today and participated in the

2:04:52Leadership Academy Cohort 3, I'd like to take this opportunity to invite you to stand by the

2:04:57City of Guelph backdrop and we're going to take a group picture to recognize the hard work and

2:05:03achievement. Great. Thank you so much Chair Carine and for everyone that was successful in that

2:06:39event. Finally, for some staff recognitions, I have the honor of talking with the Lean Green Belt

2:06:46Wave 2, the 2023 recognition. So in 2023, a second wave of the Lean Green Belt program was

2:06:54facilitated by the Continuous Improvement Office. And today we want to recognize seven

2:06:59employees receiving their Lean Green Belt certification. So Ashley Cassian, Program Manager,

2:07:06Operations and Men led the business licensing approval process improvement. The project goal

2:07:13was to improve the experience of business owners obtaining a business license to operate here

2:07:18within the City. Ashley and staff from bylaw, fire, and building services implemented several

2:07:26process improvements to reduce the total processing time to obtain a business license. And the most

2:07:32impactful result was significantly reducing the average number of business days required to

2:07:39complete the fire inspection processes for new businesses. Second is Harjeet Segal from Greening

2:07:50Parks Small Equipment Fleet. As a Parks Operations Coordinator, led the greening of Parks Small

2:07:58Handheld Equipment. Now this project goal was to increase the number of electric handheld tools

2:08:04used within all Parks divisions to contribute to the City's commitment to reduce its carbon footprint.

2:08:11Harjeet along with Parks team increased the number of small electric equipment in the fleet by 100%

2:08:19from 6% to now 12% of the entire equipment being used. Our third is Amarjeet Singh,

2:08:30a business analysis CMMS led the Improving Asset Data Completeness Project. The project focus was

2:08:40to enhance the availability of critical asset information required to effectively maintain

2:08:45an asset through its entire life cycle and ready for the City for adoption of what's called an ERP

2:08:52program. Now Amarjeet's project resulted in an increase in the asset critical data field

2:08:59completion rate from 43.1% all the way to 78.7% with that sample. Fourth we have Jennifer Birch,

2:09:10our technical services coordinator led the work order management improvement project

2:09:16to increase the maturity level of all seven steps of the work order process required across the City.

2:09:24Jennifer and the team implemented process improvements within the fleet and the facilities

2:09:29department which led to a 71% of the process steps achieved that maturity level of what's

2:09:37classified as level three or better signifying a well-functioning process. Next is Matthew Alden

2:09:46from Water Operations Technical led this condition inspection process improvement project. The project

2:09:53intended to increase the maturity level of the City's processes to inspect the condition of

2:09:58storm water sewer mains. With the support of the team Matthew's lean green belt project established

2:10:05a documented end-to-end condition inspection process along with an inspection result code

2:10:11action guide that's now been implemented. Number six is Sharon Patrick. Sharon Patrick,

2:10:20CMMS specialist led the improvement of the preventative maintenance process. The project focus

2:10:27was on improving the maturity level of the City's process to prepare a preventative maintenance plan

2:10:33that delivers timely and comprehensive maintenance of our City assets. Sharon and the team implemented

2:10:41an improvement to the preventative maintenance planning process within the facilities water

2:10:45and parks department resulting in 100% of these departments scoring a process maturity level again

2:10:53of three or above for all five asset classes. This signified a well-functioning process.

2:11:00And number seven we have Janet Gareth IT project manager led the JDE to active

2:11:11directory project. The project goal was to reduce challenges that impact employees ability to

2:11:19complete their work by improving the accuracy and time timeliness of information flowing from JDE to

2:11:25active directory. Active directory is the City's corporate network access control system.

2:11:31Through meaningful collaboration between team members from IT and HR, Janet's lean green belt

2:11:37project resulted in significant reductions in high impact and high risk incidents affecting

2:11:43multiple systems or departments across the City. Wow, good job. This is where we all really clap.

2:11:51Good job. So if you could stand if you're here, you're here in the room, many of you I think are.

2:12:02Yes, and we'd love to recognize you if you want to come down here and have your picture taken

2:12:08as well and we really appreciate all your work. Well thank you again for everyone that continues to

2:13:47you know make our City better. I would say behind the scenes I guess this is why we do this stuff

2:13:53out front and open in public on the agendas because you know people need to know that our staff are

2:14:00working on these issues constantly and helps our City run much better. So thank you very, very much.

2:14:08With that I'm just going to turn it over just quickly to Chair Downer. We just have a consent

2:14:13item on public services but I'll turn it over to her. Thank you Mr. Mayor. So there's only one item

2:14:20on the public services agenda and it's a consent agenda item and that is the Ontario Health

2:14:27multi-sector service accountability agreement and it's the declaration of compliance. Is there

2:14:33anybody who would like to pull this motion to have it talked about? Now just read what the motion is

2:14:41and then we'll go right to it. So that the Mayor be authorized to sign the Declaration of Compliance

2:14:46for the Ontario Health multi-sector service accountability agreement for the period of

2:14:51April 1st 2023 to March 31st 2024. Is there anyone opposed to this motion? Oh I need a

2:15:05mover and a seconder. Councillor Allt seconded by Councillor Richardson. Is there anyone opposed?

2:15:13Seeing none is passed. Thank you. Thank you Chair Downer. I'd like to ask

2:15:18Chair Caron to come up now and to Chair the Corporate Services portion with the one item

2:15:23on our agenda. Thank you. Thank you Mayor Guthrie. Welcome to our Corporate Services

2:15:44agenda. We have one item on the agenda but it is a very important item. We're going to be discussing

2:15:50the 2026 municipal election alternative voting methods and accessible voting service enhancements.

2:15:58We're going to have two staff presentations and a presentation from our accessibility advisory

2:16:05committee. So I will turn the mic over to Mr. O'Brien, our City Clerk for the presentation.

2:16:13Thank you Chair Caron. I appreciate that. So today we're here following up on the November 22nd

2:16:212021. We've got to rewind time a little bit and think back to that moment. That was a meeting

2:16:26where council passed a resolution that directed us as staff to research and investigate further

2:16:31accessible voting service enhancements including what we call RAVBM or remote accessible vote by mail

2:16:39as an option and report back. Following the 2022 election the work has begun to focus,

2:16:46has been really the focus of our team I should say, from the forefront. So we've, as you can imagine,

2:16:53we've been looking into this quite diligently and we've had some really good engagements along

2:16:57the way that you'll hear about in this presentation and as you can see through the report. I want to

2:17:02introduce some of the folks that are with me today. Jennifer Slater, Carrie Marie Sprague, Dylan

2:17:07McMahon, Sammy Osborne. We've also got our friends from IT with us as well. So as you can see this

2:17:13is a big body of work and one that we bring a lot of resources to bear upon to be able to give you

2:17:18the best advice that we can. The other folks we have and we've been liaising with directly is

2:17:23Leanne Warren and Sarah Bogosian from, who are staff liaisons from our accessibility advisory

2:17:29committee. They've been really instrumental in supporting our work with your AAC, the members

2:17:34of the community that you appoint to that AAC for this important work as well. So with that I'll

2:17:39invite Jen Slater up and she can continue on a few slides. Jen and I are going to sort of go back

2:17:43and forth on the presentation and then we'll happily turn it over to our colleagues at the AAC

2:17:48for their component as well. Thank you Stephen. Sure. Over the past year and a half we have worked

2:18:04tirelessly with community stakeholders, community members, and the accessibility advisory committee

2:18:09as Stephen mentioned. We have put various voting methods through vigorous SWOT analysis and risk

2:18:15analysis and we'll walk you through a bit of those today and our logic and we've come up to the

2:18:20recommendations that you see before you. Our recommendations are what the city clerk's office

2:18:26feels ensure liability, dependability, and verifiability of a system and a voting process

2:18:33can be offered with existing resources all while removing barriers and upholding the

2:18:37principles of the Municipal Elections Act. We're in a difficult position trying to balance all

2:18:43of these things and we understand this isn't an easy decision to make. We feel that free transit

2:18:49service and free parking at Market Parkade on Election Day with an accessible service hub here

2:18:54at City Hall will help eliminate some of the barriers to actually getting to a physical voting

2:18:59location. We're recommending the continued use of vote tabulators. We've used them since 2006

2:19:06and they help us in a variety of ways. Everything from helping us offer independent ballot marking

2:19:12devices to enhance accessibility at a voting location. They support timeliness of results

2:19:18and accuracy results all while being able to verify those with a paper ballot. And lastly

2:19:24we're recommending that Council approve the use of vote by mail and expansion of our vote from

2:19:30home service from the last Municipal Election as alternative voting methods. The bulk of our

2:19:36presentation report to you was about how we arrived at this last recommendation and again this is

2:19:41not being an easy decision for us to make. We'll walk you through how we came here so you can

2:19:45understand the perspective of our recommendation. First and foremost after each Municipal Election

2:19:55including 2022 we do post-election surveying from the public. We do this to understand where people

2:20:02voted when they voted their experience and their quality of the service they found as well as how

2:20:07they'd like to vote and feature Municipal Elections. And you know we're being transparent here. One of

2:20:13the primary interests that we heard from the community in terms of future voting options was

2:20:17internet voting and we're acknowledging that. Over the past year we've spoken with community

2:20:31organizations comparing municipalities and the Accessibility Advisory Committee. We established

2:20:36decision-making criteria which we consulted the committee on, considered requirements under the

2:20:40Municipal Elections Act as I mentioned, conducted a SWAT and risk assessment and narrowed in on our

2:20:45key factors. And we'll walk through that moment here. These are the comparators that we reached out to.

2:20:55We also gathered, you'll see primary comparators are on the left side there. We did reach out to three

2:21:00larger municipalities in the interest of seeing and gathering information on you know what's typically

2:21:05offered with larger resources, larger scale election services in the Ontario market. So we do have

2:21:11that information as well. We asked these municipalities you know what methods they use, the past

2:21:21benefits and drawbacks of each method, their budget and staffing abilities. We also asked them

2:21:27about what enhancements they offered and that was very helpful for us as we look at enhancements.

2:21:32We're not talking about that too much today but that was also an important part of our information

2:21:35gathering. Over the past year we spoke with eight broader community stakeholder groups

2:21:44shown here. Staff in the City Clerk's Office either met with employees of these organizations

2:21:49or individuals who access services from the organizations and they provided us with the

2:21:53wealth of feedback for us to move forward in our planning. As we gathered information we did note

2:22:00that little bit actually had to do with voting methods and a lot of it had to do with public

2:22:04engagement and greater education around municipal elections, what they are and how to vote. So you've

2:22:10certainly taken that away and that will inform our future planning into the next regular election.

2:22:19Following Council's directions City Clerk's Office Accessibility Services and Community

2:22:23Engagement staff came up with a one-year engagement plan with the Accessibility Advisory

2:22:27Committee and we presented this to them on April 18th 2023 for feedback. The engagement plan was

2:22:34delivered with minor updates to timelines due to you know quorum and deferrals with busy agendas

2:22:39from the committee. Our office prepared a total of seven engagements with the AAC. It has been

2:22:46requested that we do not summarize or paraphrase what has been said in those sessions and so all

2:22:51meeting videos were linked in the report, all meeting materials and approved minutes were

2:22:57shared as well for Council's information. We did receive two recommendations from the committee.

2:23:05Chair Root on behalf of the AAC will be presenting shortly and so in respecting this we will defer

2:23:10to the Chair to speak to the recommendations of the committee but they're shared here for your

2:23:14transparency in this slide and the next. And as I wrap up my portion here I just want to say that

2:23:22the City Clerk's Office staff are hoping that we would reach an equivalent recommendation to the

2:23:27committee. We recognize that's not the case here but we also acknowledge different perspectives

2:23:33are being shared and that's okay that's part of this process. The AAC's role is to advise Council

2:23:39to promote and facilitate a barrier free well for all citizens. Well the clerk's role as a returning

2:23:44officer is to ensure the integrity of the entire electoral process. Staff must consider many things

2:23:50ensuring accessible election to voters and candidates upholding the Municipal Elections

2:23:55Act, determining what service levels are possible with existing resources, identifying risks,

2:24:01opportunities and what's available in the market. It is all of our jobs to share our knowledge,

2:24:06our experience and then to help making this decision. I'll hand that over to Stephen.

2:24:12Thanks so much Jen. I'd like to walk you through a little bit of the the calculus that we went

2:24:17through. Jen, Miss Slater, spoke to our work on SWOT analysis and risk management frameworks and

2:24:23the like and I'd like to walk you through a bit about that. With all of the engagement feedback

2:24:28at the forefront of our minds our team the City Clerk's Office sat down and reviewed each of the

2:24:32five alternative voting methods that we were contemplating. We used all of the information

2:24:36that we gathered over the past year and took a very analytical approach using as I mentioned

2:24:41SWOT analysis, risk management frameworks etc. Obviously at the core of what we're looking at

2:24:46are the principles of the Municipal Elections Act. Those absolutely need to be front and center for

2:24:51us and quite frankly they need to be front and center for you as well as a council as you

2:24:55move through the process of this decision making this month. We also think obviously of the of

2:25:00the aspects that you would expect us to. Budgetary constraints, resourcing requirements, staff capacity,

2:25:06risks of different alternative voting methods, past elections, both our own experiences and the

2:25:13experiences of our comparators and quite frankly the whole Ontario Municipal Election System and

2:25:19administrators across the province and obviously important in that process is our contemplation

2:25:27our consideration around the recommendations that came from your AAC. The detailed breakdown of the

2:25:33SWOT and risk assessment can be found in Attachment 3 of the report but the voting methods that had

2:25:38the highest risk ratings were internet voting, vote by phone and the remote accessible vote by mail.

2:25:44I'll refer to that now as RAVBM as I move through the presentation. We realize and

2:25:49acknowledge what Ms. Slater said that internet voting is the most accessible option. In fact it's

2:25:54a preferred option. We don't we don't shirk that we don't shy away from that. However the level of

2:25:58risk to the successful delivery and integrity of the overall election is such that staff cannot

2:26:04recommend internet voting at this time. In considering all perspectives if council is

2:26:10comfortable with pursuing that risk that is statutorily a decision that you have as a council

2:26:16but I wanted to make that abundantly clear for you today. Let's talk a little bit of some of the

2:26:20key factors. After the SWOT and risk analysis we recognized some key factors that stood out from

2:26:26the evaluation criteria. Aside from upholding the principles of the Municipal Elections Act we felt

2:26:31that the dependability and of the service and verifiability of the results were of the utmost

2:26:37importance to us. That dependability and that verifiability of results is core and integral

2:26:44to trust in electoral processes and so that's a very important factor that we evaluate based upon.

2:26:51These factors are obviously important to us. They're important to the democratic system that we

2:26:55all know and appreciate and value here in Guelph and in Canada at large and they are required by

2:27:02the principles of the Municipal Elections Act to ensure again that integrity of the election.

2:27:07The ability to verify audit results, conduct a recount in another way if ordered by the courts

2:27:13means that there is certainty and results cannot be called into question.

2:27:19Then we evaluated some of the technology concerns. On this slide you'll see a couple of

2:27:23examples and I'll sort of talk through what those were. The ability to depend on a voting method

2:27:27is equally important in that the service should be fair and accessible at all times during voting.

2:27:32Everyone who is eligible to vote obviously has the opportunity to cast their ballot. Over the past

2:27:37two elections there's been issues with bandwidth and server slowing or crashing be that on the part

2:27:42of the internet voting vendors or vendors that support the use of things like a live voters

2:27:48list, a tool that we actively use to ensure that the correct elector is struck off the voters list.

2:27:54Being able to ensure that each vote that comes in is accurate and is or is as what was intended

2:28:00is paramount. In the case of voting the appetite and public tolerance for downtime of these

2:28:05interrelated systems and platforms I would suggest is limited if not non-existent. There is very

2:28:11little public appetite for downtime in that platform. We acknowledge that in the experience

2:28:17that some of our counterparts saw in the 2018 election. There was a slowing of bandwidth capacity

2:28:23for lack of better term with a particular vendor and that caused a great degree of challenges for

2:28:31a good number of our comparator municipalities and many of which are sort of southern Ontario

2:28:35municipalities. The other piece I'll mention in 2022 we experienced ourselves a slowdown in our

2:28:43ability to access and process electors through a live voter strike off system. For us it meant that

2:28:48we were slowed in our ability to process electors at voting locations, in-person voting locations.

2:28:53For others it meant that they weren't able to process electors at all. Some municipalities in

2:28:582018 extended voting days to later days. In some cases there was the wholesale stop or

2:29:05prevention of the municipality to be able to process and access electors through that voters

2:29:11list, strike them off the list and issue ballot. Again that in our view is integral to the system.

2:29:17We are keeping an eye on the technology in the space as well and as things change and evolve

2:29:20we'll reevaluate. We know for example that we would love to have a space where internet voting

2:29:25standards are available in Ontario. A standard that is set by some form of a governing council

2:29:30or a governing authority and that all municipalities can require that internet voting vendors or other

2:29:35vendors, alternative voting vendors can be held to that standard. That standard as it stands right

2:29:41now is going through public consultation and a public process but it is not yet ready and I

2:29:46build a sort of ascertain when exactly that will come to fruition but we are monitoring that as well.

2:29:52Something of note that is one of important for us as well as we've moved through this is we've

2:29:56learned the landscape of the market so to speak. We know that one of the largest election vendors,

2:30:02Dominion voting has opted to no longer offer internet or phone voting services citing paper

2:30:07ballots as the quote gold standard to preserve transparency, security and audibility in elections.

2:30:13After the publication of our report so not included in your publication report we also

2:30:17learned that the second large internet voting vendor CITL has filed for bankruptcy and is entering

2:30:23into insolvency proceedings with Industry Canada and they will not be available. That vendor

2:30:30provided some of the internet voting services for some of our larger comparators, GTA comparators

2:30:35specifically. It leaves a marketplace that has fewer and a smaller number of vendors in place

2:30:43and that is also for us. I'll just simply categorize that as notable on our part. It's

2:30:48something we are very aware of and cognizant of. This is another interesting aspect that we wanted

2:30:54to share and the intention here is to provide an example. This shows the limited city control that

2:31:01we have or our ability to test all aspects of an online voting method. So right now for example

2:31:06if you look at the left side of that slide the top of that stack is our interfacian wealth.ca

2:31:12thanks to the good support of our friends in IT. We have a great degree of control about what is

2:31:18present on wealth.ca, how electors access wealth.ca to then further allow them to access online or

2:31:25remote voting services. That's obviously very important. However every level beyond is managed

2:31:31by vendors and subcontractors that have a varying degree of control or lack of control on the part

2:31:37of the city. So we can conduct security testing and ensure data is secure and transit and that

2:31:43internet voting and the internet voting platform and any ballots cast cannot be accessed or tampered

2:31:47with but that's the tip of this technology stack or this technology iceberg. As we move more to

2:31:53more digital election services we stack systems and platforms upon each other and an internet voting

2:31:59platform stacks on top of a voter's list database. What we're trying to highlight here is that there

2:32:04are increasing levels of interdependence interoperability and and degrees at which we're able to

2:32:11affect change or really have control and test for aspects of that technology stack. The issues

2:32:19the issues we have seen in recent elections related with bandwidth being throttled or servers

2:32:24crashing or slowing unexpectedly those are things that we cannot test for. We cannot test for those

2:32:31aspects in advance. They may be happenstance they may have happened in a moment. They may not happen

2:32:37for us during a testing phase. The vendors themselves may not be able to test the subcontractors or

2:32:43sub-vendors that they're engaging with and so those are challenges for us. They provide blind spots

2:32:49for us and again it's a notable point or a caution of a moment for concern on our part.

2:32:55We need to acknowledge that this impacts the quality and availability of election services.

2:33:00That ability to test for and completely understand and have complete line of sight on those aspects.

2:33:08What we would like to talk about is some of the enhancements. A decision regarding accessible

2:33:12voting service enhancements is at the discretion of our team in the city clerk's office.

2:33:18And although it's not something that rests with you we do want to relay some of the work we've

2:33:23been doing in that sense because I think it helps you make a balanced decision as a council.

2:33:27So all of the options you see on this screen we are planning to offer all of those options.

2:33:34So the accessible voting equipment we have on site at voting locations will remain. That has been

2:33:39in place and there's a good degree of familiarity on the behalf of the electorate with that.

2:33:43Things, simple pieces, magnifying sheets. We're implementing Braille sleeves. We are quite keen

2:33:49and Ms. Slater alluded to it with respect to City Hall being a sort of a hub for voting. We're

2:33:54quite happy to offer City Hall as a mask or sent free location. We will engage and ensure that ASL

2:33:59translation and interpretation is available. And we think that the partnership we've had in the

2:34:05great discussions we've had with DCO Clark Bush and her team in and around transit and parking

2:34:10will also support increased access to voting in the 2026 election. So I did want to offer that.

2:34:17And then I'll conclude by saying thank you for the opportunity to present here. We know you've

2:34:21likely got a great degree of questions. We are at your service to answer those questions.

2:34:26But Chair Caron to you, we value the partnership with the AAC. We've had, we value very much the

2:34:32discussions we've had with them and appreciate their input. Chair Root I believe is available to

2:34:37attend and we look forward to their presentation before you now. So I'll turn it over to Chair Root.

2:34:42I believe the clerks team has Chair Root available and ready to speak to you. And then we'll be in

2:34:47a position to answer questions following that presentation. Great. Thank you for the order

2:34:53of presentations. We'll go straight to the next presentation and as you said we'll hold questions

2:35:00for all three presenters at the end. Is that me and can you hear me? We can hear you. Okay perfect

2:35:11thank you. Give me a second to get my screen reader on the right page. Hello my name is Laura

2:35:19Root and it's likely that you've heard me speak on this topic before because I've done so a number

2:35:24of times over the past decade. I'm one of the members of the community who can't vote independently

2:35:29with the current proposed slate of accessibility options. I haven't actually been able to since

2:35:352014. Just as a recap of who I am and why I feel that I'm qualified to speak to you today on this,

2:35:42I'm the chair of the city's accessibility advisory committee. I've been a member for a number of

2:35:46years. I was also the chair of the municipal election subcommittee. I'm a board member for the

2:35:52Canadian Center for Disability Studies. I serve on a number of boards and committees actually in an

2:35:58accessibility advisory capacity both at the city of Guelph and in the community. In my career I work

2:36:05as a digital accessibility specialist so I've got a background in software engineering and I have a

2:36:10high level of understanding around assistive technology and cyber security and I think that

2:36:15really comes in handy with this conversation. I also am well versed through my work with the

2:36:21Ontario Municipal Elections Act. I understand the Ontario Human Rights Code and the AODA and the ACA

2:36:27in ways that I think are important for this discussion as well and as I said I've been in

2:36:32discussion with the city about this for a decade now. I'm here today specifically on behalf of the

2:36:37accessibility advisory committee to present you with our outlook on the conversation as well as

2:36:41presenting you with some of our key thoughts surrounding the clerk's report and I'm going to

2:36:46start by reading two of the motions that were written and unanimously supported by the AAC this

2:36:51past year because I believe those two motions specifically capture the overall opinions of

2:36:55the committee really well and after that I'm going to briefly delve into some of the reasons

2:37:02behind the drafting of these motions and some of the concerns that I've heard raised by the AAC members.

2:37:08The first motion that I want to highlight was passed at our December 19th meeting in 2023.

2:37:13The motion was meant to capture the AAC's thoughts after a workshop that was organized by clerks the

2:37:18previous month. It's a bit lengthy but it's important so it reads, in order to accommodate

2:37:24independent voting for all residents of Guelph the AAC recommends that the city offer online

2:37:29internet voting, remote accessible vote by mail, vote by phone, vote by mail and door to door vote

2:37:36from home options for the upcoming municipal elections. The AAC feels that leaving any of

2:37:40these options out will leave some disabled voters without access to a confidential and

2:37:44independent way to mark their ballot. Providing all options will help the city meet their duty to

2:37:49accommodate those individuals under the Ontario Human Rights Code. Furthermore the AAC would

2:37:54like to highlight the importance of specifically R-A-V-B-M and internet voting as the two most

2:38:00universally accessible options which would solve significant service gaps that have been present

2:38:05in the past two election cycles for many disabled individuals who have not had any

2:38:09access to independent voting. There have been many other discussions between staff and the AAC

2:38:15but they're all outlined in the agenda attachment entitled AAC engagement so I'm not going to go

2:38:20over them because there were so many meetings and there's so much there but the next motion that I

2:38:25do want to bring attention to is the one from our most recent meeting when staff presented this report

2:38:30to us we unanimously passed this motion in response. The AAC does not support the staff

2:38:37recommendation that vote from home and vote by mail be offered as the only alternative voting

2:38:41methods for the 2026 election. We believe that this leaves insurmountable barriers to accessibility

2:38:47and denies many members of our community access to a confidential independent and verifiable voting

2:38:52method. Failure to provide a voting method to disabled individuals serves to disenfranchise

2:38:57a vulnerable population. The AAC recommends that council move forward with online voting and

2:39:02remote accessible vote by mail as the main alternative voting options with vote from home

2:39:07and vote by mail remaining as available as supplementary accessible options. Supplementary

2:39:13accessible options sorry. Some of the main concerns that were raised from members of the AAC

2:39:21regarding not offering these options are that it leaves no independent voting method for a

2:39:25number of individuals. Only offering vote by mail vote from home and the variety of in-person

2:39:31service enhancements that clerks listed is still disenfranchises many people including but not

2:39:38limited to any citizens who are blind or low vision, people who are non-reading, people who rely on

2:39:44speech to text or text to speech software, people who rely on eye tracker communication devices,

2:39:50people who can't hold a pen to mark their own ballot. There's a number of reasons and this is

2:39:55particularly problematic when those accessibility needs intersect with another disability or another

2:40:00accessibility need because many people have more than one. Many people's primary accessibility

2:40:06needs will intersect with other factors like mobility, limitations, mental health concerns,

2:40:12neurodivergence, immunocompromised status, environmental sensitivities and allergies,

2:40:18other physical and cognitive disabilities or a number of other factors that make it impossible

2:40:23for voters to make it out to City Hall to access voting enhancements provided there. That can also

2:40:28make it impossible for some citizens to have staff perform home visits. City Hall being the central

2:40:34hub for all voting enhancements as outlined in the staff report is in and of itself a barrier for

2:40:38many people with a variety of disabilities so those enhancements can't solve the problem.

2:40:44Even in cases where some individuals can have home visits or can attend City Hall to vote,

2:40:50many of the voting enhancements that are provided require a level of disability access literacy

2:40:56that many disabled individuals don't have. For example, the ability to read Braille,

2:41:01the ability to speak ASL, to use a SIP and PUF device or know how to use or be able to use

2:41:07other assistive tech that's available there. All of these factors combined resulted in many people

2:41:12left with no independent voting option and instead those citizens have to rely on disclosing their

2:41:17vote to someone else who will mark their ballot for them with no way to verify that the marking

2:41:22of that ballot was done correctly. This denies people their fundamental right to a secure voting

2:41:27method that grants us privacy which were all meant to be afforded as when we're casting our ballots.

2:41:34Moving on, I want to note that the staff report defines disenfranchisement as depriving someone

2:41:40of the right to vote when they're legally eligible. For example, someone who's unable to access any

2:41:45voting method available could be said to be disenfranchised. Under that definition, there are

2:41:50a number of disenfranchised individuals in wealth and have been for a long time. The staff report

2:41:55then points out that staff understand the duty to accommodate and that individual needs could be met

2:42:00on a case-by-case basis. But I know for a fact that there are some citizens who despite reaching

2:42:05out to staff for solutions are still left disenfranchised. Without a doubt, there are citizens

2:42:10like myself who with the proposed slate of options even after reaching out to staff for support

2:42:16are still left with no secure independent private voting method.

2:42:21At many of the AAC meetings, multiple members have also stated very grave human rights concerns.

2:42:27At the last meeting, members expressed that if even the chair of the AAC with all of my contacts

2:42:33and pretty much direct access to staff and council and with all of my professional technical

2:42:38knowledge on this topic with my level of literacy regarding municipal politics due to my very active

2:42:43level of engagement here over the years and with all of my fight and fire, if after a decade of

2:42:49fighting even I can't access independent voting in my city, something is very wrong. I don't like

2:42:57what that pretends for individuals with even fewer tools than I've been given access to.

2:43:02As multiple AAC members have pointed out, this has become a very serious human rights concern and we

2:43:07don't like what that means for the city in terms of potential human rights complaints and litigation,

2:43:12but we also hate that it falls so far out of line with our city's claim to a commitment of equity

2:43:17and sorry, equity and diversity and inclusion. The final piece of AAC feedback that I would

2:43:23like to touch base on is regarding security and while I know it's no longer as big a concern as it

2:43:29has been in previous years due to ample changes to cybersecurity technology, changes to the way that

2:43:34decentralized data storage like blockchain technology and other modern cryptographic protocols

2:43:39can be implemented and a shift away from using the M-PAC voter list, which I know was a big concern

2:43:44in previous years, even with those changes the staff report does still mention the potential for

2:43:49malicious actors played a factor in their decision regarding these voting methods that we're asking

2:43:54for. However, it's not listed as as big a concern with other voting methods when it definitely is

2:44:00still a very big concern. The AAC does not agree with the risk ratings outlined in the staff report

2:44:06which seem to have been calculated from a place of privilege and without considering the lived

2:44:10experience of disabled individuals. When discussing security it's important to remember that no

2:44:15voting method is 100% secure and I would argue that most voting methods feel much less secure than our

2:44:22AVBM or online voting. If your concern is security not offering these options disenfranchises people

2:44:28at the cost of not solving the problem that you're trying to solve. If we were to examine all voting

2:44:33methods with the same lens that we're using to examine these two voting methods all of them would

2:44:38fail the security standard that staff seemed to want to achieve and that's a big concern for the AAC.

2:44:43Members have expressed strong disagreement with the assessment of risk outlined in the staff report.

2:44:48In 2017 at a council meeting where clerks did recommend online voting they pointed out that

2:44:52while no voting method is 100% free of fraud risks it is the job of clerks to mitigate those risks to

2:44:58the best of their ability and I think that even this staff report outlines both their ability and

2:45:02commitment to do so should council pass a motion allowing our AVBM and online voting in addition

2:45:07to these other methods. The final factor to consider is just that online voting and our AVBM

2:45:14are tried and true methods. There are no examples of substantiated claims of fraud with these systems.

2:45:20The methods are growing in popularity due to their ability to accommodate such a wide range of people

2:45:24with varying needs. For example in 2014 when Guelph offered online voting we were one of 97

2:45:29municipalities to offer it then in 2018 when we became the first and only municipality to revoke

2:45:36the option of online voting there was still 175 municipalities using it and in 2022 more than half

2:45:43of municipalities used it a whopping 217 it's only fair to assume that those numbers are going to

2:45:48continue to grow and at a time when voter apathy is so high it would be wrong to disenfranchise any

2:45:54portion of the population especially when those people are standing in front of you

2:45:58willing to fight tooth and nail just to gain access to our right to vote. That's all I have but I

2:46:03want to express deep gratitude to staff and council for the opportunity to engage with the city on

2:46:07this. I know it's impactful for the AAC and other members of the disabled community as well.

2:46:15Thank you chair Root and we really appreciate your presentation on behalf of AAC. I think because

2:46:20we'll just get questions of clarity from staff there's been so much information presented we'll

2:46:25do questions now and then we'll do delegations after so I'm looking for hands we have Councillor

2:46:29Gowler. Okay over to you. Thank you through you Jerk Caron. Thank you for your presentation.

2:46:40I wanted to ask from the perspective of the accessibility advisory committee could you

2:46:46tell us how online voting would create more accessibility than remote accessible voting

2:46:54by mail because as I understand it with the remote accessible voting by mail it allows someone to

2:47:01access the vote use the device to print out a card and then have that mailed and when I

2:47:08reach that report one of the things that I keep on saying is there is no ability to do a recount

2:47:13on online votes but there may be an ability to do a recount if we have the the ballots sent in by the

2:47:19remote mail card so if I could ask you for for your thoughts on that. Absolutely it's actually

2:47:27it's not the opinion of the AAC that online voting is more accessible than our AVBM it's the opinion

2:47:33of the AAC that both are required because both would serve different accessibility needs that are

2:47:38currently present. I don't think we have a hierarchy other than that outlined in a few of our motions

2:47:44we have stated that our AVBM and online voting solve the most service gaps that are currently

2:47:51present but we would like to see all of these accessible options. In terms of a recount I've

2:47:57heard that a lot and I actually recently spoke with somebody at elections Canada who used to work

2:48:02at elections Canada who brought up a point that I hadn't considered before regarding recounts.

2:48:07One of the concerns that I've heard this is just me right now speaking as a digital accessibility

2:48:12specialist to answer that half of your question because the AAC doesn't have knowledge of recounts

2:48:18and things like that but in terms of recounts a recount exists to redo the tallying of a vote

2:48:25in the case where we think the tally might have had an error where the counting might have been

2:48:30done wrong. I understand some people feel that online voting ballots can't be recounted but they

2:48:37can it's just that the same program will run the same numbers and likely have the same result

2:48:42because computer programs don't miscount like a calculator wouldn't miscount. The reason that

2:48:48it matters so much with paper ballots is because paper ballots can be miscounted with human error

2:48:53but even in instances of paper ballots a miscount doesn't exist to mitigate fraud it doesn't exist

2:49:00to identify or fix fraudulent voting systems so if someone stuffs a ballot box and we do a

2:49:06recount a recount won't catch that and if someone maliciously attacks an online system as unlikely

2:49:13as I think that would be for them to be able to hack an online voting system if it happened a

2:49:18recount wouldn't catch that but there's no need to recount ballots that are cast electronically

2:49:24with a computer program that's easy to lay out the code and see exactly what the count had been.

2:49:30Okay okay thank you very much that that is very helpful. If I could go back to the to the first

2:49:36question then when we talk about online voting versus the the remote accessible what invite mail

2:49:44could you give me an idea of of you know how many community members might be able to access

2:49:51one but not the other so that I understand that that need for the overlap?

2:49:55I don't really know I know that when R.A.V.B.M first began being discussed by the city it happened

2:50:05after multiple conversations with staff that happened sorry I'm getting feedback from someone

2:50:13it's hard for my brain to think but yes it happened after multiple conversations with staff

2:50:21where they had kind of expressed concern with online voting originally the years ago was pushing

2:50:29for online voting I kind of went away and spoke to a number of colleagues in the industry I spoke

2:50:34to some friends in Seattle and all over the states and areas where voting is known to be very accessible

2:50:40and kind of did some research on what other options were out there and I brought R.A.V.B.M

2:50:44forward to staff for consideration at that time because staff had said no to online voting.

2:50:49I don't know what percentage of people would use online versus R.A.V.B.M and I don't think there's

2:50:57any way to really know the answer to that question I know that some people may have difficulty still

2:51:03mailing in a ballot and with online voting it may be more accessible for a lot of individuals but

2:51:09I don't have any stats on like how many people need them I do know that even minority communities

2:51:14regardless of how many numbers of us there are still deserve consideration in the in the conversation

2:51:19though. Thank you for that Ms. Rudin my apologies I left my mic on that that was a feedback I guess

2:51:27what I'm trying to understand is if we were to approve online voting would we still then

2:51:32require the remote access of what I'm mail I did just to understand that but it sounds like

2:51:38we should we should have all methods. That's the answer to the AC yeah. Thank you so much thank

2:51:45you chair. Thank you and does staff have any additional comments to add to those questions

2:51:51although they were addressed to the chair. Sure thank you chair Caron the only couple things I

2:51:56would I would mention is our act is chair Root makes a great point and engaging with with members

2:52:02of election Canada is is beneficial we also have connections with the local returning officer here

2:52:06for elections Canada and more broadly there is nuances and I will admit that the federal elections

2:52:13act has nuances that I'm obviously you'd expect me to be very and intimately familiar with the

2:52:17municipal elections act that I can tell you that I very much am our act the municipal elections

2:52:21act requires that a recount be conducted in the same manner as the original count so when we

2:52:27conducted a recount in 2014 when there was internet voting we simply uploaded the results of that

2:52:34internet voting platform and that formed the basis of of that portion of it now there were some word

2:52:40three ballots at the time that were counted using the tabulators and they were processed and there

2:52:44was then that verifiability to be able to visually see that ballot so there is that nuance difference

2:52:49the other aspect is we are concerned with verifiability when we use that term in the presentation

2:52:56has been that a court may order us to conduct a recount using an alternate means of counting those

2:53:05ballots if the court feels that there is if that method led to the the error or the the

2:53:14mattering question that basically generates the need for a recount we're not quite sure how we

2:53:20would actually do that with internet voting to be quite frank if a court ordered us to to tabulate

2:53:25those ballots in a different way that is a very significant concern for us and that speaks to the

2:53:32verifiability of it and then the only other thing I would mention is there was a lot of rigorous

2:53:39discussion in 2022 when when we had a good debate and discussion and chair it was very helpful at

2:53:46that point in time as well with with bringing forward our AVBM admittedly we had not heard of that

2:53:51the statement was made that that we said no to our AVBM I just will reiterate to council staff don't

2:53:57say no to voting methods alternate voting methods statutorily is your responsibility as council

2:54:02there is a great degree of aspects of the election and I'm sure you can appreciate it that is wholly

2:54:07and completely our statutory responsibility but alternate voting methods is your responsibility

2:54:12and so we certainly had concerns we made recommendations absolutely against our AVBM I won't I won't

2:54:19shy away from that chair root knows that she and I have had good conversations about that

2:54:23but that is something that I did want to mention we don't say no it's council that makes those

2:54:27decisions based on on presumably our advice the AAC's advice community input etc etc over to

2:54:35councillor or roark councillor Goller asked my question any other further questions councillor

2:54:46caten and councillor Busuttil this is to chair root so you mentioned that all voting options

2:54:56fail to be secure can you give us some examples of what you mean by that yeah absolutely um so

2:55:04from a human experience of actual actually being an end user there are a lot of ways that other

2:55:10voting methods are also insecure mail-in ballots can be filled out and returned by people who they

2:55:15weren't intended for they can be intercepted or lost or damaged on the way to a voting location

2:55:21people can show up to a voting location with someone else's voter card that was mailed to their house

2:55:26and it doesn't require any additional ID for them to cast a ballot in that person's name

2:55:31you know people have been known to in the past in elections stuff ballot boxes and

2:55:36steal ballots and coordinate robocall scandals even the people who are assigned to mark my ballot

2:55:42for me can mismarket intentionally or through human error either way that's a potential risk

2:55:50some people have also expressed concerns in the past that they aren't even really worried about

2:55:54the technology being secure as much as they're worried about the person standing next to the

2:55:59person who's casting their vote they're worried about coercion for example um but that type of

2:56:04coercion also exists as a reality in every voting method you can stand next to someone while they

2:56:10mark their mail-in ballot and coerce them to mark it a certain way you can even walk up to

2:56:16a ballot box with someone and watch them mark their ballot while they put it in the ballot

2:56:21while they mark it and put it in the ballot box I know I've never had a question asked when I bring

2:56:26someone up to the ballot box with me um so it's frustrating to me especially as a disabled member

2:56:31of the community who needs access to these tools when people use things like abuse or coercion

2:56:36to deny us these these voting methods because these are some of the main reasons that we want

2:56:41these voting method methods we want to be able to mark our own ballots privately entirely on our own

2:56:48coercion is more likely to happen under the system that I'm being required to use now

2:56:52um so those are some examples that answers yes thank you I'm sorry I have a bunch of questions so

2:57:00I apologize um through the chair to chair route what are the AAC's thoughts on requiring people

2:57:07to self-identify as disabled in order to access voting options uh through you chair Caron to

2:57:16counselor Kaden uh the AAC has discussed that I think that's been mentioned in the past as a

2:57:22possibility it's not considered equity or inclusion um I believe the accessible Canada

2:57:29the accessible Canada Act the ACA outlines it as um that you can't ask people to self-disclose

2:57:37their disability it it's not a really inclusive or equitable way to do things not everybody has

2:57:42access to a doctor to get a doctor's note if that's what's required it brings into question who would

2:57:49be the arbiter of this decision of choosing who is disabled enough to be granted these these things

2:57:56it's it's also not always comfortable for people to disclose that they have a disability

2:58:01a lot of people I've heard in the disabled community will have questions like am I disabled

2:58:06do I count am I disabled enough to count for this so there are a lot of reasons why that's not

2:58:11considered inclusive um and that's been discussed at length thank you um through the chair do you

2:58:19have any thoughts on I don't know if you had a chance to read them um on the written delegations

2:58:24attached to the agenda sorry I lost my unmute button there um I did I did read I read the uh the

2:58:36delegations and I I do I do have some thoughts um I think that some of the correspondence cites

2:58:47uh a lot of reports that are from 2014 and even earlier some of them and I'm sure you can all

2:58:53understand that the leaps and bounds made in technology in a decade are just astronomical

2:58:58so while I can absolutely understand why citizens um doing a google search about you know online

2:59:04voting and things like that might come across these types of reports and be concerned that makes a lot

2:59:09of of sense why that would be concerning to people without any engineering or cyber security background

2:59:15I'm hopeful that you will um kind of take those reports with a grain of salt and instead lean on

2:59:21expertise from specialists who are up to date with current cyber security protocols and who have

2:59:25maybe just a higher level of digital literacy than the average citizen does um but I'm not

2:59:31intending at all to be critical of those delegates I think that the delegations show a lot of passion

2:59:37that I respect a lot and I think there's just a slight lack of understanding of some of the

2:59:41subject matter thanks um through the chair to chair root um you mentioned in your presentation

2:59:50about blockchain technology can you respond to people who are concerned that cryptocurrency

2:59:55companies using blockchain technology are susceptible to hacking yeah through you chair to

3:00:03counselor katin um yes the so that comparison is very much an apples and oranges situation

3:00:10again I'm not I'm not speaking on behalf of the aac here I'm speaking on behalf of myself as

3:00:14someone who works in the industry um but uh yes it's very much an apples and oranges comparison

3:00:21online voting utilizes a number of checks and balances um there have been major advancements

3:00:26even in the past year in the types of modern cryptographic protocols that are being used

3:00:30and blockchain technology at a high level is one of those examples of changes it's a bit hard to

3:00:37explain um but blockchain technology is a form of decentralized data storage basically that's used

3:00:45to secure digital data but not all blockchain tech is created equal we can think about it in terms of

3:00:50like a lock um there are a lot of different types of locks that you can use to protect something

3:00:56there are like the flimsy plastic lock that would be on my diary as a kid that would be easy to break

3:01:01and then there are all the way up to locks that are like a high security vault with retinal scanners

3:01:06it's similar with blockchain technology not all locks are created equal not all implementations

3:01:12of blockchain are created equal and all uses there are different numbers of blocks like there are a

3:01:18lot of ways that this is different um one thing I do know though is that cryptocurrency companies

3:01:25like anyone can start a cryptocurrency company it's really not comparable to what we're talking

3:01:30about here we're talking about vendors who are reputable vendors whose entire livelihood depends

3:01:35on creating a very secure system and they have to be able to convince us that it's a very secure

3:01:42system in order for them to be able to do business so I know that all of these vendors have ample

3:01:47security testing information out there explaining these types of things um and I know that also

3:01:52staff have outlined in the report that they intend to do even further testing of on our own

3:01:57which I I think is above and beyond what we would even need to do but I hope that answers your question

3:02:03yes thank you and um my final question to you but I still have one more question uh to staff

3:02:10I understand today that you're presenting on behalf of the AAC and I was just wondering if

3:02:14there's anything that you'd like to say as an independent citizen who's affected by this

3:02:21thank you through you chair Caron to councillor Katelyn um yes thank you for your question

3:02:29it is sometimes difficult to have to split myself like to to just present on behalf of the AAC

3:02:35because some of my opinions maybe don't even align with our overall voting on these things

3:02:41um and there are some things that I would find very helpful as a citizen who needs this tech

3:02:45that we did not rule on at the AAC so um I will say that for me online voting is the most accessible

3:02:51just for me personally it would help make my life a lot different um another thing that I want to note

3:02:57is that um one thing that has been frustrating for me was to was to see in the staff report

3:03:04a lot of the comparator cities that were reached out to were comparator cities like Sudbury for

3:03:09example who didn't have any other voting options used they only had online voting and did away with

3:03:15paper ballot marking and uh and they did it all on the same day I would be comfortable this is not

3:03:22what the AAC has asked for but I personally would be comfortable with online voting being offered as

3:03:27an advanced voting method to kind of mitigate a lot of those concerns about the throttling of of uh

3:03:32bandwidth or any concerns that might come up so that we could extend the the voting days if we

3:03:38absolutely had to the way that we've often extended voting hours at in-person voting locations in the

3:03:43past when we run into other difficulties um just one other thought is that I'm very very tired

3:03:51I've been fighting this fight for a long time and it is very demoralizing to continue to have to

3:03:56fight for my access to my human rights um and I understand that everyone here is kind of working

3:04:03from the same I believe we align on our values I think we all are just concerned about the integrity

3:04:09of voting I don't think anyone here like wants to keep disabled people down or something like that I

3:04:14think um I can tell that everyone here really cares I just really want people to understand

3:04:22things from my perspective as someone who has done so much work in this city and I've I've appeared on

3:04:28every panel anybody's ever asked me to appear on on all the diversity panels at the city and I

3:04:33do all of this extra work and take all of these extra meetings and do all of this extra research

3:04:37so for someone like me to still not be able to vote it really feels unfair and a little embarrassing

3:04:45thank you for that question through the chair thank you very much for all of your time and the

3:04:51amount of work that you put into this presentation and I have a final question to staff through the

3:04:57chair I'm just wondering what were the number of people who voted by mail and how many votes were

3:05:05not counted because they showed up late through you chair Caron we had um the team's gonna get

3:05:15these specific numbers we had over 500 ballots cast by mail um and we had I want to say less than

3:05:27maybe I'll defer to miss Osborne and she can respond we had 593 kits that were requested with

3:05:32464 that were received back in time for casting so what's the total number that didn't get their

3:05:40vote counted yeah it's just a quick mathematical calculation but vote uh returned in time for

3:05:56casting doesn't necessarily mean that they arrived late so I just want to make sure we're

3:06:01calculating the right figures before answering the question they may have gone out as kits but

3:06:07they may not have been returned at all versus late so before a before you give a number want to make

3:06:13sure that we're counting the right thing yeah so just for clarification through you chair Caron

3:06:22we had 54 vote by mail kits that were received after the deadline that could not be counted

3:06:27okay thank you any further questions councillor Caton no I think I'm dead I've asked enough

3:06:34okay and just before we go to the next question I just want to clarify as chair I didn't call it

3:06:39out of order but I just want to make sure we have we have context and clarity um the other letters

3:06:45received um in the correspondence we don't ask our correspondence to give their level of expertise

3:06:53or make assumptions on their um on their qualifications um so I just want to with any

3:06:59comments about the level of expertise of correspondence to put that into context

3:07:10I think we're over to um a point of order oh yeah just a question for clarification are we asking

3:07:17questions only of chair root or chair and staff yeah these are our we're in we're into presentation

3:07:23so any of the presentations we've received today we're asking questions of clarity okay so that we

3:07:29can move on to the delegations okay super if you can put me back on the question list then please

3:07:33yeah so next we have councillor Boussio then councillor Allt and councillor Aurel

3:07:40thank you and through the chair this question is for staff just to help me understand I understand

3:07:47about the accessibility lens in looking at the um voting accessible services and the alternative

3:07:55voting methods so my question is does uh so it's two parts does the legislation direct who the

3:08:01community agency and stakeholders are for the engagement that have to be included

3:08:11through chair Caron to councillor Boussio to know the legislation is not explicit about

3:08:16which organizations or which agencies or you know I believe that's the flavor of your question but

3:08:21there's no there's no explicit direction legislatively for us to engage with the specific groups the

3:08:27report outlines that what I feel is a really good robust engagement we've had both with the AACN with

3:08:32others other agencies and associations in the community but no specific no and I guess I have a

3:08:38question follow-up to that which is I was very surprised that the four public school boards seeing

3:08:45as they're part of the election municipal election process weren't included as stakeholders they weren't

3:08:52advised they weren't consulted and specifically since they have accessibility advisory working

3:08:58group committees themselves and so I was a little bit surprised by that I made some phone calls

3:09:05to ask and and none of the school boards had any awareness that this was happening so I was

3:09:09disappointed by that because this is a process that I would hope that those stakeholders parents

3:09:18guardians staff should be aware of for that public education lens so just perhaps that's a

3:09:25takeaway for future I said there this is for questions was there a question in there I'll

3:09:30give staff an opportunity to respond yeah so I was wondering why not yeah through you chair Caron

3:09:37to councillor Boussio it is it is a valid point our engagement with the school boards tends to occur

3:09:41as we progress through this sort of timeline towards elections they become very active partners for us

3:09:48when it comes to using their facilities for example as voting locations we're very active in

3:09:53supporting things like the student vote campaign so that so that there is a really great educational

3:09:58awareness about the importance of voting and democratic processes and that type of thing

3:10:02but at the end of the day there is a place where the decision on altering a voting

3:10:06methods rests and that's with you as council we are required statutorily to provide election services

3:10:14for the election of school board trustees we hold that as as important as as electing you and

3:10:19and those that choose to put their name forward for election municipally we hold those equally

3:10:24important but ultimately the decision for alternate voting methods rests with you as council and so

3:10:29our engagement does tend to be with the school boards at a point in time when it's slightly

3:10:33after this decision has made as we move towards the actual what I'll call sort of boots on the

3:10:38ground logistical and operational considerations that we have in partnership and in coordination

3:10:43with our school board partners thank you chair caron and I'll follow up in writing thank you

3:10:50okay next we have castor alt um thank you very much chair caron uh first of all thank you very

3:10:57much to uh staff for a um very in-depth report it's truly appreciated and uh the recommendations

3:11:03I think are reasonably solid I'd also like to thank mizirut because she's been uh absolutely

3:11:08tireless on on the issue of the integrity of voting and that's where I want to go to staff with this

3:11:15the statement was made that there have been leaps and bounds in security and I think it's to our

3:11:20IT staff that I would be asking this my understanding from my brother who's an IT security expert

3:11:27is that there have been leaps and bounds and cyber threats as well and so I was wondering if our IT

3:11:32staff could please comment on that and also uh whether staff could comment on blockchain

3:11:38and online voting and the potential for vendors to offer a quality blockchain I guess it's

3:11:46security I don't understand that well actually uh through you uh Councillor Caron to Councillor

3:11:55alt um so while there has been leaps and bounds and cyber security over the last few years it

3:12:00continues to grow and get better there's also been leaps and bounds in cyber crime over the last

3:12:05few years just to cite a few stats reported cyber incidents in Canada have grown 45% annually from

3:12:1533,000 to about 74,000 from 2018 to 2022 with an average kind of increase over the time

3:12:22and something that's kind of used as a little bit of a barometer in like the cyber security industry

3:12:27is uh ransomware an amount of money paid out for ransomware so in 2022 um businesses globally paid

3:12:34out over 557 million in ransomware in 2023 there was a jump to 1.1 billion almost about 50% increase

3:12:42so while cyber security is improving nothing is 100% and cyber criminals there's also continuing

3:12:49to approve and involve all of along with it thank you I don't know whether uh Mr. O'Brien wants to

3:12:55add to that or not I threw you chair Caron to your second question there Councillor Allt in and

3:13:00around blockchain blockchains and uh uh online voting and our potential for vendors to offer

3:13:09a system yeah so I'll paint a picture for the committee about how this process would would

3:13:13roll out because I think that'll help you understand where there might be some impacts

3:13:17in our ability again using that tech stack analogy where there might be an inability for us to really

3:13:22affect change so when we go to market we will go to market for it for alternative voting technology

3:13:27in the same way that the municipality does for any number of goods and services we purchase we go

3:13:30through a procurement process a formally documented statutorily required procurement process with our

3:13:36colleagues in finance when we go for that call we can include something like a blockchain requirement

3:13:41or any number of degrees of security requirements in place we can we can allude to and note to the

3:13:48vendors in the market that we will conduct denial of service testing and threat risk assessments

3:13:53and penetration testing and all those aspects of security testing that quite frankly we would

3:13:58our our concern is that if we place those requirements on the market and I believe you

3:14:05would all agree and we certainly agree that we ought to do that what's the response from this

3:14:10market so this isn't a market where and forgive me I'm going to maybe be a little bit crass

3:14:14it's not akin to us buying some form of routine machine part for some of the equipment we might

3:14:18operate as a city this is a very narrow market space and our concern right now is that market

3:14:24space has seen the two largest players in that market space either leave voluntarily or you know

3:14:30facing bankruptcy slash insolvency and so our confidence in the market to bring to be able to

3:14:37return back a response to that procurement process that would say yes we absolutely can do that

3:14:44that is impacted and again I use the turn it's noted we ought to all note that I'm not sure what

3:14:49the market is able to do many of the vendors that are in the market space now when we take out those

3:14:54two and the two that are no longer in the market are the most long-tenured and in our in our analysis

3:15:00the most prevalent with other Ontario municipalities when we remove those two vendors from the marketplace

3:15:06as they have or they're no longer available what's the ability for the market and the remaining

3:15:11and I'll categorize it as three maybe four other vendors to be able to meet that standard in that

3:15:17requirement and so I think that paints for you the picture of how this process would roll out

3:15:23we may get to a point where you recommend it and we might then have to place a bylaw before you to

3:15:27say we can't we can't meet the requirements that we believe need to be in place and you expect

3:15:34and that's a difficult and precarious spot for you to be in as well because we've created then

3:15:39public awareness about the possibility of it and in our business it is about dependability

3:15:44reliability predictability verifiability broad communications will roll out after your decision

3:15:51at the end of this month our intent is to is to do some of the work we you would expect of us

3:15:55really broad good community engagement when there's uncertainty that that brings things into question I

3:16:01think thank you would IT staff wish to comment any further or does that sum it up IT staff says

3:16:08that sums it up I have one last question for Mr O'Brien and it actually stems from Council

3:16:13of Booth's Deals question mentioned was made of school boards the method in how we vote it strikes

3:16:21me what I'm hearing you say is not done in consultation with the school boards it strikes me

3:16:27that what we're saying is we tell the school boards how we vote on school trustees is that correct

3:16:34the through you chair Caron the legislation is clear you as a council make decisions on

3:16:39alternative voting methods and and we are required to deliver an election for both school board and

3:16:44municipal candidates and so your decision here binds the school boards with complete respect

3:16:51they're they're they're fantastic partners for us the use of facilities the great relationships we

3:16:56have with both the directors of the the larger the English public and the English separate school

3:17:00board here in Guelph and and beyond great partners but there's there's no resources that are provided

3:17:05from school boards to deliver those elections aside like like human capital or human resources

3:17:10associated with that there's no monetary contribution they absolutely come to the table with resources

3:17:14in the form of physical locations and and and and the like but this decision is your decision alone

3:17:21and we are then the sole deliverers for lack of a better term of that direction that we receive

3:17:27from council as it relates to alternative voting methods thank you just a comment does strike me

3:17:32as a bit of an oversight questions only we've got all right i'm sorry uh counter cron uh if it's

3:17:37appropriate i'm quite happy to put this on the floor if that's appropriate we haven't heard from

3:17:40our delegations yeah okay yeah so just questions of clarity for staff and chair root um councillor

3:17:46or work and then councillor don't thank you chair Caron um councillor Allt asked my question about

3:17:54blockchain but i just want to be sure i've understood so um chair root talked about blockchain

3:18:00and cryptographic protocols and things that could make it safe for voting but is that what's in place

3:18:06right now in ontario in other municipalities or we don't know through you councillor Caron to

3:18:17councillor or work i don't think we necessarily have an understanding the two largest providers in

3:18:23the market and in the level of detail we can set requirements as uh as mr o brian alluded to but

3:18:33there can be limits to what a vendor is willing to share in terms of what's under the hood

3:18:36beyond testing um we could require blockchain and there could be an alternative available for example

3:18:43that a vendor may use and we may not be aware of that at the time of the rfp okay thanks if i if i

3:18:50may sorry councillor roc i do apologize and thank you councillor Caron for allowing me to just quickly

3:18:55comment security is certainly a concern for us uh it was it was a big topic of discussion in 2022 and

3:19:01if i recall correctly leading into 2018 but again some of these the concerns that we've outlined

3:19:06in addition to the security questions you have are around the dependability and the predictability of

3:19:11the system so what we saw with issues predominantly in the sector in 2018 when 51 municipalities had

3:19:18to extend voting hours because there was a reduction in the bandwidth for lack of a term i'll use the

3:19:23term pipeline the pipeline was sort of uh truncated for lack of a better term that was not a security

3:19:28that was not a malicious attack that was again our ability to affect and control subcontractors

3:19:36sub-vendors of the of the organizations that we work with in 2022 the challenge of being able

3:19:43to process electors at an expeditious or a traditional pace that we would expect and which

3:19:48quite frankly has become very expeditious was as a result of that vendor having server issues so

3:19:55bottom end of that stack server issues uh we were we were fortunate to see simply a slowing but not

3:20:02complete stop that may simply be because our service our service our platform was residing on

3:20:09one cloud server versus a series of other municipalities that may have been residing on

3:20:13another server both slowed one slowed to the point of failure ours slowed to the point of

3:20:18a bit of a crawl but it eventually rebounded so the considerations we're making here are

3:20:23security focused but they're also on that predictability of verifier or dependability

3:20:28of all those aspects of those tech stacks that we showed on that screen so thanks through you chair

3:20:35cron um we're talking about the security of the the vote itself are we or is the clerk's office

3:20:46also looking at security of the election website that provides all the voting information so to

3:20:53you know eliminate the risk of people being sent to the wrong place or

3:20:57the instructions being changed like what's the comprehensive and I know you probably don't want

3:21:01to say all of it um but are we approaching security in a very comprehensive way for everything that is

3:21:10digital through chair Caron the council work I'll I'll begin and then maybe I'll look to

3:21:14mr fisher if he wants to add in because it's sort of part and parcel with I think our our whole

3:21:19envelope of offerings that that exists through wealth.ca the reality is a lot of what you've

3:21:24alluded to council or work is things that we would be monitoring on an active basis and an

3:21:28ongoing basis. We constantly espouse the the importance of going to the one true source of

3:21:34information for voting locations and voting information and so we we we do point that

3:21:38we're always evaluating what other you know sites may be popping up we've had to correct you know

3:21:44with complete respect because I'm mindful of who I'm addressing we've had to correct candidates

3:21:48sites with that might have slightly different nuanced information not not malicious in any way

3:21:53but just maybe a wrong copy and a paste we'll correct those things so we're constantly of

3:21:58monitoring that space from an awareness and a and a monitoring standpoint but again I don't know if

3:22:06if mr fisher wants to offer any thoughts on on how we monitor the the security and safety of of our

3:22:14our site that is gulf.ca. Thank you mr overrind. Sorry it is a little outside the scope of what

3:22:20we're talking about for alternative voting methods but I'll allow the question because I think I think

3:22:24everyone's interested in the answer. All right thank you mr. brian through you chair Caron to

3:22:30councillor work. The city of gualafas a holistic security protocol which we try and apply across

3:22:36all of our platforms. Obviously I cannot get into details as to what that is but we do have an

3:22:40overall process that we apply across all of our platforms consistently. Thank you. Thanks. A couple

3:22:46more chair Caron. Okay so through you to staff there's an estimate about twenty to forty thousand

3:22:52dollars for an rfp should we do online voting and would that rfp be for ongoing protection

3:23:03because I also chatted with a cyber security expert who works for a big company that that does

3:23:09data security for multinationals including elections in the states and that person said

3:23:15you know when they do the the intrusion testing which is probably the wrong term

3:23:20that's that's good for that moment in time but we need to be monitoring it all the time and watching

3:23:25for any sort of potential challenges so does that twenty to forty thousand dollars cover all of that

3:23:32does it cover ongoing monitoring really from the time that polls open the website that all that

3:23:38stuff like what's the breadth of that. Yeah through you chair Caron to councillor work so that the lower

3:23:44end of that range is for something that we would call threat or penetration testing and testing

3:23:50is sort of probably what you've you've heard that would to your point be a snapshot in a moment

3:23:55in time and like any election services I mean chair route articulated quite well any election

3:23:59aspect is there's there's the need for us to monitor the whole lineage and life cycle of that

3:24:05process the higher end of that spectrum would be a more broad based threat risk assessment

3:24:11which would include obviously the penetration testing and beyond denial of service testing etc etc

3:24:18to your question about whether that happens throughout once we conduct that testing and

3:24:22that dollar amount we quoted in the report that's a moment in timepiece we then turn it we then turn

3:24:28the route would engage with the vendor to evaluate any risks or threats risks that are identified to

3:24:34hopefully have those addressed patched etc but once we get to voting time and it's a live system

3:24:40it's incumbent on that vendor to monitor and to flag for us so again using that tech stack

3:24:47what can we have absolute control over it's the top layer golf dot ca the citizens interaction with

3:24:52our site that would might direct them to an internet voting platform but beyond that we're beholden to

3:24:57that vendor to alert us when we saw that slowing on the voters list system in 2022 we contacted the

3:25:05vendor there wasn't a proactive reach out to us we saw it we saw it slowing we flagged it we're able

3:25:11to monitor it so we're monitoring our end but we have no no baseline understanding in that moment

3:25:16in time of what the cause of that is nor do we have the agreements with those other sub-vendors

3:25:22like cloud services providers and services to be able to actually directly intervene with them

3:25:27and that that I think gets that gets that your question gets at the crux of our concerns with

3:25:33with that platform in that stack and these these different remote voting options thank you and

3:25:40through you chair Caron so um

3:25:44no mr clerk in 2014 supported online voting for the advanced polls and the world has changed so

3:25:52i'm just wondering when the digital governance standards institute publish their standards

3:25:58do you feel like then we'd be in a position to say yes because we've all agreed and these are the

3:26:03required standards like what is the what is the benchmark um or maybe it's constantly moving but

3:26:10what's the benchmark for us to say you know what now we're really satisfied with the integrity of the

3:26:16system through chair Caron to counsel that's a great question thank you for that um yes the the the

3:26:24a formalized online voting standards would be certainly a great step in that in that direction

3:26:31the reality is i think you're right i think it is a bit of an ongoing evaluation um that standard

3:26:36will help definitely the question i have it like once once one sort of strengthening aspect is added

3:26:41to our decision making criteria it begets another question i don't mean to sort of continually punt

3:26:46it down the road but i would be then curious about are the vendors in the marketplace as limited as

3:26:52they are and as limited as i articulated to you to you are they able to actually adhere to that

3:26:58standard because perhaps that standard comes into play and the realization is when it comes to the

3:27:03importance of voting and democracy that that the standards that ought to be in place that ideally

3:27:08are in place maybe we're not there yet and so i know that's a bit of a crystal ball answer i don't

3:27:14have the ability to to sort of hypothesize where that might go but that would be my next question

3:27:20where where do we go beyond that um and and is there a strong enough market to be able to respond

3:27:26to those standards and deliver a service and a platform that subsequently adheres to those standards

3:27:32okay thank you and chair caron through you my last question is very analog

3:27:38is it possible to add additional accessible parking spaces on cardin street to ensure there's a larger

3:27:45supply of accessible parking spaces near city hall i will perhaps start through you chair caron to

3:27:52councillor work and i'll i look over and and miss clack bush will either nod or or vehemently disagree

3:27:58but my my my sense is we could certainly work with the public services team to offer a handful of

3:28:04spaces along cardin we would want to obviously engage with the business community we're it's not

3:28:08lost in us that those are spaces that their their customers use but i don't believe it would be a

3:28:12challenge at all and then that that would certainly support in a market park aid uh being a place where

3:28:18that where we would offer free parking pending council's approval transit and some additional

3:28:22spaces we could coordinate off and i'm seeing a nod so thank you keep me in mind we still have

3:28:29delegations this is just a questions of clarity from the presentations we will have an opportunity

3:28:34to ask more questions staff and chair root after we've heard the delegations as well this isn't

3:28:39cutting off questions this is uh just getting us uh uh past the presentation so i have councillor downer

3:28:45okay thank you through you mayor uh chair caron um

3:28:50so the my question's more around um voter id for uh in-person voting versus voter id requirements

3:29:00for the alternative internet voting now my understanding is because it's different for

3:29:06elections canada elections in Ontario and municipalities elections around the voter

3:29:11id requirements showing up in person if you don't have a voter card you can't use your voter card

3:29:19in municipal elections i read that you can't use them for id but if i show up with an insurance

3:29:27policy a rental agreement that has my address on it that's all that's required no photo id required

3:29:35just a piece of paper that says that has a name on it may not be my name but that's all that's

3:29:44required that it's a name on it and it has an address and that that's for live in-person voting

3:29:50right uh no photo id required a lot of people think you can't know it's just need a piece of paper

3:29:57like i said an insurance policy a cancelled personalized check that's all you need if i go

3:30:04to internet voting the last time i'm trying to remember to register to register you had it was

3:30:14it was you needed a photo id to register i believe like a health card or i'm not sure maybe you could

3:30:23tell me what it was it was a two-point thing so if you weren't on there but if you were on the list

3:30:29you were sent a pin number or something and but how do you verify who the people are i guess it is

3:30:35i mean as opposed to showing up at a polling station with a like a cancelled check or something

3:30:43i can take this one through you uh chair Caron to councillor downer um when we did offer internet

3:30:50voting in 2014 we did have a two-step process part of that two-step process is a registration and we

3:30:55actually have a similar registration process for vote by mail in 2022 effectively using an online

3:31:02intake tool similar to what the province uses across in person any remote method it's the same

3:31:08requirements for identification that our options for identification are set by a regulation of the

3:31:14municipal elections act doesn't require photo id as you mentioned um and effectively in order to be

3:31:21added to the voters list and through that registration process id is verified at that point and that

3:31:27could be a driver's license if someone chooses that it could also be you know a bank statement a

3:31:32rental agreement anything to that effect um so that is consistent regardless of what method we're using

3:31:40then for voting you're sent a pin number separately is that correct once you've required how is i

3:31:48forget how that happened that's correct so the two-step process effectively would be um receiving a

3:31:54unique identifier on the voter card someone doesn't receive their voter card they can contact our

3:31:58office um and we issued them a version digitally uh the second step of the registration process

3:32:05required personal information from the voters list date of birth other information uh in order to

3:32:11verify that person's identity and then receive a second secure piece of identification or a pin

3:32:18number to then log into that system so it was a two-step that way so you needed date of birth

3:32:23things like that identified but we don't require that when you show up in person

3:32:29to vote you just require the person exactly there there was that extra step in order to verify some

3:32:36piece of personal information uh for the remote online voting okay thanks oh and i just want to

3:32:41confirm if if council did direct that they were interested in internet voting and you couldn't

3:32:48it didn't uh mr brine you said that there's certain requirements we'd have and standards

3:32:56that that you would be required and if none of the remaining vendors did that could do that you would

3:33:01have to come back to us right yeah through you chair chron if we were to go out with us with what

3:33:07you would expect and we would want a very high degree of of security analysis built into a procurement

3:33:12process and they weren't able to meet those requirements and we didn't get any responses to that

3:33:18you would have directed us to implement alternative voting methods being internet voting

3:33:22and we would then have to come back and tell you that the market can't support that okay and so

3:33:26there's no ability for us to do that we would then seek the placement of a bylaw before council and

3:33:31effectively if that was the case there would be not a lot of ability to not adopt that bylaw that

3:33:37would repeal the the direction so it that's again part of the complexity of this this process okay

3:33:46thank you thank you one further question councillor closson yes thank you through you chair caron to

3:33:53staff i just had a question with regard to the comparators so you mentioned that there were

3:33:58two vendors that um are no longer doing business i was wondering if from the list of comparators

3:34:04you know oakville chatham kent hamilton so on so forth if any of those comparators um are no

3:34:11longer being served by those two vendors so was that something that you when when you're chatting

3:34:16with them is that something that came up uh through you um chair caron and i'll turn to miss

3:34:23slayer she can offer some specifics about specific municipalities uh it's so new new to us and such

3:34:29recent news on the most recent announcement about a bankruptcy and insolvency process

3:34:34that i think you're going to see a lot of municipalities in our sector kind of a little bit

3:34:39concerned um sidle who is going through that process right now uh was the vendor of choice or

3:34:45for we know marcom and and vaughn recently um and so the other vendor that we would we would leverage

3:34:53which was a the previous vendor we did use in 2014 dominion voting um their system was the one that

3:34:59saw some some issues and in 2018 in terms of bandwidth and and that that ability to handle

3:35:05the quote unquote load um but i'll i'll turn to um miss miss slayer to offer some thoughts on

3:35:13on who supported some of the other municipalities sure through you uh councillor caron to councillor

3:35:19classon um it is limited and kind of regionally specific but there you know a new vendor did

3:35:26come on the market in 2022 that did support comparators for example kingston burlington

3:35:33so again there are vendors out there but the specific vending question uh their first

3:35:39ontario election was 2022 thank you thanks uh we've got one more question from mirgothry and

3:35:49then i'd like to move to delegations yeah thank you so much and through you chair um i just i i

3:35:57i want to think that i'm thinking something but i actually need the answers from you

3:36:01before i i really stand on this i keep hearing uh all the slowdowns uh or the bandwidth problems

3:36:09or things like that that occurred in the past i don't deny that but could you please verify

3:36:15is that because um was there a difference with that between those happening on an election day

3:36:22versus an advanced voting because if we keep hearing all there is these bandwidth problems

3:36:28and all all the time i'm just wondering if you could differentiate the difference of when those

3:36:32bandwidths actually occurred uh so for example in 2014 when we had our online voting um

3:36:42we we did it for advanced polling only um and then we haven't had it since so where where do

3:36:49these bandwidth problems occur is is it over a five day or 10 day ramp up period of advanced

3:36:56voting where it's more stretched out a little bit thinner and the capacity of bandwidth is

3:37:01greater there and those issues don't happen or did these bandwidths only happen on an election

3:37:06day i think that's important clarity that hasn't been stated yet so i wouldn't mind hearing the

3:37:10answer thank you yeah through to mirgothry great question and and yes good good context for sure

3:37:15most of those bandwidth issues and the server failures occurred on election day all of them

3:37:20occurred on election day what i will note though is that that doesn't preclude them from happening

3:37:25at other opportune times or in opportune times i should say um and then the other the other piece

3:37:30i would mention is again i come back to our ability to actually impact an effect change when it does

3:37:37happen so if it were to happen during the advanced voting period then electors would have the ability

3:37:42to to vote on election day but if we weren't offering a remote voting platform on election day

3:37:49then those voters uh that would would have perhaps availed themselves of online voting during

3:37:54advanced period now won't have that option the other piece i would finally offer is that

3:38:00that does again contribute to agree of concern question it doesn't make that election process

3:38:08particularly predictable and dependable from the eyes of some electors if there is a failure

3:38:12during an advanced voting period is everything yeah so thank you thank you for all those very very

3:38:20important and informative questions to staff we are going to move to our very patient delegations

3:38:25now and our first delegation is amdol cameron and we'll have uh on screen do we have someone lined up

3:38:41on video or is that a yep okay you can hear me yep we can hear you uh can't see you quite yet i

3:38:49guess we'll just do audio um just as we as we start our delegations just a reminder that um you

3:38:56will hear a little uh beep at the 32nd prior to the end of the delegation uh five minute delegations

3:39:05some of our speakers are familiar names and know the five minute rule um and we'll get started

3:39:11whenever you uh whenever you're ready mr cameron okay my name is anordal cameron i am a lifelong

3:39:19resident of gulf i'm neuro neurodivergent and live with numerous disabilities at age 15 my work

3:39:27in disability advocacy was recognized by the ontario government when i received the ontario

3:39:34junior citizen of the year award until recently i ran a small business that worked to support other

3:39:43individuals here in town i am a current member of the aac but i'm here in an unofficial capacity

3:39:52as a concerned citizen i am here today to tell you that gulf needs to adopt accessible voting

3:40:00options such as online voting and remote access vote by mail without methods like this many members

3:40:08of our community will be excluded and left unable to exercise their right to vote i've been working in

3:40:16um advocacy for disabilities longer than many of you have been in office and i have yet to hear

3:40:23a good reason that our rights should be ignored not everyone is willing or able to risk their

3:40:30lives or well being to exercise their right to vote using uh are currently available methods

3:40:38during the last election i did so i'm an anaphylactic latex allergy and could have died

3:40:45due to the envelopes that were included in my mail in voting kit

3:40:51and i've heard from some people that they feel even if we take the extra effort to go into the

3:40:57polling stations that we cannot be guaranteed that it will be accessible last year a polling

3:41:04station was blocked off by construction uh there were many who had to go well out of their way just

3:41:10to try and find access to the building others were forced to give up on voting uh i know some

3:41:16individuals like my next door neighbor who's legally blind would not have been able to find a

3:41:21solution to get into the building getting back to online voting and remote access vote by mail um

3:41:30um i believe that the concerns of hacking and interference are misplaced first of all i think

3:41:37there's an overestimation in guelph's importance we aren't a supercenter like otawa or toronto and

3:41:45besides that if someone really wants to interfere with an election they will find a way to do so

3:41:51it's not dependent on whether we offer online voting uh if you want an example of this there's

3:41:57in the news there was footage uh from the recent russian elections of someone pouring dye directly

3:42:06into a ballot box on top of that part of the process is already tied to online systems so

3:42:14the fear of being hacked is no excuse to exclude the disabled community there have also been concerns

3:42:23about online voting causing problems with existing servers and that getting overwhelmed

3:42:28and potentially doing the process if that's the case then so be it the problem isn't disabled people

3:42:37are overwhelming the system the problem is the current voting system is insufficient to support

3:42:42guelph's increased population and we should already be working on steps to remedy the situation

3:42:49when someone can't get into a building we should focus on the building being inaccessible rather

3:42:54than blaming the individual for being in a wheelchair not offering accessible voting options

3:43:00isn't a valid solution it's it's selective restriction to voting access something that is

3:43:07not looked upon favorably by today's society or for that matter history books i don't mean to imply

3:43:16anything about the integrity of the staff or elected officials i just want to make clear the

3:43:23severity of the human's right issues at stake here i will ask you to today to please implement

3:43:31online voting and remote access vote by mail please do the right thing and let us keep our right to

3:43:37vote thank you thank you thank you for your delegation and also for your services of volunteer

3:43:44to the aac i'll ask members of council if they have any questions for you and i don't see any so

3:43:51we'll move on to our next delegation uh susan watson who is here in person welcome susan welcome hi

3:43:58i've got this the sound working now okay chair caron and members of council i'd like to start by

3:44:07acknowledging the work of the accessibility advisory committee and the clerk's office

3:44:11in the research and deliberations around how to make our municipal elections more accessible

3:44:17i hear loud and clear from the accessibility advisory committee's standpoint

3:44:21that internet voting and rivbm are the most accessible and barrier free methods by which

3:44:27they could exercise their franchise in the staff report staff have zoomed out to look at the

3:44:34implications of each method of voting not only through an accessibility lens but also the

3:44:40vulnerability of each method to errors failure manipulation and fraud and most importantly

3:44:46the verifiability of each method by third party observers what is at stake is both the integrity

3:44:52of our municipal elections and critically the trust that voters have that the results truly

3:44:58reflect the intent of the electorate you likewise need to look at what is being proposed through

3:45:03those lenses of risk and trust verified voting is a 20 year old american organization in 2023

3:45:11they released a report entitled casting votes safely examining internet voting's voting's

3:45:17dangers and highlighting safer alternatives the concluding paragraph states the following

3:45:23the internet prompts promises much but when it comes to voting unfortunately it fails to deliver

3:45:29on both privacy and verifiability subjecting military voters and voters with disabilities

3:45:36to a voting system that is less secure in this case internet voting defies the democratic principle

3:45:42that all voters have a right to a safe and secure system in which they can be justifiably confident

3:45:48that their votes count more research and collaboration plus sustained adequate funding for election

3:45:54officials is needed to improve voting accessibilities in ways that do not create risk to our elections

3:46:03at a time when election security and public confidence are under relentless attack we cannot

3:46:08resort to insecure internet voting technology the stakes are just too high this same report

3:46:17quotes from a 2018 paper prepared by the american national academies of science engineering and

3:46:23medicine entitled securing the vote protecting american democracy it says at the present time

3:46:30the internet or any network connected to the internet should not be used for the return of

3:46:36marked ballots further internet voting should not be used in the future until and unless very robust

3:46:43guarantees of security and verifiability are developed and in place as no known technology

3:46:51guarantees the security secrecy and verifiability of a marked ballot transmitted over the internet

3:47:00i note that for security reasons our ballot scanners and wealth are not connected to the

3:47:04internet in any way and no information from those scanners is transmitted over the internet

3:47:10i want to take a moment to address the issue of verifiability in 2009 the federal constitutional

3:47:16court of germany ruled that electronic voting machines and by extension internet voting violated

3:47:22section 38 of their constitution which guarantees free and equal elections the court held that the

3:47:29particular voting machines used in the election did not live up to the constitutional principle of

3:47:34transparency of elections which requires that voting machines be safeguarded against potential

3:47:40manipulation or error through procedures that are understandable to the average citizen

3:47:49staff addresses the same concern on page 12 of their report with internet voting

3:47:56there is no external way to verify whether results reflect the proper majority of votes cast

3:48:02the votes are counted accurately and that only valid votes are counted and upheld

3:48:07trust in the system be called into question there would be no paper ballot to verify results

3:48:13and there could not be a recount in any other way afforded by the courts this challenges

3:48:19principles of the municipal elections act and an inability to verify using any other means could

3:48:24raise larger questions about election trustworthiness and the validity of the outcome considerations

3:48:31of reliability and verifiability present as high risk on the city's emergency risk management

3:48:37framework i ask that you support staff's recommendations and not introduce internet voting

3:48:43for the 2026 municipal election and i would say the unwritten code in democracy is we consent to

3:48:50be governed by people that we may not have voted for because we trust that this that the election

3:48:56was free and fair and we know in today's world someone could hack and change the results and we

3:49:02would never know why exactly on the bell well rehearsed well delivered our third oh any questions

3:49:13for miss Watson i don't see any so we'll move on to our third delegation we have meg hoping

3:49:22oh that delegation has withdrawn so moved on to lin grist i believe i saw in the gallery

3:49:30and we'll be joining us at the podium welcome lin that's okay we're patient our next delegation

3:49:47i think we'll be joining us remotely just as a let that person know that we're

3:49:53we're queuing up after lin's presentation and lin i know you've been there before so i don't

3:50:07need to give you the 30 second ding expectation could you just repeat what you said oh i just

3:50:13said i know you've been at the podium with us before so at the 30 second mark when you hear the

3:50:17bell i don't want that to throw you off great thank you um chair caron mega three counselors

3:50:25city staff and fellow golf citizens i appreciate the opportunity to speak today first to thank

3:50:32the staff for the detailed and thorough report and recommendations to increase voting accessibility

3:50:39for those in our community who have difficulty voting at designated polling stations on election

3:50:45day i note that in 2022 when i was chair of something called the gulf wellington social

3:50:54justice coalition which is a coalition of 19 civil society organizations we spoke at length with the

3:51:02city club office about our concerns about accessibility and also about voter turnout

3:51:09and today i just want to say at least from my perspective i actually heard felt that city

3:51:17clerk's office heard us and for that i am extremely grateful today i was particularly

3:51:25pleased to see the recommendation that there will be a sent free option for those with multiple

3:51:32chemical sensitivities a condition which is overlooked when considering accessibility options

3:51:40i say that as somebody who volunteered for people with sensitive mcs for about five or six years

3:51:48some time ago and it is a very serious condition i specifically say accessibility rather than a

3:51:56personal convenience because voting in an election is not like grocery shopping it is a consa

3:52:04a cornerstone of our democratic system as i'm sure all members of council will agree in addition

3:52:12to the recommendations by staff i would ask that council consider adding the following options to

3:52:18enhance accessibility put polling stations in seniors or predominantly seniors buildings

3:52:25in a common space so that it could be used by others in the community too

3:52:30put polling stations in nursing homes residential homes with provision for returning officers

3:52:36to take the ballot box to the room of those who are bedridden and again if it is possible have

3:52:42the polling station open to the local community i note that by the way in 2022 i was one of those

3:52:52500 who actually used the mail-in ballot i didn't have any special deal i'm just a regular citizen

3:53:00didn't know anybody on any committees and it worked for me and i was very glad of it thank you

3:53:08i'm also aware that the accessibility accessibility environments would add to the cost

3:53:14of the next election and it would encourage council as a whole to support those expenditures

3:53:21so that we all have we all have access to be able to vote i want to note in passing

3:53:31that turnout for municipal elections continues to be relatively low when compared with provincial

3:53:38and federal elections apart from the fact that municipal elections are by far the most complex

3:53:44voting for candidates for as you know mayor council's ward and and for boards of trustees

3:53:51and there are a number of myths that still exist you know people believe i rent my apartment so

3:53:56i can't actually vote i'm a student here so i can't vote i i would hope that this council will

3:54:04consider spending funds to remind the general public of just how important municipal services

3:54:11are to them and i think we might get a better turnout that way thank you for your time

3:54:17thank you miss grist any questions for the delegation

3:54:20councillor Allt thank you very much miss grist uh through through you got chair caron thank you

3:54:27very much miss grist for coming before us um perhaps i i missed it i don't think i did though

3:54:33um i don't think you made any remarks on online voting which had been something that was discussed

3:54:39significantly just prior through presentations and through delegations i was wondering do you

3:54:46have a perspective on that i do actually you'd think i'd want it wouldn't you because i'm disabled

3:54:51and it's hard for me to get around anywhere i have however a much greater concern about safety

3:54:59and security my concern is that if we all don't feel as a public safe and secure about the vote

3:55:10then we're not going to trust the people we elected and if we start mistrusting our elected

3:55:16officials then democracy in my from my perspective is actually just down the tubes

3:55:24and i know that sounds weird because i'm actually having trouble standing up you'd think i'd

3:55:29want it but it's not safe and it's not secure and i actually want more stuff in place so that i

3:55:37contrast that the people that i elect got there because they got all the votes even if i didn't

3:55:43like them thank you seeing no other questions thank you i will move on to our final delegation

3:55:52brad howcroft i believe is joining us online

3:55:58and brad as you're preparing for your delegation if a little bit of flexibility on the on the

3:56:06timing is required i don't want you to feel feel rushed on the on the timing so please take your

3:56:12time to uh to deliver your delegation according to your own timing thank you can you can hear me

3:56:21we can hear you we can see you welcome perfect uh say you care care and

3:56:29honorable we're guttrey and countless um my dear brad howcroft

3:56:39let me engulf my entire life with cerebral palsy uh many of you may remember me speaking

3:56:50as a state topic in 2017 at a chair of the aac today i am speaking slowly and i concern citizen

3:57:12living with a disability my goal is similar as in 2017 however looking at it from a different

3:57:24viewpoint time and time again wealth has to be the leader of new ideas people with disabilities

3:57:39have always wanted to be treated equal however in my experience especially as we

3:57:49is there are times that we respect to respect to expect to be required different needs example

3:58:04every able body wealth citizen it can choose can take wealth credit some disabled wealth

3:58:19citizens cannot take wealth credit well with counter health several years ago

3:58:29for a locking wealth mobility this allowed the disabled to exercise their right

3:58:44to travel independently throughout the city when i spoke in 2017

3:58:58online boarding would turn down six to seven leg mobility i am recommending

3:59:11a similar approach to online boarding i am not suggesting it i'm sorry i am not

3:59:22judging it for all persons with disabilities but to those they cannot physically make it to the

3:59:34polling booth example out of a hundred eligible 25 citizens of wealth have some type of disability

3:59:49imagine and healthy qualified doing your favorite thing with family and friends this is something we

4:00:05all hope we take for granted a person with a physical disability may never have the same

4:00:18opportunity some of our value citizens are either homebound or have difficulty

4:00:32getting out into the community for me this will probably be a great point to start

4:00:42with will probably be one to two percent of the voters where i got that number i have no idea

4:00:56but that's that's probably a good guess now you're seeing this is my wealth

4:01:11compromise from my delegation in 2017 i i still am in favor of online boarding for everyone

4:01:26in 2017 i was down there where you are now in in city hall until 1 a.m to have the motion defeated

4:01:44by one vote the online boarding should still be brought into law but my priority is to get

4:01:57online boarding for the physically disabled who cannot get out to the polls and if this is what

4:02:08it takes at a starting point i am all for it thank you and i'd be happy to take questions

4:02:21thank you mr howcroft and and your lived experience certainly adds to this discussion

4:02:26any questions for the delegation we do we have councillor Goller with a question

4:02:30shall we have a few so bear with us thank you very much for your presentation mr howcroft

4:02:37the main argument that that i've heard today against online voting is the the potential risk

4:02:44and the loss of confidence in our voting system could i ask you to comment on that what do you

4:02:51think about the potential risk for tampering and the loss of faith in our electoral process

4:02:58process if we do allow online voting before i begin if i if i do if i forget the procedure

4:03:12i'm going to the mayor and to the councilors please please forgive me is that okay absolutely

4:03:25we've got you've got the time to answer the question this is hard for me today so um

4:03:35the question was about the procedures it was about the the perceived lack of safety

4:03:48and the the potential loss of faith in our voting system because it's not as as verifiable as as

4:03:57paper okay well this to me is

4:04:04okay compared to a federal or provincial election it's a lot smaller scale if in my viewpoint

4:04:17to me okay you may laugh at this but you would want to hack a law for elections that's my personal

4:04:32viewpoint but but as a starting point if city council is worrying about the hack

4:04:46of the election which i cannot argue about because it is it is a possibility that one or two percent

4:05:07of the disability they could exercise their right i don't think that one or two percent

4:05:20that might get hacked the pleasure of not that one or two percent

4:05:29that

4:05:36they could have the ability to vote without weighing the the hack if that makes sense

4:05:50yeah thank you for that i really appreciate that

4:05:52but

4:05:56yep we we got your answer that was that was that was great we have a question from counselor or rork

4:06:02okay thank you chair Caron and uh thank you mr howcroft for your leadership on the gulf barrier

4:06:09free committee as well as your service on the aac we appreciate it we had a question for you

4:06:15in 2017 did the city offer the home visits and the vote by mail option

4:06:22and i believe um

4:06:32could that redirect us to the city after that and then i can comment and i forget yeah we can direct

4:06:42that to the staff yeah thank you chair or rork and or sorry council rork and chair Caron

4:06:49mr howcroft thanks for the question in 2018 so the decision point was 2017 but the lead up to 2018

4:06:542018 election did not have the home visit pilot program or vote by mail so then through you chair

4:07:02karan mr howcroft i'm just wondering if you find that those the addition of the home visit and the

4:07:08vote by mail is helpful for folks who have a hard time getting to a polling station

4:07:13okay um i don't have a problem with the vote by mail but um okay i ensure to say i am going to go

4:07:30this is per my personal i know aac likes the home visits but personally um to have someone i don't know

4:07:50come into my home he may hear me may have a sitting badge but you're talking about

4:08:05um

4:08:13um

4:08:18i'm talking about security i don't want to go to scale i don't want security coming

4:08:29to me so i don't know coming into my home okay thank you very much for that i really appreciate it

4:08:39we have one further question from councillor downer thank you through you uh chair Caron

4:08:45mr howcroft so i remember your delegation in 2017 and i want to ask you the same question i

4:08:54asked you then because um it for people with disabilities it's that the independence of the vote

4:09:02is um what's what's identified in in sort of the human rights you know writing about um

4:09:12the privacy being able to mark a ballot yourself or you know which can happen with the internet

4:09:18voting versus somebody helping you or somebody come into your home or just doing it like other people

4:09:25do uh do vote can you talk a bit about the importance to to you with a person of disabilities

4:09:33or or other people what what that independence means and from a perspective of voting and i

4:09:42think that was similar what i asked then i was trying to remember what it was i can't quote you

4:09:48because i i can't remember exactly but yes i do remember the question it's independence to me

4:09:59has always been a big part of my life and and to be able to mark a ballot

4:10:13either on paper or through the computer or however it is done

4:10:22and to do it yourself and be able to say i voted for for the mayor or i voted for the two

4:10:38councilmen if i warned that i believe in is a big step to make my city better

4:10:54it's it's very important and i had a disabled taxpayer even if i got a taxpayer

4:11:10if i'm a renter and student it doesn't matter who i am i had the right to vote

4:11:25okay thank you okay thanks that's the end of your questions and uh thank you so much for

4:11:30your answers i think that added to the debate um speaking of the debate i think we're well past

4:11:35the two hour mark in chambers so we're going to take a five minute bio break so that we can come

4:11:42back and debate uh and ask any additional questions of staff that may be necessary um while we get

4:11:48the motion on the floor so we'll meet back here at exactly four four eighteen yeah what is that

4:20:26okay we are back in session thank you everyone for for your patience we are continuing our corporate

4:20:34services meeting of may the seventh and the topic at hand is alternative methods of voting

4:20:40we've completed our delegations we're now asking questions of staff we will allow questions and

4:20:47comments at this time you can mix your questions and your comments if you'd like i just want to i

4:20:53know we had a lot of comments a lot of questions up front after the staff presentation so i just

4:20:59want to remind council that there is a five minute limit to uh to commentary as we entered the into

4:21:05the debate this is a very very important decision we're making today so i don't want to limit that

4:21:10debate in any way uh and let i'll open up the floor to my colleagues put up your hands and we'll

4:21:17start a speaker's list we have councillor Allt to start councillor Allt the floor is yours thank you

4:21:23very much chair caron uh first of all if you won't mind and if you request i would be happy to put

4:21:29the staff motions on the floor okay they're on the floor i need a seconder

4:21:34councillor or roark thank you very much um i want to speak in favor of the staff recommendations

4:21:41and recognize that there are also within those limit those recommendations some limitations i

4:21:47want to thank staff for the the time that you have taken to research this and to identify

4:21:54concerns identify such things as cyber crime and challenges with future votes especially with the

4:22:02abandonment of internet voting by two key firms i want to identify that offering internet voting

4:22:10might need to be reconsidered sometime in the future but i've clearly heard that at this point

4:22:15we have many questions about it staff also correctly i believe has identified many accommodations

4:22:21this is certainly not a perfect system but it does balance the issue of security with independence

4:22:27and i think that we owe it to the the community to ensure that we do have a secure system and that

4:22:33we do have one that fosters as much independence through notions of of equity and our capacity to

4:22:40deliver to people different alternative forms of voting without necessarily relying upon

4:22:46technology that could indeed be challenged as a consequence of modern dare i say cyber crime

4:22:52and i want to thanks staff very much for coming back with what you did okay um councillor goller

4:23:02thank you and through you chair Caron is uh chair root still available

4:23:09yes she is apparently um and thank you chair root for sticking around if i may through you to to chair

4:23:16root when you first gave your your presentation we we hadn't heard from delegates now that we

4:23:24heard from the delegates could i ask you to to weigh in on the the question of the on the one hand

4:23:32the increased accessibility of online or remote vote by mail for our constituents versus the the

4:23:40loss of confidence in the electoral system with that the concerns for safety of course i stuck

4:23:50around this is like my super bowl councillor goller i i live for this topic i'm here for this

4:23:57i i would say that i don't believe that those two can even they're not on opposite sides um i

4:24:05believe that voter confidence uh can be pretty easily reflected in there was a staff report

4:24:13i forget the year but it was after the 2014 voting staff did a review of a public engagement

4:24:19review of the online voting system that was used and overwhelmingly people were very in support of

4:24:25online voting people who used it said that they liked it people who didn't know it was there said

4:24:31they wanted to use it in the future so i don't know if there is as big a perception of insecurity

4:24:39for online voting or r.a. b.v.m as some some people might think there is certainly it's a

4:24:45concern to some individuals but i don't think widespread if we look at the numbers

4:24:49that is a very big concern in guelph um i can say that my confidence in the current voting system

4:24:55that i'm being asked to use is pretty shaky i think that most members of council if i asked

4:25:01them to vote the way that i'm being asked to vote if i said can i take you to the polls and mark

4:25:06your ballot for you and you don't get to check to make sure i voted correctly i think most of

4:25:11you would not have confidence in that system that i'm being asked to use today um i think my

4:25:18confidence is also delayed by the fact that we're continually punting this issue down the road as

4:25:23staff mentioned um that we're looking at this for the 2016 election right now which will have been

4:25:29you know 12 years of me advocating to please be allowed to securely vote again um so my confidence

4:25:36is shaken in a lot of ways but not by online voting or r.a. b.v.m uh i hope that answers your

4:25:43question it does thank you very much i really appreciate your insights uh councillor kate

4:25:54my apologies uh through you um i was i would like to make a motion uh a new emotion there are

4:26:04three clauses on the floor is this an amendment to one of the clauses or is this a new motion number

4:26:11four i believe that this would be a new motion number four okay and uh clerks have my motions

4:26:23they want to put on the screen that guelph city council directs the city clerk's office to offer

4:26:29internet voting as an alternative voting method for the 2026 municipal and school board elections

4:26:35subject to all security requirements and testing meeting the satisfaction of the city clerk

4:26:40and i have an opening comment too if that's okay okay and we have a seconder councillor Goller

4:26:45seconding that uh and the floor is still yours thanks so as you all know i delegated for online

4:26:52voting last term as a resident as a disabled person who has complicated access needs i know

4:26:56full well what it's like to not be able to participate in important decisions due to

4:27:00organizers not considering my needs it's our job to ensure everyone has proper tools for an

4:27:05independent secure vote the aac is our advisory committee who we appointed to tell us if we're

4:27:10meeting the access needs for as many people as we can they're telling us that the staff are

4:27:15recommended options are not enough if we want to live up to our duty to uphold their rights to vote

4:27:20like non-disabled citizens we need to have an online voting option there are no but have you

4:27:25thought of scenarios members of the aac have been tirelessly fighting for this option since it was

4:27:30used in 2014 successfully every disabled person knows their access needs it's easy to trust people

4:27:36about their own bodies disabled people are the experts and we simply need to listen to our

4:27:41expert advisors we are very fortunate that some of our disability experts are also technology experts

4:27:47we cannot let fear of technology and mitigable hypotheticals stop us from fixing human rights

4:27:53issues which include privacy and security of votes for disabled people we are elected to

4:27:58represent all people and some people not being able to vote is unacceptable to me thank you okay

4:28:05thank you um since that is a fourth clause to the motions on the floor uh discussion debate and

4:28:11questions is open for all four motions this is not an amendment so you're not limited just to

4:28:15discussion on the amendment are there any other um comments or questions from council uh councillor

4:28:23downer so and billings so my issue is like so so i actually support councillor count with kate

4:28:31kateons um motion but i also if we're going to do the internet voting i would like to take out vote my

4:28:39by mail um as i don't think if there's internet voting that it's necessary so i'm just wondering

4:28:46about order and i can move that as an amendment i just you know almost 10 of those votes mail

4:28:54in ballots did not make it the deadline and i think from a secure i think i'm surprised it's not rated

4:29:00higher as a security issue uh when you go through canada post when your ballot is leaving your home

4:29:07going through canada post and may or may not get there and what happens in between so just i've

4:29:14just seen so many problems with vote by mail but um so i i would like to have that taken out if

4:29:21we're going to do internet voting i don't think it's going to be necessary so but that's down the

4:29:26road but so i just wondered if we could do the internet voting if we could do the internet voting

4:29:31is number three and make number because if we if the internet voting loses then i'd still want to

4:29:37vote by mail i uh i agree i think we're going to reorder it and have uh clause number four

4:29:44voted on our clause number one clause number two four and then three because you're right if you

4:29:48need to make an amendment it needs to be done after clause four okay um unless the clerks have

4:29:55any concerns with reordering those clauses we can keep the numbers it's just the order of the

4:30:01vote being taken uh thank you council crown and to you and to all of council um currently you have

4:30:08an amendment on the floor for the addition of clause four we'll have to confirm that or if council

4:30:14wants not okay and then we can move forward with all four at together so we'll we'll treat clause

4:30:20four as an amendment in which case we're just going to speak to the amendment okay i'm going to

4:30:25support the internet voting um for the reasons i have before for the accessibility i think

4:30:32there are there are risks with different types of voting i when you you know when you look at the

4:30:38id required that's only required to go in to the polls a piece of paper with an address on it

4:30:45basically a lease or anything like that no photo id nothing there's opportunities other security issues

4:30:51around that that but there's risk with all different types and i understand that we're

4:30:57looking at the the verifying the vote is probably the biggest problematic um i'm it sounds like we're

4:31:05going to have a high standard that staff will come back if that we're not able to achieve that

4:31:10but i would still uh i think the independent of vote is very important to our uh disabled community

4:31:17and um so i would uh i still want to move forward with that if we can okay thanks for those comments

4:31:24i did have a speaker's list uh councillor billings busatil and clausen is that related to the

4:31:29amendment um in which case we'll keep with the existing one and then councillor will work at

4:31:35the end of that so uh councillor billings the floor is yours through you madam chair i just wanted to

4:31:42ask uh mr o brian so i have a memory issue um the 2014 vote which included um internet voting

4:31:53the number of votes that came in the percentage of votes that came in as a turnout was that

4:31:59was that much higher than the 2010 election through you chair Caron uh yeah we saw an increase

4:32:08of about not just slightly over nine percent from 2010 to 2014 now what i will add on to that is that

4:32:14it's not necessarily direct it's difficult for us to correlate that increase directly to internet

4:32:19voting um respectfully there was a contest at mayor that drove uh that what we would term as the top

4:32:26of ballot uh contest and that obviously increases turnout um there's really good research empirically

4:32:32now that has been done on internet voting that it does it can increase internet voting or it can

4:32:38increase voter turnout but it's nominal it's in the you know one to maybe two percent range

4:32:43in the data that's been collected of municipalities that have implemented it so

4:32:48it we did see an increase to answer your question council billings but the data through you madam

4:32:52chair the data with respect to the city of guava when you look at the turnout of the 2010 14 18

4:33:0022 election was not 2014 the highest turnout which included internet voting through you chair

4:33:09coran what we saw was internet voting or sorry voter turnout my apologies 34 roughly in 2010

4:33:1543 roughly in 2014 and then actually up in 2016 so down from from 2014 but greater than 2010

4:33:25in 2018 and that was about 36 percent so it did a bit of this a bit of a you know a slight bump

4:33:32but 2018's turnout was greater than 2010's turnout but not but not as great as 2014 correct that's

4:33:41correct yes okay okay thank you mr brine so so madam chair did you say you want comments now then

4:33:49on the on the amendment is that okay questions and comments together yep okay thank you madam chair

4:33:56so i've supported online voting in the past mainly because i think political participation is

4:34:02paramount and upholding the democratic regime therefore including online voting which does

4:34:09contribute to addressing some of the accessibility issues which we've talked about today like the

4:34:14independent vote and also increasing the vote count is imperative so yet again i will be supporting

4:34:22this amendment to add online voting okay thank you next is councillor busatiel she's lost her

4:34:37signal temporarily we'll move to councillor Klassen yes thank you actually i have a bit of a

4:34:45clarification i get from from councillor um sorry i'm going to start again um i have a i have a

4:34:52question with regard to what we know about online voting um and whether or not it does increase voter

4:34:58turnout so i'm just wondering uh through you uh chair oh my gosh i got flustered caron to staff

4:35:06do we have research that that supports um that voter turnout is increased with online voting

4:35:13conclusively through chair caron the research that we have uh comes from uh brock university a

4:35:20faculty member there dr goodman at at brock university that's probably the most common and

4:35:25and commonly referenced portion of research um and in a very broad brush summation of that research

4:35:34we know that there is a slight uptake or up uptick in voter turnout that often occurs in an

4:35:41about voting system or the internet voting uh municipale that implement internet voting

4:35:46the problem is to isolate for that one variable is very very difficult right races at the top of

4:35:51the ballot complex um contentious issues in the community can can drive turnout much much greater

4:35:58than can uh one's one voting method and so it's it's difficult to pin it down directly but we

4:36:04have seen the empirical research show that there can be a very small minor increase in that turnout

4:36:10that does occur with online voting whether it sustains is another question so there's a whole

4:36:15bunch of nuances around that research okay thank you um and i have a second question um through

4:36:23you chair caron to staff i just i'm curious about what would happen and if we know if there's a

4:36:30comparisons in the community um or in the ontario community what would happen if an online vote was

4:36:36compromised and we knew about it um and would we have to have another election if we if we had

4:36:41been including online voting through you chair caron potentially yes we might um an election

4:36:51might deem to might be deemed to be a mood point and we might be directed to to read recalibrate

4:36:58an election and deliver those services we may be asked to to offer a recount uh if there was a sort

4:37:03of smaller narrow impact again as i mentioned earlier our ability to to do that in a way that i

4:37:09think is demonstrable or or or observable is is and i that comes back again to that verifi

4:37:15verifiability component that's our concern we did have a recount in 2014 when we had online voting

4:37:22and uploading those results was a three-click effort and done and then we processed the paper

4:37:28ballots and people were able to see those ballots and contest those ballots and view them we weren't

4:37:34able to do that on the internet voting side and we are not able to alter that because the legislation

4:37:42requires us to conduct a recount in the same manner the ballots were cast so the tabulation of those

4:37:48results happens in the same way the only way we would be able to do something different is if we

4:37:53were court ordered to do that and i'm still not quite certain how that would actually work

4:38:00we would have that would be an aspect of an rfp we would have to include with an internet voting

4:38:04vendor to require that they do that and that may preclude them they may say there's there is no

4:38:08ability it's you know that that protection of the privacy of the vote in a way some may be

4:38:15seemed to be detrimental to internet voting and our ability to recount it in the way that i think

4:38:19people would expect to be able to see those ballots so to answer your question yes it could result

4:38:24in us having to recalibrate and reconduct an election okay thank you thank you over to councillor

4:38:34downer and then we'll see if we can reconnect with councillor busatiel yes so i just wanted to

4:38:44did the councillor katens motion mention advance polls are we allowed to

4:38:48direct the returning officer to whether it's the alternative voting is used in advanced or

4:38:56or not because that would be my preference that it was only advance internet voting in the advance

4:39:03the motion doesn't include direction as what it did before in 2014

4:39:10yeah the motion doesn't include direction to the clerk's office to limit the scope

4:39:15to advance voting but i believe um mr o'brien you had a response

4:39:20regarding what the authority of the clerk's office is versus the authority of council and

4:39:25i wonder if you could summarize that yeah through you chair come to councillor downer and to all

4:39:30committee um councillor katens motion didn't include any reference to advance voting our ability

4:39:35so what we require from council is the authorization of the use of alternate voting we would we would

4:39:41respectfully scope that down to be implemented only in an advanced voting period for all of the

4:39:46reasons we've talked about and discussed um i will once again reiterate we are not supportive of that

4:39:52direction just to be clear i think that's very clear in the report ultimately that decision is

4:39:57yours and we respect council's place in in that decision-making process but we would certainly

4:40:02scope that down to offer if it was successful pending the end of this month to only offer it

4:40:07during advanced voting and we would be evaluating how how how many days of that would we offer that's

4:40:13something that is is within the purview of our statutory authority um under the legislation

4:40:20okay thank you are there any other comments or questions on this matter or councillor work and

4:40:25then margothry uh thank you chair caron through you to staff um i don't have it on the screen but i

4:40:31believe councillor katens amendment um has language around security measures to the

4:40:38satisfaction of the clerk so we heard today that you you know what's available out there

4:40:45and that you're not satisfied with the security so is there any way that you think you're going to

4:40:51find something and come back and say yeah i think this is this is a good solution and this is a

4:40:56secure method uh through chair caron to councillor work we can certainly be satisfied with security

4:41:08to a certain degree but it would obviously go deeper what i imagine happening is we will be very

4:41:14if this was to pass uh we will do our best to require of the market a high degree of security

4:41:20built into the process um and verifiability that's another piece that we will seek to have

4:41:26inclusive in the process we may not get much response back from the market in that regard

4:41:33dependent because of what we know of the market if that was the case we would probably bring a by-law

4:41:37before council um and require that that the direction to pursue alternative voting internet

4:41:44voting as an alternative voting method be rescinded and repealed uh because you will give that direction

4:41:50to us by by-law later this month we will then have to come back uh and evaluate that process um

4:41:58and to the satisfaction of the clerk will be it will be rigorous and robust but it i mean we can't

4:42:05very well have a direction on the books to pursue this and it be adopted in the form of a by-law at

4:42:10the end of this month and then find that it's not it's not meeting our requirements or the requirements

4:42:16we set and then have that stand we would need to have clarity in terms of the direction of

4:42:22council in the form of a by-law that says it's internet voting it's vote from vote from home

4:42:28vote by mail etc so it will add an extra step in this process which is admittedly um in full

4:42:34transparency not ideal in our in our view as well um this market will be tapped in terms of

4:42:40interest in it they may not be able to meet those expectations or they will they will

4:42:44allude to the fact that they can and we will have to we'll have to work through that if they

4:42:51agree that they can do it and they say that they are able to meet those requirements we will have to

4:42:56live through that process and see what the outcomes are thanks and through you chair caron um there's

4:43:02something around the timing right we have to approve the voting methods two years ahead of time and

4:43:08then you can't suddenly say this is no longer working for us right so can you just walk me through

4:43:13I can't recall exactly what the timing is but what how does that work if there's a security concern

4:43:19identified in the next two years great question um through you councillor caron the statutory date

4:43:27used to be may 1st two years in the year prior to the year of the election the current government

4:43:33moved that to may 1st in the year of the election uh I believe in advance of the 2022 election in our

4:43:40estimation that's that's not possible we we we would want that decision we would our best advice

4:43:45is to hold fast with that previous date so may 1st in the year prior to an election year may 1st

4:43:512025 would be that date for us um the reality though is um when we look at this the the the

4:43:58sort of menu of options and the buffet of options for lack of a better term um I would suggest that

4:44:07this is this is your election team so our ability to um add that level of rigor evaluate multiple

4:44:15voting methods report back um support a full degree of confidence in those methods can be a

4:44:22challenge and so we our approach our approach here is that we would love to have a final decision

4:44:28at this juncture that lets us go with a high degree of certainty back and begin that work we are now

4:44:34as the city of guelph we're now and I've been here supported three elections here we're at a spot now

4:44:39where elections is an ongoing side of our our business we don't stop in in years in between we

4:44:44continue to move uh and advance that work um year over year and so there is there's the need for us

4:44:51to be moving on it with good finality and decision and determinations on decisions thank you and

4:44:56chair crown my only comment would be um I would I would love to feel confident in in the online

4:45:03voting I really would I would love to be able to say you know yes absolutely full steam ahead

4:45:12but the fact of the matter for me is that elections Canada elections Ontario um they don't

4:45:17offer online voting the cities of Toronto and Ottawa don't and elections Quebec just ended

4:45:23their internet voting pilot and and those digital governance standards are still being developed

4:45:29so at this time I don't I don't have the confidence that I need to have to support this this motion

4:45:38okay thank you um mirc Bethry thanks and through you chair I was just wondering just as a follow-up

4:45:44to councillor works question when you say um to the satisfaction of you uh and your team in regards to

4:45:52if this motion passes um what kind of standards then are you using to benchmark your satisfaction

4:46:01we have the best clerk head clerk in Canada might I add but um if we have uh if we have yeah I'm

4:46:10looking straight through you Steven I was kind of yeah but but if we but if we if we have 216 other

4:46:20cities that do use online voting and they are satisfied but your rigor and your tests is just

4:46:30like way beyond that my concern is is that we'll be an outlier again for the wrong reasons

4:46:39all right are you not going to be are you not going to be using some sort of a framework

4:46:46in how you determine to the satisfaction of the clerk that doesn't automatically

4:46:53eliminate everyone do you understand what I mean Steven I maybe not explaining it the best

4:46:58truth through you chair caron absolutely mayor gathreth and great question thank you for it

4:47:02our our we will be using in terms of a framework or a rigor or a process or a standard we're going

4:47:09to be looking I imagine us developing that we will be we will be evaluating this so we will be

4:47:14looking at what what other partners those other 200 plus municipalities that have done it we will

4:47:19look predominantly to those municipalities that are um large um municipalities multiple contests

4:47:26on a ballot um comparable with us we will look to the draft online voting standards even though

4:47:32they are draft um without knowing what they are in the finality uh and so we'll be looking to those

4:47:37kind of components we will we will tap and leverage the the good resources we have in

4:47:42house with our with our it colleagues um and and bringing them to bear on what we might or what we

4:47:48ought to include in some form of a standard or a process uh we will engage with third party

4:47:53vendors that are experts in those those aspects to be able to build and frame that out so we will

4:47:57do all of those things the one comment I will make is I think that you're going to find that there

4:48:03was 216 that did it previously I think that number may or may not stay the same it may go up but I'm

4:48:09very very curious in light of how recent some of the news we have it is that one of the largest

4:48:15vendors is is no longer providing that they're still providing alternative voting technology

4:48:19being tabulators but they're out of that online voting business and the second major player in

4:48:24that field is now facing bankruptcy and insolvency procedures so for me I'm interested to see what

4:48:32changes that necessitates I think it was Councillor Goller's motion that originally got us to reporting

4:48:37back at this moment and I think that's very fortuitous on council's part to have supported that

4:48:41because we're well ahead of the game in making some of these decisions but the market and the sector

4:48:47will be watching very closely to see what other municipalities are doing all right thank you so

4:48:51much and so then chair I just have a very quick comment and then I'll be done thank you so it

4:48:58will come as no surprise that I will be supporting um Councillor Caton's motion um

4:49:06you know not being my first rodeo I have talked and met with so many people that uh

4:49:14uh were so excited that they were able to actually vote in their first election in 2014

4:49:22uh using online voting and by the way I don't know who they voted for when I met these people later

4:49:28but they have been golf lights for actually many years and due to accessibility issues

4:49:34they shared their story with me about their ability to actually vote and like that

4:49:42that means a lot to people's like has been described today by many of our delegations

4:49:49and in the past so to to know that in 2013 or whatever that I was part of the council

4:49:58that voted I believe it was unanimously at that time for internet voting um

4:50:06you know it made me feel like we were a part of something to help other people in our community

4:50:11that were able to now fully participate in one of the most important things that they're able to do

4:50:18I have also met people if I could just get away from the accessibility point of view where

4:50:25they had a surprise overseas work appointment on election day and so the only way that they

4:50:35were able to actually vote had nothing to do with accessibility was through online voting

4:50:41prior to the main day election last time as well those votes are important too and so there is not

4:50:49only the accessibility lens on this uh issue for me but there is an ease and that is why there is

4:50:57usually a higher voter turnout and more people engaged and able to do this the risk that is there

4:51:05I recognize but is a tolerance of risk so much so that I can't agree to this method the answer is no

4:51:16I feel that that there is risk as councillor downer said in everything and I feel like the motion is

4:51:21worded miss madam chair in such a way that is um giving some strength to make sure that we are saying

4:51:29if this if this is supported we are saying yes but and the but part is that our our crew there can

4:51:37go away and try to verify some of the things that I also think are important to verify too and they

4:51:42can come back if there's an issue uh but yeah I'm I'm I'm uh disappointed that over several

4:51:49elections we went from having it to not and with that I think this is an opportunity for us to

4:51:56to correct I'm going to say the word to correct I believe the mistakes that have been made in the

4:52:01past uh in making sure that everyone has the right to vote independently uh come come the

4:52:07elections so thank you madam chair thank you and just uh I won't call you on a point of privilege but

4:52:14the votes of council are not mistakes I just uh you characterized the previous democratic vote

4:52:21on this matter as a mistake so yeah I'll withdraw that sorry I uh I uh you're right to call me out

4:52:26on that my apologies thanks we have councillor busetel back so welcome back we can't hear you

4:52:39uh do you want to just check your mind okay got you can you hear me yes I apologize my internet

4:52:44went out and now I'm on my phone uh and I think my question may have already been um raised uh I

4:52:53heard a little bit of councillor roark and mary gathry's question and it was around the wording

4:52:58in councillor um kateen's motion of the clerk's satisfaction and so if I could just um have it

4:53:06echoed back for my benefit of what exactly does the clerk's satisfaction mean I think it was answered

4:53:13in mary gathry's question but I want to just be sure uh before the vote

4:53:22mr o'brien it was asked and addressed but I think you need to hear it as well if you weren't online

4:53:27at that time sure thank you very much chair Caron um again what I'll start off is it we're not

4:53:33recommending internet voting obviously as the report alludes to we've done the analysis that we can thus

4:53:38far without sort of going as far as a formal rfp process and make putting requirements into paper

4:53:44but based on our analysis we're still on supporting that being said if we if we're

4:53:47directed to to move forward in this regard what we will be doing is connecting again with with some

4:53:54of our our colleagues in municipalities that are comparators evaluating what they've set in terms of

4:53:59standards and the rigor and process around security of internet voting we will look to the draft

4:54:06still at this time they may change after we look at the draft standards for online voting that are

4:54:11being evaluated right now in our space we will obviously connect with and engage with our own

4:54:16internal it colleagues to get their best advice we will likely probably engage a third party to

4:54:23help us perhaps even develop some form of a standard or an rfp or a requirement to include in an rfp

4:54:30and so that's sort of a bit of a quick broad brush summation of some of the steps that we would do to

4:54:35quote unquote meet the satisfaction as it's outlined in the in councillor caton's motion

4:54:42thank you and if i could just a supplemental so it would be something a little bit more than what

4:54:47is currently part of the evaluation in the report that we received for today's meeting

4:54:55through you chair Caron I mean councillor Busuttil we we did a great degree of rigorous work to get

4:55:02to this point a lot of evaluation a lot of contemplation a lot of engaging with existing

4:55:08vendors in the market um comparators we will just now continue to do that again we will ask specifically

4:55:14for examples of copies of procurement documentation that's spelt out some of the requirements that

4:55:19other municipalities had that gave them a good good degree of confidence we will absolutely be probing

4:55:26the market on their ability to mitigate some of the challenges we saw in 2018 and what we saw in

4:55:332022 with respect to their interplay with other vendors we use um and so we will be asking those

4:55:40type of of more detailed questions and those would then form some form of a public procurement

4:55:46documentation and we will wait to see what the market returns in that regard thank you and just

4:55:52one one more supplemental my understanding of the motion on I lost all my texts and stuff it's

4:55:58it's to the clerk's satisfaction and so it is it might be likely or it might be possible

4:56:05that a future report after again this rigor a next level might come and if the litmus test is a

4:56:13clerk's satisfaction um you may come back and say I still don't recommend this and these are my

4:56:20reasons why is is that a possibility uh through you chair caronta councillor Busuttil our intent is

4:56:31is at the conclusion of this month to have a good degree of certainty of which pathway council wants

4:56:36to pursue we will then go off and do that that due diligence as directed we'll evaluate what the

4:56:43market can support in terms of rigor and standards around that that equipment our ability to come

4:56:49back and have a report and then respectfully reopen the debate of which voting methods an

4:56:55alternative etc um we'll have to evaluate as we go through that process but it may be it may suffice

4:57:02to simply that we we need to table a bylaw because there was no response from the marketplace

4:57:06that can meet those requirements and those standards and that bylaw would be to repeal

4:57:10effectively council's direction to pursue internet voting as an alternative voting method so at this

4:57:16point it's difficult for me to speculate councillor Busuttil on what that would look like when we get

4:57:20there it may be as simple as respectfully placing a bylaw before council and asking that you adopt

4:57:25that given our findings in the marketplace um and so we'll have to cross those bridges as we go

4:57:32effectively yeah yeah thank you thank you madam chair okay seeing no oh councillor gibson thanks

4:57:40very much uh chair Caron so i maybe i'll just add one more so we've we've heard a lot of reasons

4:57:45why so a lot of different groups a lot of different demographics that could that could really use the

4:57:49support of internet voting i'll just add one more something i haven't heard yet today but it's something

4:57:54that it hit me in 2018 door knocking during the election you meet people there's communities in my

4:57:59ward and i'm sure there's communities in other wards as well they're they're set up for the turnkey

4:58:03snowbird type of thing where people leave so i i met a number of people in 2018 who september

4:58:08october november head south come home for a few weeks at christmas january february march head south

4:58:13again and and they reiterated to me that although they're very active and very involved they they

4:58:17don't vote in municipal elections generally because they're they're out of the country so um the idea

4:58:22of an internet vote for those individuals as well be it a smaller but probably growing segment of our

4:58:26population is just another reason why i i plan to support um internet voting in the next election

4:58:32thanks for those comments seeing no others um i do have some quick questions uh and then we'll call

4:58:38the vote um you're very active in am cto your association do are we ahead of the game are we

4:58:45are we the first municipality that is making our recommendations returning regarding alternative

4:58:51voting are we in the middle do do you get a sense of uh of where other municipalities in

4:58:57ontario are going or can you report back at the end of the month on that thanks for the question

4:59:02chair Caron we can certainly get a little bit more context for the end of the month perhaps um

4:59:07anecdotally i would say we were probably near the front of the pack but we may not be

4:59:12leading the pack in terms of being first out of the gate so we can certainly look into that and

4:59:16find more details okay a second quick question i hope is um some of our coterminous municipalities

4:59:22townships in the county um have overlapping elections specifically school boards um is this

4:59:29something if that do you know whether or not they are considering internet voting i'm just

4:59:34thinking about if going out to a vendor and an rfp is something that we could do together and

4:59:40consolidate our elections so we might get a better response from a vendor is that are we too early

4:59:45for that through you chair Caron we tend to enter into agreements solely with vendors simply because

4:59:54when you get a broad range of municipalities and as as council well knows there's 444 municipalities

4:59:59about 420 in change of those offer um election services um there's a wide range of municipalities

5:00:07there's small northern rural municipalities larger urban southern municipalities and and a wide range

5:00:14in between our requirements might differ greatly from another municipality and so we do tend to sort of

5:00:21enter into and wait into the marketplace to explore a bit further um on our own and i think

5:00:26that gets to our ability to answer the question of satisfaction of any alternative voting method we

5:00:32we we evaluate so um what we may do at times is we may engage with partner municipalities to support

5:00:40um some of the testing the the penetration testing that i mentioned to council or the

5:00:45threat assessments we may leverage a collective to be able to um support that um but generally speaking

5:00:52the procurement of the service itself and the solution itself is something that we we choose to

5:00:56do on our own okay that makes sense i just thought there's some overlap especially ward six plus

5:01:01lynch we've got some coterminous municipalities so um but i appreciate the answer uh and then i just

5:01:08want to clarify um before we vote on the amendment um you are not we are not asking you do not require

5:01:15nor do you want direction from council on any time limited scope for advanced voting and

5:01:23you would also want that all the work that were to be done if this were to pass to be done and before

5:01:29council uh before may 1st of the next year uh in terms of all the work that's necessary to prepare

5:01:37for the 2026 election you would like a time limit of of may 1st before if you if you were to be

5:01:44bringing back an alternate recommendation um to repeal the bylaw you would want that work done by

5:01:51this time next year and would you need any additional resources to do so to chair Caron so the first

5:01:59question you asked um we do not need specific wording about the the timing of of any of those

5:02:06alternative voting methods you approve the methods that are available to us to to leverage uh

5:02:12through an election we then uh pursue procurement of those methods so we can offer any of those

5:02:18methods and in sort of a a different wide range of of of patterns uh to support the election we would

5:02:23evaluate what is best from a security predictability reliability dependability verifiability standpoint

5:02:29as we've alluded to um based on our analysis and we would likely offer many of those voting methods

5:02:35in in an in an advanced voting period on your question about sorry forgive me councillor regarding

5:02:41additional resources i mean we have cyber security experts in house uh but whether the clerk's office

5:02:48would need external expertise i know at the university of guelph there's a cyber security and

5:02:53threat intelligence masters program would do do you require any additional resources by contract

5:02:58or external consultants uh to do that rigorous work that uh that you need to bring back a recommendation

5:03:06council thank you i think for the clarity on that the question you had asked was around the timing of

5:03:11it um we will avail ourselves of additional resources as needed i know that councils entering

5:03:17into discussions on budget that are um that may be complex coming in the later portion of this year

5:03:23our our approach will be to get as much information as we can as part of the procurement process

5:03:31the the deadline decision that we would we sort of adhere to is still that may first in the year

5:03:37prior to an election but the reality is if we start this procurement in the next few months we may

5:03:41not be finished until and and the evaluation of those things until beyond may first next year

5:03:47that's how long some of these processes can take and so we still will be able to meet the

5:03:52statutory deadline may first in the year of the election because that's the change to date

5:03:57but our preference right now is firm clear concise direction on how council wants to

5:04:04proceed by the end of this month as part of council's deliberations at the end of the month

5:04:09so the ratification of committee's decisions that gives us ample runway to begin this our ability

5:04:14to then bring a bylaw forward we will we'll have to be informed by our evaluation of some of those

5:04:19vendors in the marketplace okay and if this passes there is no budget implication through you chair

5:04:27there absolutely is budget implication adding an additional voting method absolutely increases

5:04:33the resources that we will use to bring to bear the election so we're not we're not if we swap vote

5:04:40by mail if that's an option that council chooses to do because right now through through you chair

5:04:46I believe that we've got the three motions that were presented in the staff report plus the fourth

5:04:50to chair or to councillor Downer's point I believe there was some interest in in jockeying vote by

5:04:55mail and as opposed in favor of internet voting or sorry voting internet voting in favor of

5:05:01over vote by mail if you add internet voting to vote by mail that's an added cost absolutely

5:05:08if you take out vote vote vote by mail there I mean there is a degree of savings there's a degree of

5:05:15equality between those two in terms of the the resourcing requirements and the budgetary requirements

5:05:20it may be slightly higher might be slightly less but generally speaking it's in and around the same

5:05:25amount okay so adding in on top of an increased budget absolutely okay and I have a note to

5:05:31go to councillor Downer after after this amendment so we are going to call the vote on the amendment

5:05:37so if we could have the amendment up on the screen one last time for the benefit of council and anyone

5:05:44watching uh is there anyone against the amendment and that is against the online option councillor

5:05:54Richardson councillor auroroc councillor Allt and I don't see oh and councillor Busuttil so that is

5:06:00for against so that motion is carried I have a note then to go over to councillor Downer for

5:06:09potential amendment we're back to the three main motions uh councillor Downer did you have an

5:06:16amendment to one of those yeah that um that in number three that vote by mail be removed

5:06:24as an option so that it's just amending um so that councillor proved the use of vote from home

5:06:32as an alternative voting method so I probably need to write that out do I yeah I know

5:06:39clerk certainly appreciates that so that we can have it on the screen so I'm seeing remove the

5:06:45use of vote by mail change the da to a yes and if those could be put on screens before we call the

5:06:56vote on the amendment any or any questions uh on the amendment do we have a seconder yes we'll

5:07:04need a seconder for the removal and we have Mayor Guthrie as a seconder removing uh vote by mail

5:07:10questions and comments councillor auroroc uh thanks chair caron through you to staff

5:07:17if you are not satisfied with the online option well we remove vote by mail today do you have

5:07:25enough time to come back and say we can't do the online would you have enough time to then bring back

5:07:32the vote by mail um through you chair caron to councillor auroc it would be certainly tight and

5:07:40complex the we have the benefit of having offered vote from a vote by mail so if we go through the

5:07:46process and in it voting is not deemed to be secure based on whatever requirements we place into a

5:07:52procurement process um we would then bring that bylaw back to repeal the direction to pursue

5:08:00online voting and at that point we would likely include back in vote from home I would presume I

5:08:05mean ultimately it is council's decision as I said but I'm presuming that's um that's that would

5:08:10be the the approach that council would want to see we would include that in a bylaw it would be

5:08:14tight but we will we've got the benefit of being able to spin up that that procurement process specific

5:08:21to vote by mail um because we've got the experience having done it previously okay thanks okay councillor

5:08:30uh clausen yes through you chair dana to staff just have a question regarding the accessibility

5:08:35of mail in and versus online like I think and and maybe I'm wrong here um but aren't there

5:08:42potentially people who don't have access to the internet and the mail-in option is something I mean

5:08:49that perhaps somebody can request a mail-in package for them um and that way they can send it in I'm

5:08:55just wondering if we potentially exclude people um by removing that option

5:09:06through you chair crown yeah I think the answer is yes potentially there are folks that might not

5:09:11have access to reliable and and dependable internet access to process an online ballot

5:09:16that is what is the benefit I believe of keeping in something like the vote from home

5:09:21in the same way we might have individuals if there's an online voting platform that might not be able

5:09:25to navigate the need to add oneself to the voters list using a digital tool or um verify that they're

5:09:31on the voters list or any number of aspects and interinterrelations they have with online voting

5:09:35and so I think you know it's beneficial to keep that vote from home option in so that we can support

5:09:40those those electors that do need those additional requirements our our approach I think as councillor

5:09:45can appreciate is we take each individual case independently even in the absence of online voting

5:09:51we work with individual electors to make sure that they're best supported to be able to mark

5:09:55their ballot as independently as possible there's a comment made that you know having someone mark

5:09:59your ballot for you means that you don't ever get to see it I would challenge that an elector is

5:10:04absolutely 100% legally entitled to see how their mark was their ballot was marked whether they did

5:10:10it or it was there was a support for someone that provided that so um we work with electors individually

5:10:17to make it as convenient and easy as possible and we have good good evidence of doing that in the

5:10:22past three elections for sure great thank you councillor Allt thank you councillor caron my

5:10:30question because of councillor Klassen's question will now be a comment I uh I cannot support the

5:10:37motion because I believe we've been talking about accessibility here and accessibility extends to

5:10:42those who do not have the capacity to use computers and I've spoken to many of them who when I said

5:10:48well why don't I just email you they said I don't use computers I have no interest primarily these

5:10:53are seniors so consequently by taking away the the mail-in element what we are doing is taking away

5:11:01an opportunity for accessibility this actually flies directly in contradiction to the last motion

5:11:06we passed okay oh councillor downer I have a question I mean there's there is the library

5:11:15but I mean how do how do you how do you how do you request about it when you do the vote by mail

5:11:28through you chair Caron you you requested online or yeah or you or they or I mean there's multiple

5:11:33pathways I should say I mean the most predominant way we saw is a request online um some folks called

5:11:39uh many some folks walked in and and we provided that service so individuals can avail themselves

5:11:45of the vote by mail process through many different means they'd have to walk in to do it they could

5:11:51walk in they could phone in they could access online to register to vote by mail and receive a vote

5:11:55by mail kit yeah any further questions oh councillor Goller one more thank you through you chair

5:12:03caron to staff could you help me understand how the the cost for the vote by mail works do we pay

5:12:10the same whether 10 people or 500 people use the system so you councillor caron to councillor Goller

5:12:24the cost is a little bit in it is flexible in some ways the the most significant cost with

5:12:30by mail is postage so we have to prepay the postage on every kit that we set up in advance

5:12:37any kit that goes out is requested we've paid the postage on we don't necessarily pay the postage

5:12:44if it doesn't return um so by by and far that's the most significant cost for us the the amount of

5:12:51kits is pretty flexible for us and we do have leftover stock from the previous election which

5:12:57lowers the cost there in this case okay so just to clarify if we do end up with both

5:13:04internet voting and vote by mail and and those 550 people that voted by mail choose to use another

5:13:12method and it ends up being only a couple dozen people that use the vote by mail the cost system

5:13:17is that we've seen here would be significantly reduced correct it would be on the front and I

5:13:23think there is consideration in terms of the amount of staff time and capacity to prepare for

5:13:28both methods um that is where we would be looking at increased staffing to resource which would

5:13:34also have a cost uh upfront so different considerations great thank you for that thank you

5:13:40chair thank you uh oh we have another question I just it's not a question just a comment I get

5:13:45one of my concerns and it's a concern with the other levels of government with vote by mail

5:13:51is the amount of ballots that don't meet the deadline that you have no control over

5:13:56people think they voted and they haven't so 54 out of 500 like 10 percent sent their ballots back

5:14:06in and didn't get them counted I mean what happened to those I mean either those ballots

5:14:12didn't get mailed in or they tried the deadline so they didn't follow the instructions or we had we

5:14:18had to rely on Canada Post maybe I'll just leave that comment there but you know I think there's a

5:14:27concern um I have a concern around uh people voting I mean that that think they voted and and and

5:14:38then they may find out if they because sometimes they're tracked I know find out after that their

5:14:43ballot didn't get there in time or or they show up at the polling station and they say I didn't get

5:14:50my ballot I asked for it I ordered it online and I didn't get it so I want to vote now there's this

5:14:56this is happens and um so there's issues around mail-in ballots um I think you know if we're doing

5:15:05internet voting it's just my preference that we not do that but ultimately if not then I do agree

5:15:12with going ahead with it great well I think we oh councillor mr. brown would like to respond

5:15:19just one one other comment to that we were just discussing you know our ability to resource from

5:15:23a capacity budgetary standpoint staff resourcing additional voting alternative voting methods

5:15:31um we may we may have to make this determinations about election day voting as well right so

5:15:36guelph has a has a quite a broad range of in-person voting locations that we deploy

5:15:43I think we we exceed sometimes our federal and provincial counterparts in terms of the

5:15:48number of voting locations that are available those are calculus this these are sort of like dials

5:15:53levers right you increase the lever on on internet voting it may mean we need to decrease the number

5:15:58of physical voting locations on election day our ability to resource and staff those elections

5:16:03is already becoming a challenge because finding people that are able and willing to work with

5:16:08the technology that we need in physical voting locations is is becoming more and more of a

5:16:12challenge for us um so it's just more of a comment for for committee's consideration you know increasing

5:16:18one adding in another option at the at the buffet so to speak might mean that we turn the volume down

5:16:24on on some of those in-person voting locations just to be able to meet the resourcing requirements

5:16:28and the budgetary requirements okay thank you mr. brian and I think we've had a very rigorous

5:16:33robust debate on this amendment and the whole issue so I'm going to call the vote on the amendment

5:16:39is there anyone against the actually can we get that up on the screen just before we we cast our

5:16:46votes on that that is the removal of the mail-in ballot is is there anyone opposed to this amendment

5:16:54one two three four Richardson clausen galler all point of busatil katan that is

5:17:05point of order point of order yeah this motion says approve the use of vote from home as the

5:17:11alternative voting method for the 2026 yes yes and the original motion contained use of vote by mail

5:17:18and vote from home so vote by mail has been removed from the motion this is the visiting

5:17:25home visits yeah okay so we we've got vote from home still an alternative yep and the removal of

5:17:30vote by mail and again i'm going to call for do we have a port of point order yes definitely a point

5:17:35of order the motion that councillor downer had was to remove from the original motion which was in

5:17:42front of us that's what we should be voting on not on what's on screen yet a point of order actually

5:17:50i agree it's the removal of vote from home this motion that you're seeing on the screen will go

5:17:55to the floor when the amout when the amendment passes okay so is there anyone opposed to removing

5:18:02vote by mail from the recommendation one two three do you want me to call them out clausen

5:18:09galler alt katon busatil orork and richardson so that is seven so that amendment fails so we are

5:18:22back to the original motions now we have three original motions three clauses one is approving

5:18:29free transit the second is approving vote tabulators and the third is the alternative voting methods

5:18:35does anyone want those separated or can we vote for all three together i see no request for

5:18:42separation so we're going to vote for all three and we'll put them on the on the screen oh it's

5:18:50all four yes of course absolutely yeah we have four clauses on the floor including our online

5:18:56voting recommendation would you like which which clause do you want separated number four has been

5:19:02asked to be separated count um merica three did you want anything separated as well i did not

5:19:08madam chair but i just i did have one question and i'm sorry i don't know if it's relevant now um

5:19:14may i ask it and just determine whether it's relevant now oh thank you absolutely three

5:19:18i'm sorry i just i'm just trying i was a little bit confused in that last vote and where we were

5:19:22calling so my apologies i guess if you can answer this now if it's relevant so be it if it's not if

5:19:27you want to email us or tell us later that that that's fine before the end of the month

5:19:32but i guess i'm just trying to figure out what is the differential between um removing the mail

5:19:38voting option versus not because and i know that we were skating around that answer i thought

5:19:44i heard that it's about the most expensive part is the the dollar postage or whatever on on 500

5:19:51ballots that went out and so in my mind i'm just trying to think like are we only saving $500

5:19:59or are we saving like $50,000 like i'm trying to figure out what the differential is on that because

5:20:05that's where i was a little bit confused like i don't i don't want to get rid of a voting option if

5:20:09we're saving someone five if we're saving $500 so can you just is that is this a relevant question

5:20:15now or is it sorry because we haven't called the vote on it so if we have an easy answer great let's

5:20:21let our clerk answer the question if not and it can come at the end of the month or an email after

5:20:26this meeting that'd be fine as well yes and if if through you chair chron if council would like

5:20:31more information on as we can certainly furnish it at the end of the month what i will say is

5:20:35that the cost of of postage as miss slater alluded to is a predominant driver but it is

5:20:42comparatively a smaller portion what we will do because as it stands right now if it was adopted

5:20:47we now have vote from home vote by mail internet voting our tabulators that we do deploy

5:20:54so we've got the whole the whole bevy the whole gamut we will be we will be recruiting another

5:21:00election coordinator to support that work so it's not a it's not a 500 delta as you alluded to it's

5:21:05probably more north of a hundred thousand dollar delta sorry madam chair thank you i just needed

5:21:13to understand what we were kind of looking at thank you there's more to it than just $500 and

5:21:18and uh thank yes it's resourcing capacities is effective yeah and you know what now that we know

5:21:22that i think that's a takeaway then between now and the end of the month thank thank you i think

5:21:26that's a good piece of information the vote was already taken no problem we can see what happens

5:21:30at the end of the month okay and we do have one additional question so it has opened up a bit of a

5:21:34a window sorry yeah and then we'll call the vote thanks chair chron uh through you to staff

5:21:41attachment to on page three says lack of understanding of the voting process in general was the largest

5:21:46barrier for the members of the various communities that these groups served so i'm wondering do we

5:21:51have a plan for voter education to promote the accessibility options or do you need a motion

5:21:58through you chair chron no i don't believe we need a motion we've learned a lot from the vote from

5:22:02home pilot you know there was a reference to you know not wanting an individual to come in into the

5:22:07house that's not a requirement of the vote from home project or opportunity we can serve electors

5:22:13at their doorstep we don't need to enter the home so we will do things like that to educate that's

5:22:17a really good example um we will obviously depending on what council decides and depending on what we

5:22:23can procure and secure in terms of alternative voting methods we will be working with our

5:22:26communications team to make sure we build out a very robust communications plan so that the

5:22:30electorate in general understands all of the options available to them as we move through it thank you

5:22:37and and again we're voting to give direction to staff on the alternative methods implementation

5:22:43and how they administer that direction is the responsibility of the office of the clerk

5:22:48so we're going to vote on clauses one two and three all together and we're going to separate

5:22:56clause four anyone opposed to this group of motions clauses one two and three regarding

5:23:03transit service and free parking regarding vote tabulators and vote by mail and vote from home

5:23:10I'm seeing no votes against so that is carried unanimously we'll move to clause four

5:23:18which is the online voting option as an additional alternative method so we'll get that on the screen

5:23:23for the benefit of council and those at home anyone against this motion so we have councillor

5:23:33alt councillor Richardson that is and councillor Busuttil so that is carried so that brings us to

5:23:45the agenda end of the agenda for corporate services thank you everyone for your patience

5:23:51it's been a really great discussion we have service area chair and staff announcements so I'll turn

5:23:57it over to DCAO lee to see if there's any he's saying there are none so that brings us for a

5:24:05motion of adjournment motion of adjournment anyone mayor got three seconded by councillor Busuttil

5:24:12anyone opposed I see none meeting adjourned