Claire Mu, Director, Internal Audit, thanked Enforcement and By-law Services staff for their support throughout the audit, and introduced Brad Cecile, Manager, Internal Audit, and Project Lead for the subject audit.
Brad Cecile provided a presentation entitled "By-law Enforcement Audit (Property Standards)", which included an overview of the audit and audit findings.
Regional Councillor Keenan, Chair, expressed thanks to the Enforcement and By-law Services Division for their efforts and acknowledged the challenges associated with the work they do.
Committee discussion took place, and staff responded to questions, regarding the subject audit, which included the following:
- Decrease in complaints over a three year period
- Robert Higgs, Director, Enforcement and By-law Services, advised staff are investigating this matter to determine the reason for this decrease
- Processes and issues relating to 'Add-on' service requests
- Findings relating to:
- service requests assigned to summer students that were not closed before their departure
- service requests that have been cancelled and do not include complete information in the system
- Timeline for implementing system improvements and interim measures
- Next steps and timelines for implementing audit recommendations
A motion was introduced to add the following clause to the recommendations in the staff report:
3. That staff report back to Committee of Council on steps to be taken by By-law Enforcement to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of property standards enforcement by enhancing processes around managing and responding to service requests and the process for reconciling paid contractor invoices to ensure that the City fully recovers clean-up charges from offending property owners and should also work with Service Brampton to ensure service requests for “Grass” and “Refuse” are properly categorized.
The motion, in its entirety, was considered as follows.