A few tweaks are coming for a model meant to help predict the need for new civic facilities in St. Albert.
The model was presented to council last year. It uses data inputs to try to predict when facilities like a new library or public works building will be needed, and currently uses benchmark data from other cities, the population forecasts for St. Albert and three possible service levels for council to consider.
However, Coun. Sheena Hughes feels more data could be incorporated into the model. She thinks the current model doesn’t include enough factors to give a strong justification for the need or timing of facilities.
Council has also overruled some of the recommendations generated by the model, she noted.
“The model is too weak,” she said, suggesting if council was planning to enshrine the model in policy, “Let’s have a model that’s worth solidifying.”
Some of her suggestions for possible extra data included resident phone survey results about new facilities, the population size and percentage of non-St. Albert users of St. Albert facilities and the driving distance to the nearest comparable facility outside the city.
Hughes ended up rewording her motion to avoid suggesting particular data points. The motion that passed unanimously asked administration to develop a revised set of principles and evaluation criteria, including expanding the data inputs and incorporating weighting factors.
Mayor Nolan Crouse urged council to take a policy, governance-based approach, and that suggestion was taken into account. The motion includes a request for a draft of a possible policy.
Crouse said without some kind of policy in place, the model could “drift into oblivion, just like many other models,” when future councils are elected.
“There is no sustaining policy that breathes life into it,” Crouse said.
Coun. Tim Osborne said he was supportive of the idea of adding more data into the model, but noted while the model is a useful tool, he doubts council will be entirely able to abdicate its responsibility to make decisions on new facilities to a spreadsheet.
“These are always going to be political decisions,” Osborne said.
