HVRA Board Minutes

Tuesday, June 19, 2007   7 p.m.

Kensington Gardens

Present: Gus Sinclair, John Hong, Tim Grant, Jane Auster, Sue Dexter, Richard Gilbert (present for half the meeting), Michael Heydon, Margaret Beare,

Regrets:  (we had quite a few) Sandra DeAthe, Katrina McHugh, David Booz, Jane Perdue, Leslie Thompson, Stuart Schoenfeld, Richard Longley.

1.      Chair's Welcome: The meeting commenced at 7:10 p.m.  There was not a quorum so the meeting was conducted as a discussion and anything requiring a vote was to be finalized via an email vote following this meeting. According to the memory of the Chair-this is the 1st time ever that the Board failed to reach a quorum.

2.     Approval of Agenda: The agenda was approved with the following additions; Gus wished to add an item regarding insurance and a memo from Adam Vaughn's office and Sue added a detailed Bloor Visioning discussion.

3.     Approval of minutes from April 17, 2007 was obtained via email vote following the meeting.

4.     Spring Meeting Discussion. Conclusion was that it was an excellent ‘interactive' meeting. It was commented that at the public meeting by Adam Vaughan two months ago there was a lot of optimism regarding the College Street changes with respect to the creation of the curb patios. But alas, once again, there appears to be a political delay in bringing about this change.

5.     Committee Reports

• a. Environment
• i. Trees

Five new Sakura trees on Bathurst Street are thriving. There are now 7 in total-two survived from last year.

37 people attended the recent tree-identification/survey meeting and are now out in the communities identifying trees in the neighbourhood.  Julie Keller has been hired to assist in the project. The inventory is not just the type of tree but also the size/age/health etc for each tree. End of July is when folks will be finished collecting the data and the report will be written by Julie in August.  Neil Wright offered a summer student to the project but there may not be a role for this additional person.

• ii. Solar

Tim discussed the solar project.  80 households (118 systems) have been booked for solar in our neighbourhood. He specifically requested that the record show that David Booz was great to work with on this project. This project has been tremendously successful and has gained media attention as well as local support.

• iii. Graffiti - Michael Heydon provided a graffiti report. He had met with the Harbord Business Improvement Area (HBIA) representative Neil Wright but there was no conclusion as to a partnership with their Association to remove the tags. A count of the graffiti sites revealed that the number is not immense and could be handled by the graffiti removal group. The conclusion seemed to be that the graffiti removers should go ahead.

• b. Membership (No report)
• c. Community Liaison (No report)
• d. College St. (No report)
• e. Zoning (No report)

f.    Communications (No report)

g.   U of T Liaison (No report)

h. Community Police

M. Beare gave a brief report on the Police Community Liaison meetings.  The key concern for the police is the discussion regarding the location of the new police detachment and no decision has yet been made.  An invitation was issued for community participation in this process.  Other than individual letters from separate HVRA Board representatives, there was no consensus as to whether HVRA should have an actual ‘position' regarding their new site, so no representation on behalf of HVRA was made. 

6.      Other Business

Liability Insurance

Following the research by Leslie Thomson on liability insurance for Officers and Directors which was presented  to the Spring Meeting  which resulted in an enabling motion for a sum to be spent on D&O insurance up to $1200 plus GST, Jane Perdue made enquiries of various authorities at City Hall from Committee of Adjustment Staff and City Legal  Neither the staff manager for Committee of Adjustment nor the Director of Legal Service, Zoning have heard of a situation where a home owner has sued a neighbour or an association in conjunction with a C of A application. The legal process would appear to protect against being sued. There is a mandatory notification that is circulated to neighbours (within 60 metres) - it is a legal procedure and the information is

circulated in advance of a hearing. Anyone beyond that 60 metres has a  right to state their opinion about whether or not they want the project to be approved. That's why there are hearings, i.e. to listen to people's opinion. The conclusion appears to be that no one in government has ever heard of a community person suing a neighbourhood association. The only grounds would seem to be defamation, which is unlikely and preventable. A report will be circulated to the Board for further discussion at the next meeting but in the interim, there was a consensus, via an email vote, that no insurance would be obtained unless additional information should arise. We would not act upon the enabling motion passed at the Spring Meeting.

Bloor Visioning Meetings

Sue Dexter reported on the Bloor Visioning meetings. A firm called Office for Urbanism has developed a proposal. A series of meetings have been held and culminated in the drafting of a proposed plan. Among the numerous  proposals and suggestions are the following:

• Intensification at a number of key corners.
• The plan also included the suggestion that Bloor from Bathurst to Avenue be narrowed with trees added to link Bathurst to Avenue. 
• Robert Street field should be a public park, possibly traded for something else.
•  Fingers of green are to smooth the various transitions.
• David Green as a local developer has taken a lead role having amassed an area around Spadina and Bloor. 
• Most of the intensification is on the north side of Bloor.  The north side has more open building spaces behind the stores that front on Bloor.
• A consensus at the meeting appeared to be that the ‘neighbourhoods' should/would not be disrupted. 

By September the HVRA must draft a document that describes our neighbourhood in terms of what we are, what we value, what is unique about our area and what the nature of our community is etc. This document could list our services, parks etc.  Further discussion will be required in order to make this document's objectives clearer. 

Neighbourhood Beautification Project,

It was decided that:

1: Area reps would identify the number of City Planters in their areas that could use re-planting.

2: On every street there are at a number of serious gardeners. Area reps will approach one or two such people with the proposition that

if we supply the plants and materials, would they see that the planters

got prepped and planted and watered for the summer/fall?

3: reps will send this information to Gus who will then organize the drop off of the plants and materials  - Due date: Monday June 25th.

The Chair brought the meeting to a close at 8:33 pm.