The North Shore Wastewater Treatment Plant fiasco shook many people’s confidence in the Metro Vancouver Regional District, including its governance. Today, municipalities appoint directors to the Metro Vancouver Regional District board with votes based on population. I’m simplifying some aspects of the board’s makeup for this post. The Regional District’s board is political, and in my mind, that is OK.
Deloitte recently completed a board governance review of the Regional District and presented 49 recommendations. Under provincial legislation, the Regional District consists of three entities: the Metro Vancouver Regional District, the Greater Vancouver Water District, and the Greater Vancouver Sewerage and Drainage District.
One of the challenges with today’s decision-making on water and sewerage infrastructure is that the projects tend to be complex and challenging to “see” if corners were cut, if the project delivered as it was supposed to, or if it was a gold-plated solution.
While some people point to other challenges in the Regional District, the biggest challenge is the lack of independent review of large water and sewer projects. I observe that some of these projects become like trains; once they leave the station and pick up speed, they are hard to adjust or even stop if required.
One big recommendation from Deloitte is to have the Water and Sewerage Districts have smaller boards with a mix of elected and independent, non-elected members. The independent members would be appointed based on their qualifications to manage large utilities. Would this hybrid model work better? It reminds me of the TransLink Board, and I think the jury is still out on that governance model.
The other significant recommendation is to include feedback from the existing technical advisory committees in board reports to provide a broader perspective. These technical advisory committees include staff representatives from member municipalities in Metro Vancouver.
Deloitte interviewed me as part of this governance review. When I talked with them, I told them I wanted to see the creation of an independent technical advisory group that reviews the Regional District’s significant projects and plans to determine if they are delivering value for money for our region and meeting the overall strategic goals of the board.
Deloitte recommends enhancing the current internal auditing at the Regional District, but it does not capture what I think is needed.
It’s scary to think I’ve held elected office for nearly a decade. I’ve observed that governance is rarely the problem; it is whether people decide to be good or bad actors in a political system. You cannot governance your way out of bad actors; that is what elections are for.
I’m happy to see many of Deloitte’s recommendations. Still, I think they missed the Regional District’s biggest challenge: the need for the board to have independent technical advice for major plans and projects.
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