the broken typewriter

15 Years of Service – Jessica Harrison:

Graphic designer Jessica Harrison joined the City of Fort St. John’s Community Services Department in February 2010. Her role was reclassified a few years later into a communications specialist, and she routinely collaborates with other city departments to provide information to Fort St. John’s residents, businesses and visitors.

Over the years, Harrison has led a brand and website refresh, as well as developing the city’s community engagement processes. Her role is vital, says the city, in communicating and marketing Fort St. John’s various events, programs and initiatives such as the Visitor Guide and High on Ice Festival.

She is continuing her education by working on a Public Relations Diploma, and Mayor and Council are looking forward to many more years of work with Harrison.

2025 Operating and Capital Plans:

In a report to Council, the city’s finance department reported that the budget has now been balanced.

Originally, the Operating budget had a shortfall of $451,933, but the combination of options presented to council at the January 27 meetings, which were endorsed, succeeded in finding savings that eliminated this imbalance.

The Capital budget, which depends largely on revenue from Peace River Agreement funds, was presented with an estimated amount in January as the city wasn’t sure of the exact of amount of funding it would receive this year. Since then, the city received confirmation that PRA funds will be $28,804,650, an increase of $1,504,650. Both budgets have now been adjusted for this increase.

Notices of Motion:

Councillor Trevor Bolin brought forward two Notices of Motion on Monday. In the first one, he proposed;

“THAT, Council direct staff to issue annual Requests for Proposals (RFPs) for the provision of routine services of signage, printing, and towing required by the City.”

“RFPs on a lot of the services we use, are a great money-saving local business tool,” said Bolin. “I think that we stand a large chance to save taxpayers money by doing this.”

Bolin’s second notice of motion is in line with the first, he says because it’s related to the City’s procurement policy.

“THAT, Council direct staff to review the City’s existing procurement policies and procedures to identify opportunities for incorporating a Canadian First buying policy, AND THAT, staff provide Council with recommendations for amendments to facilitate a Canadian First procurement process.”

Bolin said that with tariffs from the United States imminent, a lot of what the city is planning over the next few years could really impact the budgets, such as the steel the city wants to use in building the new 106 Street water reservoir.

“It puts us on a Canadian-BC-Fort St. John first sort of a transition,” he said.

 Deputy Chief Administrative Officer Darryl Blades said that this is something the provincial bodies the city belongs to are already working on this, because there are several trade agreements that must be adhered to.

“There are some agencies a little bit above us that are working on this. There’s some language that’s going to come out here in the next little while that will help us get around where we have the Western Canadian Trade Agreement, the Northwest Trade Agreement.”

The northwest trade agreement, for example says that we have to do international purchasing, because it’s with Washington State, Blades said.

At a recent CAO conference, Blades says that this language and agreements were concerns of every size of municipality from those with less than 5,000 people to Vancouver.

“We’re looking for some language how we manage existing trade agreements.”