City of Williams Lake 2009 Annual Report

All municipal governments in the Province are required to file an Annual Report with its residents' prior to June 30th in each year (Sections 98 & 99 of the Community Charter)

You can read the City of Williams Lake 2009 Annual Report here

However, the City of Williams Lake has so far only made its' final draft of the City's 2009 Annual Report available online and one would have to dig through the City's website to get to it (Annual Report on Council's Meeting Agenda for tomorrow night). In addition, paper copies will not be made available, I'm told, until Wednesday, after Council is set to adopt the 2009 Annual Report. Talk about being committed to "building communities" and "being accountable".

I would suggest that this would violate, in spirit, Section 99(2) of the Community Charter which says:

"The annual meeting must occur at least 14 days after the annual report is made available for public inspection under Section 97 of the Community Charter"

Paper copies of the City of Williams Lake 2009 Annual Report should have & must be made available to the residents' of Williams Lake prior to Williams Lake Council considering this report and for the usual period of 2 weeks between release of the report and the Council meeting at which the Annual Report is considered. Quesnel Council has already done this. Their 2009 Annual Report was released for Public Inspection on June 11th and will be considered formally by Quesnel Council on Monday, June 28th at 7:00pm in Quesnel Council Chambers. If I get the chance, I hope to have the opportunity to address Quesnel Council on their 2009 Annual Report

Furthermore, this report, although it contains aspects that I like, is still full of errors and omissions that I find lacking includes:

* Lack of Full Audited Financial Statements for 2009
* Up to date information in Portfolio Assignments (former CAO Alberto DeFeo left in August of 2009)

All in all - a decent improvement (2009 vs 2008 Annual Report) but this Council can do considerably better on the Annual Report for 2010 which I hope to see some of my concerns addressed