Item - 2023.EX10.1

The Executive Committee recommends that:  

1. City Council authorize the City Manager to negotiate, enter into and execute the Memorandum of Understanding with the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority, including without limitation any future amendment, renewal, extension or termination thereof, on substantially similar terms and conditions as set out in Attachment 1 to the report (November 21, 2023) from the City Manager, and otherwise on such terms as may be acceptable to the City Manager, and in a form acceptable to the City Solicitor.

2. City Council direct the City Clerk to deliver a certified copy of City Council's resolution in this matter to the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority, the Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry, and the Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing.

The purpose of this report is to inform City Council of recent amendments under the Conservation Authorities Act ("Act") which introduces a new framework for the delivery of programs and services by conservation authorities and to seek Council approval to enter into the Memorandum of Understanding ("MOU") with the Toronto and Region Conservation Authority ("TRCA"), as set out in Attachment 1 to this report.

Recent legislative changes to the Act have resulted in a distinction between mandatory programs and services and non-mandatory, municipally requested programs and services that conservation authorities have provided to municipalities in the past. As a result of the amendments to the Act, non-mandatory programs, services and projects provided to a municipality by a conservation authority require a memorandum of understanding or other similar agreement to be entered into between the municipality and the conservation authority by January 1, 2024, in accordance with Ontario Regulation 687/21.

The MOU between the City and TRCA as set out in Attachment 1 to this report fulfills the requirement for an MOU or other agreement to be in place for discretionary non-mandatory programs, services and projects provided by the TRCA.