Development services review update: what we’ve heard
Over the past few months, we have made some great strides in our development services review. We’ve taken meaningful steps to understand stakeholder needs and prioritize areas for improvements that will help guide us down the path of achieving a greater focus, coordination and accountability to our development functions so that we can continue to build a great city.
Currently, we are in the planning phase of the review, which has two objectives: develop a shared vision so we can work towards a common goal and select processes to dive deeper into during the next phase.
To explore these objectives we:
- Started by interviewing staff in October
- Expanded our engagement by interviewing the development community in November 2018
- Launched a public survey and interviewed residents in November 2018
- Conducted three staff visioning workshops from November 2018 – January 2019
- Participated in a strategy session with Council – March 2019
If you have any questions, please contact: Margaret Love, Project Manager, margaret.love@kitchener.ca, 519-741-2200 ext. 7042.
Sincerely,
Justin Readman, General Manager, Development Services Department
City of Kitchener
This project has ended. Thank you to everyone who took part in the consultation.
The City completed a multi-year review of its development services, implementing improvements developed in consultation with community organizations, developers, residents and businesses. Better information, new digital tools for developers and an improved public consultation process are already showing early signs of success. City staff played an important role in identifying solutions across 18 priority areas.
The review identified two immediate areas for improvement: the site plan process and public consultation. Improvements suggested by the review will continue to be implemented throughout 2021, and staff will be assessing the effectiveness of their improvements at regular intervals. The full report can be found here.
