Economic Action Plan Update (April 2022)
In the past two years our businesses have faced difficult challenges. This includes job losses, climbing debt, and business closures. As well, our general population has faced rapid economic and social changes. The way we recover will define how we build up the economic strength and resiliency of our city. I want to take some time to highlight some of the changes that have been made over the last few years and how that has helped make it easier for businesses to start up and expand.
Recently, a number of improvement initiatives and strategies were presented to city council. These include:
Business retention and expansion framework through Business Friendly Edmonton and;
Permit and Licensing Improvement Initiative
Mobilization of Capital and Red Tape Reduction
Through ongoing engagement with businesses, City Administration has been able to better support all businesses in Edmonton.
The Business Friendly Edmonton initiative includes four areas of support:
Focus on Customer Services
Help Businesses at All Stages
Steward Innovation
Work with Partners
Focus on Customer Service looks to:
Build relationships
Communicate clearly and ensure information is relevant
Act with accountability
Treat businesses with empathy, respect, honesty and support
Clearly articulate businesses’ and the City’s responsibilities
Support highlights in the ‘Help Businesses at All Stages’ include:
Building on successful One-on-One Business Support Program to provide clear pictures of requirements, timelines, best practices and costs
Facilitating introductions to key contacts
Creating focused programming in collaboration with organizations serving underrepresented entrepreneurs
Educating businesses about their responsibilities in the regulatory stage and the value in hiring a professional consultant where needed
Providing site selection support to businesses
Maintaining and developing relationships with businesses in order to support their growth expansion, and continued reinvestment within the City
The Business Friendly framework identifies a stream of work dedicated to supporting organizations that wish to partner with the City of Edmonton to test their innovation on a larger scale, within a municipal context. This intake process will steward innovative projects from these businesses, leading to faster decisions, increased action, and a more consistent experience for the City’s external partners.
Work with Partners supports include:
Administration follows the agreement undertaken between Edmonton Global and all members of the region that outlines the protocols for investment attraction, information-sharing and other economic development activities
Facilitating business inquiries from Business Improvement Areas, Innovate Edmonton, Health Cities, Edmonton Screen Industries Office, Explore Edmonton, and others
Ongoing communication and collaboration in the continuous improvement of Business Friendly Edmonton.
Key performance measures for Business Friendly Edmonton are established by the Economic Action Plan. An integral part of this work resides in fostering inclusive economic development by supporting the accessibility needs of entrepreneurs, engaging with underrepresented entrepreneurs and reducing barriers to municipal services, resources and information.
There was also a recent report provided to our Executive Committee on the Permit and Licensing Improvement (PLI) Initiative.
In 2017, Edmonton launched the Urban Form Business Transformation (UFBT) initiative. The initiative, executed from 2017 to 2019, largely focused on the initial stages of the land development services (rezoning and subdivision), decreasing application requirements, standardizing technical review of applications to only what was required, streamlining the process, and setting improved service level targets that are reported quarterly.
Improvements to regulatory services are estimated to have saved Edmonton’s planning and development customers 260,933 days and $4.6 million in delay costs annually.
Going forward the key principles of the PLI are:
Setting Service Levels
Permitting Transformation for Businesses
Enhance Home Improvement Permitting
Customer Feedback Management
Ongoing Continuous Improvement
The PLI Initiative improvements include:
Creating an integrated application process across Business Licenses, Development Permits, and Building Permits.
Developing an interactive self-serve experience that will automatically create the appropriate permit applications for the user, addressing a common barrier for business owners who do not always know which permits they need for their projects.
Streamlining zoning and safety code feedback to the applicant during the application process to reduce time-consuming requests for more information.
Exploring concurrent development and building permit reviews, allowing business owners to complete their projects and open sooner.
Specific improvements for the Enhance Home Improvement Permitting section include:
Creating a self-serve interactive guide that will automatically generate the applicable fees and documents required, which gives homeowners more clarity and will let them plan their project timelines better.
Providing the ability for applicants to cancel and submit revisions for their HIP application online, addressing a common frustration for projects that can change after initial submission.
Streamlining the refund process to reduce frustrating barriers and delays when returning money to applicants.
Improving workflows to provide application requirements upfront based on project needs, which will provide a more predictable, transparent experience.
Timeline reductions through PLI are estimated to save applicants an additional $5.3 million and 67,600 days collectively each year.
Lastly, Executive Committee was updated on reducing red tape and increasing investment in the City as part of the Economic Action Plan.
The Economic Action Plan is on track to achieve its 10 year goals. The City and its partners, including City-funded organizations, the private sector, community organizations, other orders of government and the post-secondary sector have completed a number of initiatives and investments in 2021 that advance the Economic Action Plan, which contributes to The City Plan.
Mobilization of capital, partly indicated by non-residential construction in the Edmonton region, increased in 2020 and began to slow in 2021. Overall, the number and value of non-residential building permits has increased since 2019. In 2021, 2,222 permits were issued with a total non-residential value of $1.1 billion of investment in Edmonton.
The City delivered a number of red tape reduction initiatives in 2021 to make Edmonton an easier place to do business. Improvements to regulatory services are estimated to have saved Edmonton’s planning and development customers 260,933 days and $4.6 million in delay costs annually.
A priority in 2022 is to develop the performance measurement framework in consultation with the City's partners and in alignment with The City Plan.
I know that the City isn’t perfect yet when it comes to supporting businesses. I will get the occasional call or email from businesses that are being held up for a permit. With that said, when the reports came forward a few weeks ago, we received a lot of positive comments from different industry groups about how things have improved over the last few years. That was encouraging to see and it shows that City staff are making great strides in ensuring it is easy to do business in Edmonton.
Through continuous collaboration with businesses, business improvement areas and key partners and the guidance of the Economic Action Plan, our city will be able to make Edmonton an ideal place to start and continue doing business where entrepreneurs can truly thrive.
I highly recommend as well that you all read Mayor Sohi’s Blog: A business friendly city is a recovery-friendly city.
