• ○ Planning and Development leadership team meetings - These meetings are held bi-weekly between the leadership team of the Planning and Development Services Department, including the City Planner, Deputy City Planners, and the Chief Building Official to discuss planning and Development applications. They provide an opportunity to the City Planner to give guidance and directions regarding the current planning applications that are in progress. In addition, any potential issues relating to building permits for these applications to move ahead are also discussed at these meetings with the Development department through the Chief Building Official and his team.
• ○ Site plan approval team - Led by the Deputy City Planner/Manager of Urban Design, the Site Plan Approval team meets on a weekly basis internally to discuss and review progress and issues with site plan applications. These meetings allow the planners on file to bring up specific issues such as identification of studies to be performed, additional requirements due to comments from other departments and external agencies, delays in processing, etc relating to an in-progress application or a new potential application that has gone through the pre-submission/pre-consultation phase. Any significant issues are escalated to the Development Triage Team and the Planning and Development Leadership team to discuss.
• ○ Agenda setting meetings - Every month, the Planning and Development Services team meet to discuss and set the agenda for the upcoming Development & Heritage Standing Committee meeting. This involves a review of the status of each applicable application by the planner on file to make a decision on whether it is ready to be presented to the Standing Committee.

• ● SharePoint application listing - The Planning and Development Services Department maintains a Sharepoint site, which contains a list of all types of planning and development applications which are logged in by a member of the team once the application has been received by the Department and a unique identification number from AMANDA is generated . The site tracks the details on the application such as applicant name, property address, date of submission, and the planner assigned. It is used to keep track of workloads among the team, along with the deadline according to the Planning Act for each application.
• ● Adherence to Planning Act and Official Plan - Through inspection of ten (10) sampled planning and development applications during 2018, Internal Audit noted that:

• ○ The pre-consultation meeting was performed for all sampled applications.
• ○ The sampled applications had their completeness confirmed within the prescribed timeline from the date of submission of the application.
• ○ The sampled applications had a file manager assigned to it, responsible for seeing the application through the various phases through to completion and final approval.
• ○ Where applicable, a draft report with preliminary comments and requirements was shared with the applicant outlining required items for final approval.
• ○ The sampled applications were approved by the authorized approver such as the Deputy City Planner, City Council, and the Committee of Adjustment.
• ○ The sampled applications were processed and approved within the timelines prescribed in the Planning Act.
• ○ Where applicable, notice of hearing/decision on an application was communicated to the public within the prescribed requirements in the Planning Act.