Corporate Asset Management

Corporate Asset Management (CAM) is a coordinated activity of asset management processes to realize the value of City-owned assets. It is an integrated approach, involving all organization departments, to effectively manage existing and new assets to deliver services to customers. The intent is to maximize benefits, reduce risks and provide satisfactory levels of service to the community in a sustainable manner.

In the context of the CAM Plan, an asset is a physical, non-financial substance that is acquired, constructed or developed and

• are held for use in the production or supply of goods and services for rental to others, for administrative purposes or for the development, construction, maintenance or repair of other tangible assets;
• have useful economic lives extending beyond an accounting period;
• are to be used on a continuing basis; and
• are not for resale in the ordinary course of operations.

The Corporate Asset Management Policy is a Council policy that sets out the City’s approach to planning, designing, constructing, acquiring, operating, maintaining, renewing, replacing and disposing of its municipal infrastructure assets in a way that ensures sound stewardship of public resources, while delivering effective and efficient customer service. It provides a coordinated approach to align asset management planning with the City’s financial plans, budget and other relevant Acts, policies, frameworks, and plans. It also outlines the City’s commitment to considering climate change, mitigation approaches, disaster planning and supports informed decision-making and planning with respect to the City’s contingency funding. The CAM Policy provides a foundation for the City’s CAM Program which assists in identifying and prioritizing investments in existing and future municipal infrastructure assets to ensure it is robust, safe, sustainable, efficient, and capable of supporting the desired quality of life in our community. The Policy also identifies the roles and responsibilities of staff who make infrastructure-related decisions to provide a clear governance structure to ensure that other elements of the CAM Program (CAM Strategy, CAM Plan, CAM Processes) align with the CAM Policy and the 2023-2027 Strategic Plan. 

The CAM Program is designed to enable the management of the infrastructure assets in a way that connects the strategic community objectives to day-to-day decisions related to when, why, and how investments are made into the infrastructure systems. 

The CAM Plan sets out how the City’s infrastructure will be managed to achieve the commitments and principles outlined in the CAM Policy which is achieved through the following:

• Understanding the current state of local infrastructure systems.
• Measuring and monitoring levels of service (LOS) metrics established by staff to enable a quantitative connection between aspects of infrastructure systems and the degree to which the systems are achieving the objectives laid out in the CAM Policy.
• Developing a relationship between the asset lifecycle management strategies executed by staff (i.e. operation, maintenance, rehabilitation and replacement of assets) and the LOS metrics.
• Establishing a financial strategy to fund expenditures that are required to achieve the approved LOS metrics.

It is the difference between the planned budget and reserve fund availability versus the optimal expenditure to manage assets needs (what is available versus what is required).

The City’s 10-year cumulative infrastructure gap as a percentage of the replacement value is 3.32% to maintain the current levels of service and 4.84% to achieve proposed levels of service.

Levels of service (LOS) are the objectives that the City intends to deliver to its customers. LOS are established by City service areas and include key performance indicators as well as some mandatory metrics recommended by the Ontario Regulation 588/17.