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Thursday, March 9, 2017 • WATERLOO CHRONICLE • 19 An on-going issue for the provincial municipal and business sectors is inter-est arbitration, or the current process for settling contract disputes with essential services such as police and fire. The Ontario Chamber of Commerce (OCC), supported by individual Chambers and Boards of Trade, forwarded a letter to Premier Wynne last week indicating that the costs of emergen- cy services are escalating across the province at over three times the rate of inflation annu- ally since 2002. This increase is unsustainable in the cur- rent era of fiscal restraint within all major pub- lic sectors including health care and educa- tion. The principle concern of the OCC is that the current arbitration system does not adequately consider the ability of municipalities to pay for salary increases. The recently released municipal budget of Owen Sound revealed that 46 per cent of all city expendi- tures were absorbed by police and fire services in 2016. In Sudbury, one-third of the budget is allocated to these functions. Increasing emergency costs limit the resources that municipalities possess for other core functions such as infrastructure and social ser- vices. The Ontario Chamber has advanced three recommenda- tions for reforming the current system. Firstly, as noted above, decisions from arbitrators must reflect the ability of a m u n i c i p a l i t y t o p a y increased costs. Awards are based on pro- vincial, not regional emergen- cy services which is a chronic challenge for smaller centres. It is also highly impracti- cal to suggest that arbitra- tion increases be addressed through municipal taxes, rath- er analysis should be confined to the existing municipal tax structures and available rev- enue streams. Secondly, arbitration deci- sions should be delivered with- in 12 months. Significant inef- ficiencies and costs result from the fact there is no limit as to the length of time for which a decision can be delayed. In disputes where a decision is not delivered with 12 months, the Ontario Chamber recommends that the issue be directed to the Ontario Labour Rela- tions Board for a final award. Finally, arbitrators should be required to release a written explanation of their deci- sion, particularly how the fiscal condition of a municipality was incorporated. Such action is required to ensure that both residents and businesses are knowledgeable of increased emergency service costs and how they will impact the community. As noted above, core services continue to be at risk due to dispro- portionately high emergency service costs. Municipal services cannot be sustainably delivered without the consideration of impacts on taxpayers. The current arbitration system is broken and requires immediate correction. ••• Ian McLean is president and CEO of the Greater K-W Chamber of Commerce. Limited time lease offer available from Toyota Financial Services on approved credit. †0% lease APR for 39 months on a new 2017 RAV4 FWD LE (Model ZFREVTB) with an all-in price of $29,344 equals a weekly payment of $59 for 169 payments with a $3,500 down payment or trade equivalent. First weekly payment due at lease inception. Total lease obligation is $13,524. All-in lease includes freight and fees (PDE, EHF, OMVIC fee and air condition tax, where applicable). HST, licensing, registration and insurance are extra. Dealer may lease for less. Based on a maximum of 60,000KM. Additional KM charge of $0.10 for excess kilometres, if applicable. ♦$1,000 Customer Incentive is valid on retail delivery of a new 2017 RAV4 FWD LE (ZFREVTB). Offer is valid to retail customers (excluding fleet sales) when leased, financed or purchased from an Ontario Toyota dealership. Customer Incentive will take place at time of delivery, include tax and will apply after taxes have been charged on the full amount of the negotiated price. Vehicles receiving Customer Incentives must be purchased, registered and delivered between March 1 to March 31, 2017. ΩDealer Fees may be added and may be comprised of administration/ documentation fees, VIN Etching, anti-theft products, cold weather packages or other fees. Fees may vary by Dealer. Offer is valid between March 1 to March 31, 2017, and is subject to change without notice. All rights are reserved. Dealer may lease or sell for less. Dealer order/ trade may be required, but may not be available in all circumstances. Please see your participating Ontario Toyota Dealer for full details. GETREALVAL UE ONANEW201 7 RAV4 Pre-Collision System with Pedestrian Detection Automatic High Beam Lane Departure Alert Dynamic Radar Cruise Control NOW STANDARD weekly for 39 months with $3,500 down payment and Customer Incentive applied.♦ Includes freight and fees. HST extra. ALL-IN LEASE|2017 RAV4 FWD LE $1,000 ♦ CUSTOMER INCENTIVE $59 †at0%apr AWD Limited model shown. 2017 RAV4 Your local Dealer may charge additional fees of up to $989. Charges may vary by Dealer.Ω 7102 WEN A NO 4VAR LLA -LLA -LLA ESAE LNI | 4 VAR 017 2 ED LWF .nwsho odelm edtiimL DWA 4VA7 R102 Province needs some resolution on arbitration system BuSIneSS MATTERs IAn mclean engineering students at the university of Waterloo will apply classroom lessons in artificial intelligence (AI) to help develop new uses for a voice-activated virtual assis- tant system in a program fund- ed by Amazon. Waterloo is one of just four north American universities initially selected to participate in the Alexa Fund Fellowship, which comes with funding for instruction and supervision of student design projects in the burgeoning field of AI and the Internet of Things (IoT). "It's evolving at incred- ible speed," said Fakhri Kar- ray, director of the Centre for Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence and a professor of electrical and computer engineering at Waterloo in a press release. "These are very exciting times for researchers, product developers and cus- tomers." Alexa is a cloud-based ser- vice that powers devices like Amazon echo, echo Dot, Ama- zon Tap, and more. Alexa uses natural language understand- ing and speech recognition technology to process voice queries and commands from users, whether that's play- ing music, making to-do lists, reporting the weather or con- trolling smart home devices or appliances. As part of the year-long program, Amazon will supply Waterloo with Alexa-enabled devices and send an Alexa speech scientist to help men- tor researchers and students, more than 600 of whom will have access to the system in three undergraduate courses and a graduate-level course. A post-doctoral fellow will assist classroom instruc- tors, liaise with Amazon, and supervise at least 10 projects involving Alexa by fourth-year students and another six Cap- stone Design projects by grad- uating engineering students. "Voice computing is no longer science fiction," said Pearl Sullivan, dean of Water- loo's Faculty of engineering in a press release. "By under- standing the principles behind the interaction between com- puters and humans, our stu- dents can develop new appli- cations and startup ventures." Professor Karray, a uni- versity Research Chair, said a key objective is for students to develop ways to integrate Alexa with other AI tools they learn about in class so users can operate and interact with machines and devices in a more natural, human-like way. For example, instead of asking Alexa to heat a room in a house to a particular tem- perature, the goal in the future would be to simply ask if the room is warm enough and have the smart home under- stand and respond accord- ingly. Amazon funds AI program at uW