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Kincardine council has finally decided what governance style
is best suited for the municipality.
After three meetings, including more lengthy debate Wednesday
night (Feb. 4), council agreed to stick with the status quo as
far as the structure goes for committees, committee-of-the-whole
and council.
Chief Administrative Officer John deRosenroll put the issue back
on the table because there was no firm decision made at the
council meeting Jan. 28. At that time, it was agreed to revisit
the topic when all members of council were present. All but
Councillor, Randy Roppel, were there Feb. 4, but he arrived in
time to participate in the debate.
The discussion up to Wednesday night was to discard the
committee-of-the-whole level and have committees, through their
staff and chairpeople, report directly to council.
Councillor Guy Anderson said that system would limit discussion
of a lot of things.
"I'm interested in more information about how this would work,"
said deputy mayor Laura Haight. "Who do the delegations come to;
and what are the roles of the public and council?" She said the
major flaw in the current hybrid system of committees and
committee-of-the-whole is poor communication. "What amendments
could we make to improve this system? Should we be sending more
things to more committees so more councillors get the
information? Should all delegations come directly to council and
not to committee? I'm not confident with our current structure."
Mayor Larry Kraemer said the only difference between the hybrid
system and a true committee system or committee-of-the-whole
system, is the unusually high number of public advisory
committees in Kincardine. "That's good because it allows citizen
involvement and it has helped unite the community," he said,
"but it's also difficult because it requires additional staff
and it takes more time to manage that system."
He said the main business of the municipality should be done by
council which was elected to do that work. He suggested leaving
the committees in place until Nov. 30 and then switch to a
committee-of-the-whole system (with public advisory committees
instead) for one year.
Councillor Kenneth Craig said the proposal doesn't sound
significantly different than what is in place now. "We already
said we wanted to move away from that, so, how is this system
going to be better; tell me," he said.
(next column)
04/02/2009 10:09 PM
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"I've sat at the council table for 10 years since
amalgamation," said councillor Ron Hewitt. "The (current) system is
working. I don't think it's broken. We're not doing that bad a job.
Let's finish our term with this committee structure and then leave this
to the next council to decide."
"Can I get a second opinion?" asked Craig. "We are looking for ways to
improve on the current structure."
"I agree," said Kraemer. "I thought we were trying to streamline the
system."
"If your goals are to have councillors know what's going
on and to enhance community involvement, then stay with the status quo,"
said deRosenroll, adding that a true committee system is not as good as
the hybrid system or a committee-of-the-whole system.
"When we first thought about changing the system, I thought it was
because the committees do all the work and then come here and council
can turn down their recommendations," said councillor Mike Leggett. "If
we get rid of the committee-of-the-whole, then we don't have two levels
of council discussion. We can bring reports and experts straight to
council. Structuring it that way makes sense; otherwise, leave it
alone."
"I'm a little confused here," said Roppel. "I thought we had decided
what direction we were going. But it apparently didn't suit some people
so we're going round and round again."
The more the debate raged, the more council became convinced that any
change would make the whole system more complicated.
"The status quo is starting to look good from this standpoint,"
concluded Kraemer.
Council agreed to stick with the status quo and work harder at improving
communication between committees.
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