After discussing the idea of cutting their numbersduring ongoing budget deliberations, Thompson city council finally put this talk into action at their Feb. 12 meeting.
But before the council can vote on whether they should reduce their members, and by how much, they want changes made to the Thompson Charter Actfirst.
According to Mayor Dennis Fenske, the Thompson charter stipulates that council can only be comprised of nine members—eight councillors and a mayor—which directly conflicts with the “not fewer than four and not more than 10 councillors” stipulation outlined in Manitoba's Municipal Act.
“So the resolution tonight is to ask the province to change the city’s charter to allow the flexibility that the Municipal Act allows,” said Fenske.
While a couple members were missing from the Feb. 12 meeting, the majority of council still supported this resolution, passing it by a final vote of 5–2.
“I’ll be supporting this,” said Coun. Penny Byer. “Because regardless of whether we reduce our numbers or not, this puts us on the same rules and the same flexibility as other municipalities in the province.”
As is often the case, Coun. Duncan Wong was the biggest voice of opposition during this debate portion of this meeting. Although he doesn’t disagree with the idea of changing the number of councillors, he accused the mayor and the administration of not following proper procedure when it comes to rolling out this resolution for public consumption.
“Why are we bringing it up since you said we have not approved the budget yet?” Wong said, addressing Mayor Fenske directly. “Someone is breaching the confidentiality agreement. I think they should be removed or someone should be fired for this.”
Fenske reminded Wong that no final decision has been made with regards to the number of councillors or the 2018–19 budget. This resolution only aims to reconcile the Thompson Charter Act and the Municipal Act so that council has the option of changing their numbers somewhere down the line.
Coun. Ron Matechuk’s objection to the resolution had more to do with the suggestions outlined in the administration’s memo, which states that they are looking to pare the council down from eight councillors to six. Not only is the cost saving potential minimal—approximately $20,000—but Matechuk argued that cutting these two seats will negatively affect the democratic process, since those positions are usually taken up by people who are new to local politics.
“We need new blood, or we end up with an old boys club and we all know what happens there.”
Coun. Judy Kolada also piped up during the Q and A portion of the meeting, asking why this discrepancy between the Thompson charter and the Municipal Act is just being brought up now, since it wasn’t an issue when the council was reduced to eight members between 2002 and 2010.
Fenske said the Manitoba government just recently notified the city that they are in violation of their own charter, and they are doing their due diligence to amend that past mistake.
Pending the province’s approval, if council wants to change their numbers they will have to pass a bylaw by late April, or 180 days before the upcoming general election, which is set to take place Oct. 24.
The next Thompson city council meeting is Feb. 26 at 7 p.m.
