Solicitor Fred Dean.
HEATHER BOA Bullet News CENTRAL HURON – Rejigging the way meetings are structured will give councillors in Central Huron more time to discuss issues that are important to the community, says an expert on municipal government.
Removing items from the agenda that aren’t necessary for council to make decisions and grouping together information items so that council can deal with them all at one time and possibly replacing its committee of the whole meeting with a second monthly council meeting were among the recommendations made by Toronto solicitor Fred Dean to council during a training session last night.
“I need to tell you a secret: If you get your procedure bylaw right, you’re going to have a great time on council and your community is going to win big-time and if you get it wrong, things will go off the rails in a hurry,” said Dean, who gives advice to municipal officials on a variety of matters including governance, conflict of interest, codes of conduct and municipal powers.
“Usually I get to come to councils when things are already off the rails,” said Dean, who served as the City of Greater Sudbury’s solicitor for 23 years. “You’re not there. You plan to do this. And I really commend council for undertaking this project. This is important to do.”
He also acknowledged members of the public, who filled the seats in the gallery.
The Municipal Act 2001 requires each municipality to have a procedural bylaw that outlines how meetings are run. There are some parts of the bylaw that need to meet rules laid out in the Municipal Act, such as when councils are allowed to go into closed session, but much of it is left for councils to create.
Coun. Brian Barnim said people say council makes its own rules.
“Damn right. And that’s a good thing. The Act says you have to,” Dean said. “I think it’s completely appropriate that council sets the rulebook. I think you create a set of rules that, if you reflect on, defines the relationship with the public, defines your relationship with each other, indicates what power the chair of the meeting has, defines the relationship with staff. You get to do that. That’s part of your job. I would never apologize for setting procedure.”
Central Huron is currently reviewing its procedural bylaw, which was last revised in 2006.
Jim Ginn, who is Central Huron’s mayor, expects much of the municipality’s procedural bylaw will remain in place, but areas of it will be tweaked based on Dean’s recommendations.
“I think there were really good points to ponder. We’ll see what the rest of council wants to do about it,” he said, after the three-and-a-half hour session. “It’s important that council has good debate on the important issues and maybe not so much time spent on the smaller things.”
Council will consider the recommendations at a future meeting. A copy of the draft revised bylaw is available for public review by emailing the municipality’s deputy clerk, Florence Stalenhoef, at Florence.Stalenhoef@centralhuron.com
