It’s critical that citizens participate in the political process, whether by voting, running for office or by being able to speak directly to their elected officials. Currently, the formats of meetings of St. Albert city council work against this for various reasons. The first thing our next city council should do is change the way its meetings are run, so that they become more accessible and transparent. In working for the Town of Morinville several years ago, I noticed several things about their council meetings that our council would benefit from adopting.
One of the biggest problems is that our council meetings start at 3 p.m. This makes it very hard for people with nine-to-five jobs to attend council meetings, much less run for council themselves. How many of these people could justify leaving work early every week so they could attend meetings on time? Sure, we can watch council meetings online, but that doesn’t allow people to speak to council directly. The public portion of council meetings should start at something like 5:30 or 6 p.m., so more people can actually participate. Morinville’s meetings, for example, start at 7 p.m.
It’s been suggested that a later start time would make the in camera portions of the meetings (the parts of the meetings closed to the public) run late into the night, but what Morinville does is deal with a lot of the routine in camera business before the public portion starts, saving the essential in camera portions for later once the public part of the meeting is done. Councillors with nine-to-five jobs would still be able to attend the public portions of council meetings and stick around for the important in camera business.
Another thing I noted in Morinville was how often the town administration asked council for specific direction in handling certain issues. Administration would present council with a list of options, list the potential pros and cons of each one and then ask council which option they should pursue. Council could choose any of those options, or instruct administration to do something else entirely. These types of choices rarely seem to come up in St. Albert council meetings. Council can and should take a more active hand in providing direction to administration the way our neighbours in Morinville do.
Finally, Morinville’s council meetings usually only have two in camera portions. One takes place at the start of the meeting before the public portion, and the other one takes place after the public portion is closed. These are ideal times for discussing matters behind closed doors. Currently, our council meetings have public observers leave in the middle of the meeting whenever council goes in camera, and has them come back in once the in camera part is done. This interrupts the flow of council meetings, particularly when we don’t know how long an in camera gathering will take.
These changes would make it easier for more people to participate in council meetings both as spectators and elected officials. They would also open up the decision-making process and further stimulate debate. Finally, they would help strengthen accountability and transparency, which is a particularly big issue in Canadian politics these days.
If they’re good enough for Morinville, surely they’re good enough for St. Albert?
Jared Milne is a St. Albert resident with a passion for Canadian history and politics.
