Reality television does not get much better than a Halifax city council meeting on Eastlink Tv. Tuesday, Aug. 3 they were back at it again after a three week break. The main issue this evening was whether or not to change the number of members on the council or to stay with the status quo. This topic of debate was especially heated by late Tuesday night.
Supporters for and against the status quo were virtually even, which only increased the drama and tension inside the chambers. The first vote held on the issue was barely in favor of staying with the status quo; even though two members of the council were not present (they had decided to leave after the first half of the day and therefore were not there to vote on this issue). The act of leaving halfway through the day by these two council members brings to the forefront the first point, how responsible are our council members.
When elected to the city council there is a job to be done. These members who do not bother showing up for a debate on an important issue are completely disregarding their duties. The status quo was being debated for possibly lowering the number of council members. If they decided not to stay with the status quo, maybe those two members playing hooky could be the first ones to go.
Immediately after the vote, a council member opposing the status quo put forward a notice of motion of reconsideration. This in itself was a smart play by the council member. The notice, however, put the chamber in an uproar because it meant the vote that just happened does not matter.
The issue will then be debated and voted upon again at the next meeting. It took several attempts by the solicitor to clarify what this notice of motion was and the rest of the councilors had trouble following the rules of the debate and speaking in turn. This rule does not make since, though, seeing as hypothetically every time you lose a vote you could put forth a notice of motion of reconsideration which could keep delaying the problem week after week. This leads to the final point; the rules of the debate need to change and the ones debating should learn the rules.
This rule that you can put forth a notice of motion of reconsideration should be re-designed. Right now the one who puts the notice forth has full control of the notice of motion. He/She can choose to do the vote again right then and there or to put it off until the next meeting. The council should have some authority over the notice. The authority the council should have could be as simple as having control over whether or not to delay the vote until next week or to have another vote the night the notice was put forward.
The whole issue did resolve itself in the end after a huge fuss was made by half a dozen council members (who seemed to not know the rules of the debate). The council member, who had originally put the notice forward, withdrew his notice which then allowed the council to finally move on.
Nick Moore, Sackville
