Council now has policy to address vacant seats

Future vacancies on city council will now be decided through a by-election or appointment depending on when those vacancies occur.

Council voted for a policy drafted by city clerk John Hannam that would call for a by-election within the first two years of council’s term, use council’s discretion during the third year and be decided by appointment within the last year of the four-year term in the event of a vacant council seat.

Coun. Andrew Foulds, who voted for the resolution, said when a vacancy came up during council’s last term, he voted in favour of a by-election. Foulds said although some on council had an issue with the possibility of burdening the public with a federal, municipal and provincial election in one year should Coun. Ken Boshcoff win the federal Thunder Bay-Atikokan seat for the Liberals May 2, people should never be ashamed to vote.

"I think it balances a lot of the interests when it comes to some of the democratic issues that are coming forward," said Foulds.

Foulds said he has always felt tremendously uncomfortable with appointments over elections.

"People are fighting and dying worldwide to try and avoid appointments," said Foulds.
But some councillors, such as Coun. Joe Virdiramo said under the Municipal Act, councils have the choice whether to appoint or elect positions during vacancies.

Adopting a policy that takes away the choice for council was actually undemocratic Virdiramo said.

"It takes away the democracy. It takes away the decision making," Virdiramo said. "All we’re doing here is having somebody make the decision for future councils."

Coun. Rebecca Johnson said looking at the history of Thunder Bay, out of the 20 vacancies on city councils only one was determined through a by-election. Johnson said she felt uncomfortable using a policy in a political decision because city councils need to decide based on the context of the vacancy. Because the policy would force a by-election in the event of a vacancy within a month of a municipal election she wouldn’t want to make people vote again so soon.

Although several councillors brought up the last appointment when Robert Tuchenhagen joined council after the resignation of Andy Savela, Johnson said she’s never heard any complaints from the public.

"I think things need to be dealt with at the moment," Johnson said. "At this point I’ve not had any comments relative to what we’ve done in the past."

Also Monday, council turned down an idea by Coun. Larry Hebert to form a five-member citizen’s committee to look into the size and make-up of future city councils. Hebert, who wanted an at-large only council and reduce the number of councillors to be a plebiscite in the last election, said he though the idea was worth another look.

Coun. Trevor Giertuga said while he would actually rather have a ward-only council, the issue was worth looking into because it keeps coming up in council meetings over the years.

"I just think we should look at it," Giertuga said."It’ll come up again it always does."

But Foulds said at-large only systems are more costly and only end up serving parts of the communities where politicians can gain votes.

Foulds said in Thunder Bay’s case Red River, as the ward with the highest voter turnout, would be courted by politicians looking to win while McKellar, with the lowest turnout, might suffer form being poorly represented. Foulds also said it would be harder for lesser known candidates to win.

Ward councillors can also better serve their particular neighbourhood than at-large councillors in most cases.

"You know that every square inch of this municipality is covered by a council," Foulds said. "There’s a real value to that."