To the editor:
Voters in Thunder Bay have made it clear they want a smaller city council. Now it’s also time to let city hall know it’s time to get rid of the over-rated, undemocratic ward system.
We can do that by filling out an on-line survey city hall is going to unveil next month.
The Council Composition Review Committee will ask the public to consider two options: one is a re-jigged model that includes ward councillors; the other is a new model where every voter gets a say on each person who sits around the council table.
Why should we get rid of the ward councillors? There are many reasons.
Ward councillors don’t have the power many people think they do. Ward councillors can’t order a city employee to fix a pothole or shut down the partying going on next door.
Ward councillors are simply conduits for complaints that are forwarded to bureaucrats.
If we want to keep those conduits open, there’s an easy solution: voters elect an all at-large council, but once the election is over councillors assign themselves to hold ward meetings. You can even keep the existing ward boundaries.
The fact is ward councillors no longer hold the same sway they had over the distribution of buildings and infrastructure across the city 25 years ago.
We have a recreation and facilities master plan. We have a transportation master plan. We have a fire rescue master plan. We have an emergency measures master plan and so on.
There is, in fact, very little left for a ward councillor to do to affect planning in their ward given the mechanisms I’ve described as well as the official plan and the zoning rules we now have in place.
Then there’s this. Ninety per cent or more of the business conducted by city council has city-wide implications and little to nothing to do with a particular ward. Look at the agendas of council meetings. Look even at the agenda of ward meetings. The vast majority of issues are ones that affect the entire city.
Through the lens of what decisions are actually being made by city council, ward councillors are a blight on the democratic process.
Currently, we only get to vote for seven of the 13 members of council. We may vehemently oppose the decisions of most ward councillors, but we have no say on whether they remain on council.
On its face, this voting deficit is simply wrong. Our vote is under-weighted. As individuals, we do not get to determine the outcome of our local election. This won’t change with a re-jigged ward system.
Ward councillors are elected by a small fraction of the electorate. But once they’re sitting around the council chamber, ward councillors have the same decision-making power as a councillor elected by people from all across the city.
End this disparity. Take the survey. Tell the committee you want to vote for everyone who has the power to raise your taxes.
Shane Judge,
Thunder Bay
