Lack of quorum sinks two special meetings this week
Two hastily-convened Council meetings have flopped in the past week due to a lack of quorum. The scheduling of meetings this month has been unusual, even accounting for the confusion created by the landslide emergency.
A decision was taken last month to move this month's regular Council meeting from December 17 to December 10. Then, on December 12, the first special Council meeting was scheduled for December 17. That meeting was unable to achieve a quorum, but was attended by Mayor Ken Berry and Councillor Michael Broughton and with Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) Ross Blackwell.
On December 18, another special Council meeting was called for December 19 at noon.
The initial special Council meeting had three items on the agenda, as presented by staff: a Lions Bay housing background report, a proposed appendix for a housing report issued in November 2021, and a combined Village of Lions Bay Final Report. Also in attendance online was Eric White, a land-use planning consultant from urban planning firm RWPAS, who signed the first report on the agenda.
The December 17 meeting was called off after a 15-minute wait for other Council members to appear.
Yesterday's meeting also had essentially the same agenda, with the addition of a closed portion to be held after the open segment. However, this meeting was only attended by Berry and Broughton, without CAO or guest speakers present.
Long-time resident Anthony Greville, a member of the Infrastructure Committee who attended both meetings, expressed his frustration with the process.
Referencing the second meeting, he said Broughton appeared to read from a prepared statement saying it was a shame the three other Councillors did not attend this meeting and that some Councillors appeared to have have predetermined their decisions.
"In an interesting paradox, Broughton said he would have been interested to hear the legal opinion and the ensuing discussion required to carry out the business of the Village – which sounds reasonable – until you notice there was nobody else present at the meeting table, or on-line, to give a legal opinion; no lawyer and no CAO, no guest speaker of any sort," said Greville.
The Watershed contacted members of Council, as well as the CAO for further comment.
For his part, Councillor Neville Abbott clarified that he was responding for himself, not on behalf of Council.
"It was made clear to everyone in advance that there would not be a quorum at either meeting, and only the Mayor and Councillor Broughton can explain why they continued with the meetings," he said.
"There was an emergency meeting of Council on Monday in which urgent decisions were made about the unfolding situation," he added. "The items on the agendas for Tuesday and Thursday were not critically time-sensitive, and staff agreed to cancel the Thursday meeting. This is a sad time for the community and we should focus on getting past this before dealing with other matters."
Councillor Marcus Reuter echoed Abbott's sentiments and further cautioned that members of Council and staff should "resist the lure of media spotlights and microphones, as this is where mistakes happen."
No other comments have yet been received, although a further update on the rescue effort is expected from the municipality later today.
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Political showmanship on full display. The audacity of this land-use consultant to lecture a community on deadlines about something as trivial as a tone deaf housing report was really out of touch. See you next Tuesday.
Kudos to Anthony Greville for noticing Michael Broughton’s (failed) attempt to score political points.