Turner Valley councillors expect eliminating day-time council meetings and hosting biannual public information sessions will allow them to better connect with citizens.
Town council agreed at its April 15 meeting to rescind a motion made by previous council to host its first regular council meeting of each month at 1 p.m. rather than 6:30 p.m. Last week’s decision means council meetings will now be held the first and third Monday of each month at 6:30 p.m.
“We’ve had ample time to test the waters on day-time meetings and evening meetings,” Mayor Barry Crane told council last week. “We’ve got our cameras up and running, recorded meetings in place, we’ve got a fairly young council minus two. It just seems that as we’ve moved forward, the attendance at the day-time meetings is not what we expected when we made that motion to change it up.”
Jamie Wilkie, Turner Valley’s newest councillor after winning this month’s byelection, said he heard from citizens during his campaign that they prefer evening meetings.
“It’s just a challenge for folks with a day job to make it to meetings during the day,” he said.
“It’s something I heard coming off campaigning time and time again – transparency and increase people’s ability to come to meetings.”
Coun. Jonathan Gordon, who’s missed the daytime meetings due to work conflicts, said he supports the change.
“It’s been brutal missing one meeting a month,” he said. “To be able to be back in council chambers letting my point of view be known is excellent. I, too, have heard from a number of residents who miss out at least 50 per cent of the time coming to council.”
Coun. Cindy Holladay brought a motion to council at last week’s meeting to host a public coffee and open house every six months to improve transparency between council and the public.
Holladay said she would like council to share its achievements while giving citizens an opportunity to ask questions.
“We should definitely have the chance to tell residents what we’ve done and accomplished since they elected us,” she said. “We definitely need to get better information out there.”
It was during this spring’s byelection forums that Holladay learned the hot topics amongst residents, she told council.
“I think having a little bit of a lead up, having something to provide a framework for the night, would be good,” she said. “If they’re not up for that and just want to sit and have coffee and doughnuts and talk, we can do that too.”
Deputy Mayor John Waring said the public open house sessions is a topic he’s already discussed with Gordon.
“I fully support your proposal,” he told Holladay. “How formal this needs to be we can discuss ourselves when we decide on a date and location.”
Holladay’s motion was approved unanimously by council, with the expectation of hosting the first session in late spring.
“It’s a great idea to make us available to the public for discussion,” said Coun. Lana Hamilton.
