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A metropolis councillor says she’s apprehensive “the minority vote” may very well be silenced at some committee conferences due to a brand new measure authorised Tuesday that can enable debate to be short-circuited.
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In an 8-6 vote Tuesday, metropolis council authorised the usage of a call-the-question movement, or to name a vote to halt debate, throughout committee conferences of all 15 members of council. Full council attends conferences of the finances committee and strategic priorities and coverage committee.
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“Committee is the place the place we’re alleged to have the dialogue and the talk,” Coun. Susan Stevenson mentioned. “I’m very involved that on both aspect of political arguments, we could have the minority vote silenced.”
She, together with councillors Anna Hopkins, David Ferreira, Hadleigh McAlister, Jerry Pribil, and Steve Lehman voted in opposition to the transfer that requires two-thirds help of councillors, whereas Coun. Sam Trosow was absent.
Stevenson mentioned she’s had the movement used in opposition to her twice since being elected, and he or she’s apprehensive about restrictions in opposition to freedom of expression, together with her personal as a ward consultant.
Calling the query is already permitted at common council conferences with a two-thirds vote of council, however can’t be used on debates about bills of greater than $1 million. A councillor who has already spoken within the debate can’t name the query.
Deputy Mayor Shawn Lewis, one of many proponents of the transfer, argued councillors nonetheless must vote to finish debate, they usually can vote in opposition to calling the query if everybody hasn’t spoken but.
He pointed to latest finances conferences the place politicians debated some repeat funding pitches for hours solely to reach on the similar vote as throughout February talks, or pitches which solely had one or two members in help.
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“I don’t assume that anyone ought to presume that (calling) the query is essentially going to ensure that council goes to vote in favour . . . they might or might not relying on how the talk has been going,” he mentioned.
Mayor Josh Morgan mentioned he doesn’t imagine approving the usage of the transfer at committees-of-the-whole will change a lot.
“(It) has solely been used, in my time on council within the final 10 years, a couple of handful of instances, and I might be clear that I used to be truly on the receiving finish of various these . . . and didn’t have a chance to talk,” he mentioned in an interview.
Calling the query has “a excessive democratic threshold,” Morgan mentioned, and has been current in several ranges of governance for many years, together with regionally, and nonetheless hardly ever has been used.
The change was a part of a handful of tweaks to council’s procedures that had been handed, together with mandating committee service, and clarifying that letters and delegation requests should be associated to agenda objects.
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