Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "Tricky
Ethics":
Methinks the Councillor & his 2 buddies should spend
their time working on the Rules of Procedure before they go after the Conduct of
their fellow councillors. It boggles that both Councillor Gallo & Councillor
Gaertner are still getting the basics wrong after all their ' years of
experience '.
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To be fair to both Councillors, it's not experience that teaches how the rules work.
It 's guidance and control in the chair.
The chair's function is to implement the rules with consistency
.
Councillors cannot acquire facility without consistency from the chair
Council before last, rules had not been mastered by the chair. My friend Tim Jones preferred to swing along on good will. He looked in all the wrong places. Little good will was extended in his direction Eventually, he paid a price
In the last Council, as each question came on the table, Councilllor
MacEachern was automatically recognised by the chair and held the floor with an endless stream of questions until all oxygen had been sucked from the room.
Rules require Councillors be prepared to debate. Be recognised by the chair. Speak without interruption. May ask a question. Purpose of the question to confirm a point
Endless inquiry is not debate.It wastes interminable time
Last night I was both satisfied and surprised
Three Councillors took a position on the question on the table. So accustomed were they to composing thoughts in the form of a question it wasn't immediately obvious to them.
I pointed it out. There was no question, therefore no answer required. A position had been taken. Which is exactly how debate is supposed to be.
The three were Councillors Humfryes, Gaertner and Gallo.
I chaired a committee meeting two weeks before and created turmoil by disallowing a number of questions. Especially those seeking opinions from staff .
The ruling was challenged several times and upheld. .
Staff have no place in Council debate. This is not a disrespectful comment.
Staff provide advice.
Council's exercises judgement and makes decisions.
Nine different points of view brought forward in debate is not beyond the realm of possibility.
It means Council is doing it's job.
If the chair uses authority to control decisions, the function of Council is not fulfilled. The rules are frustrated.
The Municipal Act spells out the function of the Mayor as providing leadership and guidance.
Done effectively, influence is inevitable.
If the presiding member detaches or fails to relate, Council is like a ship without a rudder, a boat without a sail.
A great deal of satisfaction is derived from working together, the way a Council is supposed to work
It's not about agreeing or making deals behind the scenes.It's certainly not about aligning with staff.
It's about Council sharing the common purpose of serving the community.
Each in our own way coming together as a whole.
The majority may seldom be right. But having the right to be wrong in the majority is better by far than the alternative.
For someone who was mayor for so many years, Tim Jones was especially bad at running council meetings.
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ReplyDeleteMight one say that councillor MacEachern created her own personal black hole? It's unfortunate that she did not crawl into it and vanish for ever more.
One must first learn what the rules are and then apply them with consistency. Without the first the second will never follow.
By the way, did many of the councillors in attendance last night know what ethics are or what was meant when one used the word "integrity?"
The ability to lead and guide does not come to many of us. We are, instead, like so many sheep, running all over, like some members of Council.
Awesome. Wish I could think this clearly all the time.
ReplyDeleteI know you avoid Councillor Ballard's Blog. But you might want to know he is taking on Lucid and the man who spoke to Council. Not at all pleasant & Council should know.
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ReplyDeleteFor those of us into self-torture, one should take a gander at Clr. C. Ballard's latest missive on "Blogging for Ballard."
Perhaps the man's head has come loose from his body and is running laps around Machell Park to keep his brain from atrophying.
He claims to have been a journalist and to have spent more than 25 years in business and politics.
I see no sign of maturity or mental competence in this individual.
The only conclusion that I can come to is that certain people, when seated at the Council table, go missing in action.
Here we go again with the Irony. Councillor Ballard, who runs a restricted Blog, is furious that Lucid also runs a restricted web-site. Might that be to prevent people like our self-proclaimed journalistic Councillor from going ballistic on their pages?
ReplyDeleteIt is one thing to quietly check out the snappers on a Gift Horse. Quite another to perform Root Canal on one for public consumption.
ReplyDeleteI'm no fan of Cllr Ballard, but imagine the hue and cry on this blog if Cllr Buck received an e-mail similar in tone.
ReplyDeleteThough I hold my own skepticism on the Lucid proposal and it’s success here in Aurora and in many ways agree with C. Ballard, I believe he has overstepped his bounds all in his belief that he protecting the best interests of the citizens of Aurora.
ReplyDeleteIn his quest to investigate Lucid he has also cast his doubts to the Council process, to the abilities of Mr. Downey and the Town staff and essentially has thrown a wrench into the works. But perhaps that was always his initial plan.
C. Ballard voted along with all of Council (it was unanimous) to approve the proposal from Lucid and to allow Mr. Downey to take it to the next step. C. Ballard has essentially smiled in everyone’s faces and stabbed them in the back as to how he thinks it should be handled. Nothing good will come of these tactics including C. Ballard’s grandstanding (he boasts on the number of hits on his site) and in fact I wouldn’t be surprised that Lucid just walks away from everything and finds another town.
Why didn’t Ballard just vote against the proposal in the first place? If this is how he was going to approach it, I am truly skeptical about his self-serving methods and abilities. He's not someone I would want to do business with if this is his method. He wants to be able to come back to Council and say “I told you so” and I’m just doing my job as a councillor. That will be his defense.
“Let the games begin” indeed.
C. Gaertner is now also on Ballard's bandwagon defending his loopy Lucid ways. All under the guise of protecting the Aurora's public interest. This won't have anything to do with the jazz moving north now would it. And trying to point their fingers at the other Councillors would it. It's all politics, nothing to do with public interest.
ReplyDelete"This won't have anything to do with the jazz moving north now would it."
ReplyDeleteWhich is also why councillors, in the wake of that unpopular Jazzfest-killing decision, are desperate for Lucidpalooza to get their political/popularity asses out of a sling.
Well said 4:49! Is it just me or did he make a grammatical error in his journalistic pursuits on twitter and leave out John Gallo's name in his rant naming councillors who beat the jazz gang to the carpet. Mr. Gallo seemed happy to be part of the photo-op with council and the members of Lucid.Or was Gallo just "voguing"? Ballard is a good reason why the ward system won't work...I wouldn't want him speaking for me...
ReplyDeleteWhich 1:52pm is why it is all the more puzzling that C. Ballard voted with everyone and then proceeded on his own accord to investigate Lucid and usurp what Council has asked Town staff to do. It would be different if he had voted against the proposal. Then he could perhaps garner some credibility to his actions. And some respect for going against the flow.
ReplyDeleteIMHO with respect to Aurora and a summer music festival, it’s damned if you do and damned if you don’t. The Council should just lay to rest any festival for this summer and get on with other business. No fault to Lucid, others are comparing it to the Jazz festival down to the last details and whatever they do will be tainted. It’s now almost March that leaves 5 months before the event and it is still in a proposal stage. I know small businesses can act a lot quicker than governments to get things done but really time is running out and talk about a $40,000 profit with 25% going to the Town is a bit thick in the timeframe. And what’s this talk about youth volunteers selling coupon books?
I really wish I could get my hands on the 30 page proposal from Lucid – it would make for some interesting reading and at least I could judge for myself. Lucid is a business. It may be organized as a non-profit but it has to pay its organizers and staff – they are not doing it for the good of Aurora they are doing for the good of Lucid. That’s not a bad thing that’s just the reality of any organization.
Remember “if it sounds too good to be true – it probably is”.