County passes public presentation of committee bylaw amendments

By John Watson Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Wheatland County council, during their May 7 regular meeting, discussed Bylaw 2024-05, being the Public Presentation Committee Bylaw. 

Brian Henderson, speaking on behalf of county administration, said the bylaw was created in 2022 in order to “clean up” council meetings and leave them to be more decision making-oriented.

“When we first implemented this bylaw, we had mirrored another municipality and as we were reviewing it and as the Public Presentation Committee has gone forward, what administration has done is we have brought forward changes to the public presentation committee bylaw,” he said.

The original details of the motion were presented to council via their public meeting agenda, as well as the amended details for their review. 

One significantly altered section refers to a feedback mechanism, which had been a point of question for council with the goal being to make the process “crystal clear” on how to bring ideas forward from the public presentation committee to a council meeting for consideration.

“Other changes in here as well were that in the original bylaw, it was that the chair approve the additions to the agenda where really that is an administrative function, then the committee does vote on that when it comes forward all at once,” said Henderson. “We have never denied a presentation, but there is a clause in there just in case there is a reason … such as an item being litigated is coming forward to a Public Presentation Committee, or there are items in there that administration would deem inappropriate.”

Henderson added the reasons why an item may be denied must be conveyed in writing to the presenter, and council would also be provided a copy of the reasoning. 

The proposed bylaw, ultimately being similar to its predecessor, was described as having been cleaned up, and better reflective of current county practices. 

Public Presentation Committee meetings are scheduled at the County Organizational Meeting and the intention of administration is to have applicants present during committee of the whole meetings.

Public Presentation Committee meetings are aimed to be scheduled per quarter, with four such meetings taking place across a given year.

Prior to readings of the bylaw, a language change was implemented by the request of council to section 6.8 of the drafted document. 

All three readings of the amended bylaw were held during the May 7 meeting, and the amended bylaw was passed without further discussion or changes.