Sparks fly at council over procedural issues

Times Reporter 

 

One Town councillor voiced his concerns at the regular Town council meeting held July 3, after proper procedure wasn’t followed for donating funds. 

Administration had received a request to provide a donation of $1,000 towards a dinner to be provided to High River residents. It was put to a straw vote, the cheque was written, but voted approval to donate the funds was not held until the July 3 meeting. 

“I feel that the item on the agenda is moot being that the cheque has already been written and the money has already been spent. The problem arising here is that a councillor has bypassed our local town bylaws and shown blatant disregard for the Municipal Government Act,” said Councillor Earl Best. 

Best said the first thing done wrong was when the Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) was bypassed and the request went directly to the administration staff. 

He said the second problem was having the Deputy CAO get a cheque cut without a motion from council authorizing it or voting on it. Best feels it is disrespectful to council and administration.

He felt a special meeting should have been called, which would have taken 24 hours before it could take place, or an emergency meeting was called which would have taken no time to put together.

“It would have had this matter before council with a motion and a vote that would have alleviated this conundrum, it’s for that reason your worship that at this time I would ask for Councillor Sobol resign his position from council and that this motion be dismissed as moot as the cheque has already been written and the money spent,” said Best. 

Mayor Steve Grajczyk said when Brooks had been faced with the E-Coli outbreak council did that same thing, a cheque was issued and a motion was made after the fact, which he said Best did vote on. Grajczyk said he thinks they can trust the decision about the $1,000 when they all know council is going to vote for it anyway. 

“I don’t disagree, technically you’re very right and it is an issue, but it’s done let’s work together on it and move forward,” said Grajczyk. 

Sobol was disappointed to hear the comments, but did say he will not be tendering his resignation. He read from a prepared statement outlining his position on requesting the funds. Sobol also said he did consult with the CAO and Deputy CAO and the Mayor, and that he did ask for a special meeting. 

“As a councillor, my job is to represent the members of my community. I have little doubt that the vast majority of our citizens feel extremely fortunate to have dodged a bullet, so to speak. Having avoided the terrible floods in our town does not, however, relieve some of the need to help or to deal with, in some cases, tremendous feelings of sorrow and sympathy. It is with those thoughts in mind that I felt that action, rather than talk and rhetoric, was needed,” said Sobol. 

“The two projects that I requested Council approval were not focused on re-building damaged property. They were, instead, focused on helping our residents help others and to ensure our residents had the means to focus their support. 

“Feed High River is a project started by the people of this community. Their coordinator is Koreann Bland, a responsible, mature and respected leader in our community. I am closely involved with this project and can attest to everyone that the thousand dollars provided by our municipality will be well spent and will make a difference in peoples’ lives. The money was needed immediately so that the enormous task of preparation could get started.”

Sobol continued on to say he will make no apologies for his actions. 

“As far as your comments that you read Councillor Best I think the word disrespectful is too strong let alone using the word resignation for what Councillor Sobol tried to do to help people,” said Councillor Pat Fule.

“If it means we can get money to help people who need it after a flood like that, that hit High River I don’t disagree with what we did, and I don’t disagree with what Councillor Sobol brought forward. You can wrap around policies all you want, but that doesn’t help people who are suffering.”

“We needed it so badly that it has been sitting there doing nothing for all this time?” said Best. 

The money was not used until July 4 when the dinner was held, though initially the plan was to have the dinner on June 29. Because evacuated residents had not been allowed back to their homes by that date, the dinner was postponed. 

“I want the public to know too that we don’t just do this willy-nilly where we do these straw votes and decide on things like this, but this was a unique situation, we thought the money was going to be needed…last Saturday,” said Fule.  

“So we did agree to it using a straw pull we didn’t call an emergency meeting, we decided to do it the fastest way we could and if I had to do it again I’d do it again.”

Grajczyk said the cost of calling an emergency meeting would have been $500. 

“I just want to make it clear, I am not against what we’re doing here with this $1,000 and I am certainly not against donating it for this specific purpose it’s obviously needed,” sadi Best. 

“The devastation that’s happened around Southern Alberta is certainly exactly that, devastation what has happened in High River is nothing short of colossal damage, it’s hard to even explain. I am certainly not against this, what I am against is the procedure.”

A motion was made by Councillor John Rempel to approve the donation of $1,000 with the funds drawn from the Financial Stabilization Reserve.