After going to weekly council meetings due to the COVID-19 pandemic, City of Powell River Council will be returning to its old schedule.
At the June 24 council meeting, councillor Jim Palm said it was timely to bring back discussion around meetings as council heads into its summer schedule.
“The COVID-19 situation seems to be under control going into the summer,” said Palm. “I appreciated our past setup, where we had healthy discussions with committee of the whole on Tuesdays and with council meetings, where we passed recommendations once we’ve had a good length of time to think about what came forward at committee of the whole meetings.”
Palm said he’d like to bring that back as council heads into July, along with its summer schedule, where councillors give themselves and staff a break during the heat of the summer.
“What I would propose is that since next week is broken up and we have Canada Day happening, that we hold our next two meetings, committee of the whole and council, the following week, July 7 and 9,” said Palm. “Then, in two weeks’ time after that, we would hold our next committee of the whole on July 21 followed by council on July 23, and then we pick that up in August.”
Mayor Dave Formosa said basically, what Palm was saying, is to go back to the pre-COVID-19 schedule.
“We changed things because of COVID-19 and things were moving rapidly, so we needed to make decisions quickly,” said Formosa.
He added that going back to the old schedule would mean bringing back regular finance committee meetings in addition to committee of the whole and council meetings.
“I would support that; I feel we have a handle on things;” said Formosa. “It was the chief administrative officer and the corporate officer who sat down with me and suggested we do what we have done. I feel it’s time to go back.”
Councillor CaroleAnn Leishman said for clarity, the old schedule was typically the first and third weeks of the month. She said if the resumed schedule begins on July 7, council would not be going back to its old schedule, it would be going to a totally new schedule.
Formosa agreed that the schedule in place had been the first and third week of the month for committee of the whole and council meetings.
Chief administrative officer Russell Brewer said if council went back to its old schedule, the next council meeting would be July 2, followed by committee of the whole on July 14 and council on July 16.
Councillor Cindy Elliott said if council returned to its regular schedule on July 2, committee of the whole would take place on June 30. Corporate officer Chris Jackson said that date would be past the publication date of the meeting so it could not be held.
Formosa said July 2 would be the next meeting date for council and everything would flow from there like the old days.
Council carried a motion that starting July 2, it return to the originally planned schedule for council, committee of the whole and finance committee meetings.
