City of Powell River councillors will be reviewing its draft code of conduct at a future committee of the whole meeting.
At a March 5 meeting, chief administrative officer Lisa Bhopalsingh said on February 8, a consultant, in an open meeting, went through a code of conduct discussion, following up on a motion from city council. She said qathet Regional District’s code of conduct was reviewed as a basis for the conversation that council had with the facilitator.
Bhopalsingh said the committee was being provided a draft code of conduct to consider to peruse and to bring forward at a future council meeting.
“You may wish to look at it more thoroughly, take some time, and we can also bring back the facilitator if there is something you’d like to discuss,” said Bhopalsingh. “This follows qathet Regional District’s code of conduct with some changes that are specific to councils versus regional district boards. It also references the wording of our policies that are different than qathet Regional District’s.”
City councillor George Doubt said he was concerned about the recommendation before council because it stated referring the code of conduct to a future council meeting for adoption. He said that could be some time in the distant future or it could be soon. His opinion was that it should come back to council sooner for further discussion. He said a legal opinion was required for the draft that is not the same as the regional district’s.
“I’d like to see it come back sooner than later, within the next few months,” said Doubt. “It’s important to have a code of conduct.”
Councillor Trina Isakson asked if legal council had reviewed the code of conduct so far, and was that step required.
Bhopalsingh said the regional district had a legal review and city staff felt, given the changes, there is limited risk.
“However, we are more than willing to submit it for legal review,” said Bhopalsingh.
She said staff did not give councillors a date for the process because staff wanted to provide council the discretion of picking how much time it might like to consider the draft.
Doubt said after councillors had a chance to look at it in detail, they could then set aside a significant amount of time to talk about amendments and to do the wordsmithing.
“It’s important we do that because we have to get it right,” said Doubt. “A small mistake in a definition will lead to a big problem in the future. It’s worth spending the time.
“I thought the goal today was to say here’s a draft, the public can see the draft, we will be getting together again at a future date and spending much more time talking about how to change each and every part if we want.”
Doubt said he’d like to see the draft come back in one or two months.
Mayor Ron Woznow said he wanted to move that the draft code of conduct be referred to a council meeting before May 5 for adoption.
Bhopalsingh said she thought the timeline was fine, but for council to have an extensive discussion, having a committee of the whole meeting between now and May 5 would be wise. She suggested having a meeting mentioned in the motion.
Woznow then revised the motion to indicate the matter be brought back to a committee of the whole meeting by April 5, with the intent to bring it to a council meeting before May 5.
Councillor Earl Almeida said a legal review might be best after councillors discuss any changes they’d like to make. He said the May 5 deadline might be time sensitive to allow for a legal review.
“I’d rather make an amendment to remove the second half of the motion, focus on April 5 and get it to committee of the whole, and from that point on, we can better estimate when we can get it on the council agenda,” added Almeida.
The amendment motion carried unanimously. The committee then unanimously carried a motion to bring the draft code of conduct back to a committee of the whole meeting by April 5.
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