It was almost a greatest hits package of the most contentious Tiny Township deputations from this term that was discussed at the most recent committee of the whole meeting, as council looked into revising their municipal procedure bylaw.
Council members spent an hour at the meeting hashing out their suggestions for procedure bylaw revisions as compared to the suggested red-line revisions offered up by clerk and legislative services director Sue Walton.
Meetings of regular council and the following committee of the whole, as well as special meetings, adhere to a policy of procedure which guides what-falls-where under a given agenda that council uses throughout the meetings.
As a direction to staff, the primary intent from council was to make the proposed procedure bylaw more friendly to people that wanted to share their voice to council through open or scheduled deputations, but who could be reiterating other deputants or who might be confused where their say would appear on the agendas.
The longest discussion revolved around the time allotment for open and scheduled (or closed) deputations, as the differentiation would be merged into one section to include both regular council and committee of the whole portions instead of separating them.
Council members decided to hold the deputations in the earlier regular council meeting but extend them to a 30-minute period, while agreeing to a limit of two 10-minute scheduled deputations.
In that discussion, Mayor Dave Evans referred to council’s discretion to allow more deputations as seen during short-term rental opposition last year; Coun. Steffen Walma pointed out the contentious issues which could overlap in a meeting as per the discussions against taxation of places of worship and open alcohol in township parks; and Coun. Kelly Helowka aimed for more flexibility in meetings while noting the strong outing against a residential gun range.
“We’re pretty unique in Tiny in the amount of deputations we get; which is great, we get a lot of feedback,” said Evans. “There’s neighbouring municipalities that don’t get any deputations as part of their agendas.
“I’m happy that we’re going through this process so we’re clarifying it and making sure everybody has that opportunity to speak. That’s one of the beauties of municipal-level government, because you can’t walk into the County of Simcoe and make a deputation. You certainly can’t walk into Queen’s Park or Parliament Hill and make a deputation. So we get the grass roots viewpoint here.”
That solved the ‘how long’ issue but when it came to ‘who’ could provide a deputation, council members found it difficult to come to a consensus.
Walma offered that the township look to the way beaches were handled, as the BEST (beach enjoyment strategy) cited ratepayers first, then neighbouring municipalities and finally the general public; he added that allowing deputations related to neighbourly issues would be relevant as: “candidly, right now we’re going through some growing pains with our neighbours with some items that affect both of us.”
Coun. Dave Brunelle sought clarification on what the difference was between a ratepayer, a taxpayer, and what constituted a non-taxpaying resident as per their ability to provide a deputation. Evans rekindled his disdain toward the views of some outsiders, alluding to recent deputations from Manitoba and British Columbia for a local matter.
“This is an opportunity for people in Tiny and issues in Tiny to be discussed,” said Evans. “If people are using this format to publicize their views on a national scale, or there’s not too many deputation opportunities to get the press to hear your pitch – if that has nothing to do with Tiny then I don’t see any reason why we should be including it as part of our proceedings.
“We can go round and round in terms of taxpayer, ratepayer, resident, seasonal, non-seasonal, whatever – the definitions are innumerable. Maybe the focus should be more on giving leeway to the chair,” Evans stated. The agreed decision was to side with him and remove limitations on who could provide an open deputation at the discretion of the meeting chair.
A proposed petition policy was also included in the discussion, with the committee of the whole agreeing to approve and incorporate its contents into the procedure bylaw when ratified. No discussion was given to it in the formal meeting, although an earlier deputation by Tiny resident Karen Zulynik requested council explore alternative petitions by residents for acceptance if they met township requirements.
With Walton receiving direction from staff on the offered red-line revisions, it was approved that the procedure bylaw and petition policy be brought to the next regular meeting of council for further discussion or ratification.
Information on how to sign up for deputations, provide correspondence, or submit petitions to the municipality can be found on the council and committees page of the Tiny Township website.
The proposed new procedure bylaw and proposed petition policy can be viewed on the agenda page on the Township of Tiny website.
Archives of council meetings are available to view on the township’s YouTube channel.
