At the November public meeting of Pontiac mayors, council announced a decision that could turn out to be a significant step towards greater transparency from the MRC table.
Mayors passed a new schedule that will see the monthly council meetings moved from Wednesday to Thursday evenings. This shift, pitched by Otter Lake mayor Jennifer Quaile at last month’s plenary, seems to be moving forward because it allows staff more time to prep documents, including draft resolutions, for mayors, who need them 72 hours ahead of the meeting. As it stands, staff are often faced with a Sunday evening scramble to get the documents out on time. Bumping the meetings by a day may give the mayors more time to review the resolutions before voting on them.
But Quaile has said she hopes the change will also make it possible for the draft resolutions to be released to the public ahead of time, so that those interested in MRC decisions have time to read up on what will be discussed.
This has been a request from the public for some time now. Part of the reason given for why these draft resolutions, not yet voted upon, are not released in advance is a fear that they will be taken as final, that their early publication will risk spreading misinformation.
Standard meeting protocol used to be that the resolution was presented, the MRC staff member responsible for the file would offer a brief explanation of its contents, and then mayors would vote. It all happened incredibly quickly.
In April, the meeting management bylaw was changed so that mayors read out each resolution before it was voted on, without any explanation from the experts leading said policy’s development. The change, which didn’t last long, seemed to be an attempt to address a frustration with lack of access to resolutions ahead of time. There you go, public. Now you know what’s in the resolutions before they’re passed. But even a trained ear could barely keep up with content being rattled off.
Now, members of the public may finally be able to study resolutions to their hearts’ content.
It’s a simple adjustment that would answer calls for greater transparency and accountability around MRC decision making. As simple as Warden Jane Toller’s decision to move the meetings from the middle of the day to the evening, to make it possible for members of the public to attend. So simple, these changes, they beg the question of what else could be done without much added burden on MRC staff or mayors to further crack open the black box many feel obscures county policy development.
Calls for greater transparency and accountability were frequent during the recent municipal election cycle, especially from the candidates making a bid to replace incumbents. So frequent that the words themselves were hollowed out, used simply as sign posts for change, for disrupting the status quo. A discussion of what tools are available for bringing this about was often lacking.
The conversation around what transparency looks like often gets reduced to two possible options – either meetings are open to the public, or they are closed. Take, for example, the common suggestion to open up the MRC’s plenary meetings, where mayors meet for a full day to discuss policy matters before voting on them at the public meeting. Those advocating to keep the meetings closed are often accused of being secretive. Those pushing to have them opened are framed as being unduly disruptive, and not understanding the complexity of MRC processes. Both characterizations are unfair.
The polarization of this conversation overshadows the smaller, incremental changes that may allow those interested to hear what the people they elected actually think about important county matters before it’s time to vote, while not turning already lengthy plenary meetings into marathon public consultations.
What if the meetings were simply broadcast online, as the public meeting is already, with sensitive discussions (HR or legal) taken off camera, so those who want to dedicate hours of their day to tuning in can do so, without opening an opportunity for those watching to ask questions.
The City of Gatineau seems to livestream its budget meetings so anybody can tune in to learn about how spending decisions are being made. Does the peanut gallery have a mic in this context? Absolutely not. But the long, likely dull meetings are open to any and all who wish to see behind the curtain.
Or how about committee meetings? Of course no mayor can be an expert on every subject. If plenary meetings need to be protected as a safe space for mayors to explore ideas without fear of being judged or interrupted, perhaps only the meetings between those dedicated to certain files could be open, or their contents somehow shared readily without the need for an access to information request.
Last month’s news of the shifted public meetings may be a step in the right direction when it comes to increased transparency, if resolutions are indeed released in advance. Coming at the first council meeting of the newly elected mayors, it is also a reminder of how simple some of these changes can be. Let’s keep up this momentum.
