A discussion about removing Irricana’s vision statement from the Municipal Development Plan (MDP), as per section three of Bylaw 7:2009, evolved into a discussion among council members concerning public input and the ethics of public hearing scheduling during the Nov. 16 council meeting.
Geoff Stephenson, Irricana chief administrative officer, said the current and previous councils have discussed changes to the five- and 30-year vision statements included in the MDP, which in past years would have been contrary to the essence of the bylaw.
Dillon Consulting, which helped draft the bylaw in its current form, informed the municipality the vision statement should not have been encoded within the bylaw, but instead kept separate, Stephenson said.
“(The vision statement) is not so much a planning item, but a strategic element,” he said.
A change to the bylaw would require a public hearing session be held, which could be before a council meeting, after a council meeting, in a separate meeting all together, or – as Stephenson suggested – during the meeting as the item comes up.
“To separate public hearings to one part of meetings and have votes on another seems somewhat pointless,” he said.
Deputy Mayor Dennis Tracz disagreed, arguing putting the hearing in the middle of a council meeting gives the appearance it is being buried and not giving the public fair and open comment.
He also feared the council meeting would then be taken up entirely by public input from the hearing if held on the same day and stated it would be better to hold the hearing on a separate night entirely.
“Nothing else will get done,” he said.
Mayor Valerie Squires suggested a 6:30 p.m. hearing on Dec. 14 as a way to set a dedicated amount of time prior to the council meeting at 7 p.m.
Councillor Laura Thiessen argued that a 7 p.m. time would probably leave more than enough time.
“I hate to be a ‘Debbie Downer,’ but I don’t think we’re going to have a lot of input,” Thiessen said.
The Town has been soliciting input for all bylaw items on a grand scale since July by mail and electronically. Bylaw 7:2009 was also reviewed at Ideafest, placed in two newspaper advertisements and included on water bills.
According to Stephenson, community response from the bylaw survey has been low with most responses from participants along the lines of ‘I don’t care’ or ‘this has no impact on me.’
“Those are the majority of the comments,” Stephenson said.
Tracz believed what had been missing with public engagement is an obvious starting point.
The Town has asked residents to give input about the bylaws, he said, but hasn’t given any inkling about what it is that council is changing.
“We haven’t done that,” Tracz said. “We’ve blindly asked for comments.”
He added when residents have seen changes side-by-side in the past it has sparked public engagement and input.
Council passed a motion by Tracz that a “proposed changes” version of Bylaw 7:2009 be made available online to the public separate of the agenda package with any changes made visible in red.
“If (that) doesn’t (work) then I think we’ve exhausted all avenues,” Tracz said.
All but Tracz voted in favour of amending the bylaw and a public hearing is scheduled for 7 p.m. on Dec. 14.
