File photo (Image credit: CFJC Today).

By Mel Rothenburger

ARMCHAIR MAYOR

ROTHENBURGER: Mayor gets shot down again, but more politely than usual

Jul 26, 2023 | 5:00 AM

‘SURPRISE, SURPRISE.” With those words from Mayor Reid Hamer-Jackson, yet another one of his motions succumbed to The Team by a vote of 8-1 at yesterday’s City council meeting.

The mayor wanted to set up a town hall forum for September on a variety of topics, rather than waiting for a newly ‘invented’ committee to ponder it over the coming months.

There’s a need, he said, to let citizens talk to council about seniors’ issues, crime, civic operations and improving communications by City departments.

Councillors, however, are determined to plan town hall engagement via a committee that was established at the last council meeting just a few minutes before Hamer-Jackson presented his notice of motion, which he says the councillors knew was coming.

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So, the die was cast for yesterday’s debate on that motion but, overall, it was at least more civil than many have been in the past.

Coun. Margot Middleton, for example, suggested the council could have it both ways — approve the mayor’s plan, and let the committee do its work making additional arrangements.

And she was absolutely right. Community engagement isn’t an all-or-nothing proposition.

Coun. Kelly Hall couldn’t support it but he was courteous. He noted that the KamTalk exercise organized in 2002 by the mayor of the day yielded “outstanding” results.

He suggested the mayor read the report on KamTalk. Clearly, Coun. Hall is a man of brilliant insights and stellar observational powers.

Even the mayor’s prime antagonists Stephen Karpuk, Dale Bass and Katie Neustaeter — the latter having just filed her statement of defence to the mayor’s defamation suit against her — were polite.

Only Coun. Bill Sarai couldn’t find it in himself to discard his usual confrontational attitude, blaming the mayor for delays in getting a town hall off the ground.

And so, in the end, council (overall, more politely than usual) shot the mayor down, again.

They came so close on this one, but no cigar.

I’m Mel Rothenburger, the Armchair Mayor.

Mel Rothenburger is a regular contributor to CFJC Today, publishes the ArmchairMayor.ca opinion website, and is a recipient of the Jack Webster Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award. He has served as mayor of Kamloops, school board chair and TNRD director, and is a retired daily newspaper editor. He can be reached at mrothenburger@armchairmayor.ca.

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Editor’s Note: This opinion piece reflects the views of its author, and does not necessarily represent the views of CFJC Today or Pattison Media.