Former Councilor and now Langley Township Freewoman Muriel Arnason made a late delegation at the June 18th Township council meeting about Councillor Mel Kositsky's June 11, 2007 motion to dumb down democracy by eliminating the recording of movers and seconders in council minutes - the official record of council meetings. Kositsky's motion was seconded by Cllr. Howie Vickberg. It passed with Cllrs. Kositsky, Vickberg, Ward and Mayor Alberts in favour and Cllrs. Bateman & Long & Fox opposed. Cllrs Richter and Ferguson were absent due to their attendance at the 45th International Liveable Cities Conference in Portland, Oregon. (Cllr. Richter talks about this conference in a previous posting here).
Arnason spoke passionately to the fact that she was aghast at this attempt to muffle the voices of Councillors after 92 years of recording movers & seconders in township council records. To hear her 4.5 minute presentation in its entirety play it here.
Logical that some of the Old Boys Club members would try to pass this kind of anti-democratic garbage while Richter was not in attendance! They almost got away with it except that the motion was re-tabled on June 18 and rescinded with both Richter & Ferguson adding their voices to not change this 92 year long democratic and accountable procedural tradition.
During the discussion on the rescinding motion, Cllr. Kositsky made a very derogatory reference to Richter's & Ferguson's absence from the previous week's vote accusing them of "skipping" meetings. (Funny how that reference was not made at tonight's meeting when Cllr. Bateman was absent from a very political vote on a 12 story lit up steeple). Hmm how convenient... no votes lost here!
The Mayor cut off Richter's microphone after she just started to try and take exception to and chide both Kositsky for inappropriate language for saying they "choose to skip" the council meeting and Mayor Alberts for not calling Kositsky to task for saying so. She then objected to Alberts behavior towards her and her mike was finally turned back on again. To listen to the actual content of 5.18 minute debate in its entirety play it here.
So in summary, why on earth would Kositsky (mover) Vickberg (seconder) Ward & Alberts want to remove the accountability measure of recording who made and seconded a motion after 92 years? Just because GVRD board meetings don't record movers and seconders, is that good enough reason for the Township to follow suit? As Richter points out, Council members and the public never know what work the Township's GVRD reps, Mayor Alberts and Cllr Kositsky, initiated at their $200+ paid GVRD meetings. But maybe the key is that we also don't know what they did not do! In this Editor's opinion, this all essentially leads to a dumbing down of democracy. To see my point, rent my latest favorite movie, "Idiocracy" (or click below Utube clip - note some crude humour in the video clip) .
Idiocracy suggests the age of morons is upon us! We suggest an interesting parallel to politicians with on-going dumbing down actions like eliminating records in which politician did something!
So please remember at election time next year that Councillors Kositsky, Vickberg, Ward and Mayor Alberts all unsuccessfully voted to eliminate the democratic tradition and accountability measure of recording the movers and seconders on Council motions, not once, but twice! All hail to Idiocracy! P.S. Three times in the audio clips Mayor Alberts called Muriel Arnason Mrs. Arnason and not Freewoman Arnason even after being reminded by Richter of the honour bestowed on her by Mayor Alberts and Township Council at Douglas Day last fall. What the heck is going on here?...
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