Perhaps the one person in town who watches City council the closest, moved from observer to participant last week. Larry Golden who is quite interested in openness and transparency issues at council, frequently attends council meetings and makes notes on the business conducted on our behalf. He addressed the November 27th session of city council to ask questions about potential conflict of interests at council and how the city plans to address the issue.
Golden recounted an appearance of the airport committee at a recent council meeting and that got him to wondering if any of those members might have made a contribution to local candidates in the last election. A situation that he feels might be crossing a line and one which council should guard against in the form of a conflict with their duties.
His presentation and concerns on the issue were included in a front page story in yesterdays Daily News.
COUNCIL CALLED ON TO DRAFT ‘CONFLICT POLICY’
By James Vassallo
The Daily News
Monday, December 4, 2006
Pages one and five
A local resident wants councilors to be up front anytime someone who contributed to their election campaigns approaches the city.
“I would like to see council come up with something in the next two to three to four months on an explicit statement for guidelines about conflict of interest,” said Larry Golden at council’s Nov. 27 meeting.
The policy would be in council’s own best interest and would be as simple as the councilor stating that they received a donation from the person and how much, he said.
“Last time I was here, the airport committee left (and) I suspect three or four of those members gave ‘x’ hundreds of dollars to at least one candidates here,” said Golden. “You would hope that when you came and met those people you would say ‘councillors I got the donation from this person, or these three people. I don’t think $200 or $300, that’s not going to buy my conscience or any vote or anything like that, but I just wanted you to know.
“I expect there are very serious consequences for going across that line and going across that line might have been broached in the last year or two.”
When the mayor and members of council are elected, they are counseled on the regulations surrounding conflict of interest. Most of these, however, relate to receiving a material benefit or having a material interest in a matter.
“In other words, a rezoning that might affect a property I own (or) a matter than might affect a company in which my spouse or family income is impacted,” said Mayor Herb Pond. “Every member of council and the mayor is (also) required to declare any gifts in a year that exceed $200, sum total.
“(But) I don’t believe there’s a direct conflict related to campaign donations, those are declared, they’re available publicly and it’s an open book.”
Pond said his observation has been that the conduct of council has been very high and that the city’s representatives often err on the side of caution by removing themselves from discussions.
However, the idea’s merit did resonate with at least one member of council.
“It’s sort of an interesting idea,” said Coun. Joy Thorkelson..
“Mr. Golden is asking us to write our own policy about declaring if someone in the room has made a campaign donation to you so the rest of the councilors, or if it’s an open meeting, the public know whether you have any allegiances to that person or organization.
“It would be interesting to know if any council in British Columbia has a policy like that.”
City staff were directed to investigate if such a policy existed anywhere else in the province.
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