{"id":26842,"date":"2020-06-25T09:06:02","date_gmt":"2020-06-25T13:06:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=26842"},"modified":"2020-07-02T19:32:36","modified_gmt":"2020-07-02T23:32:36","slug":"council-moves-forward-on-six-ward-system","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/council-moves-forward-on-six-ward-system\/","title":{"rendered":"Council moves forward on Six Ward system"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

A six-ward electoral system will be in place by the time Aurora residents go to the municipal polls in 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Tuesday night, Council ratified its decision to implement wards on a vote of 4 – 3. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Aurora\u2019s present at-large electoral system, whereby eligible voters select one mayor and up to six councillors to represent the Town as a whole, will be set aside in 2022. In its place, a new model will be adopted where the mayor will represent the whole community while each Councillor will be elected by certain neighbourhoods to represent their interests at the table.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A six-ward model was moved forward to Council at the on a 4 \u2013 3 vote at the June 16 General Committee meeting, with Councillors Wendy Gaertner, John Gallo and Rachel Gilliland expressing misgivings that such a move doesn\u2019t yet have a buy-in from the community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI am not confident I have the pulse of the community one way or another,\u201d said Councillor Gallo at the Committee level, citing feedback he has received from the community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His preference, he said, would be to put the\nrecommendations stemming from the Town\u2019s Electoral System Review (ESR) on the\nbackburner to explore further options on community engagement, including the\npossibility of another community-wide referendum on the model. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI just want a better gauge of the public and I don\u2019t\nhave that,\u201d he continued. \u201cI feel like we\u2019re kind of skipping a step. I don\u2019t\nthink I am abdicating my responsibilities \u2013 I was elected to make decisions on\nbehalf of everyone \u2013 but this is one of those big ones that public engagement\nwould be vital and I simply don\u2019t have that.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite assurances from consultants tasked with carrying\nout the ESR that the level of engagement within Aurora had been far higher than\nother municipalities that have gone down this road, similar concerns were\noffered by Councillor Gaertner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

She suggested Council make a decision on its preferred\nmodel for a ward system and then put the final decision to the public in the\nform of a referendum, which Town Clerk Michael de Rond said would take\napproximately a year to get off the ground and could be held in a style similar\nto a byelection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Previously a proponent of Aurora adopting a ward system,\nCouncillor Gilliland said she was hesitating on a final decision as she\u2019s not\nsure of the overall feeling amongst the public.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIf I were to pick something, I do like the six-ward\nsystem that is being presented to us; I just don\u2019t know if that is 100 per cent\nwhat the public is wanting to do going forward because that wasn\u2019t really the\nquestion that was presented to the public,\u201d she said. \u201cI would still like to\ndigest what we have been presented and what the public thinks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are elected officials making decisions [for the\npublic], that we feel is best for the community, so we can serve our\nconstituents in the most effective manner,\u201d she continued, adding that her\ncolleagues had made some good points from the \u201cpro\u201d camp. \u201cThere are a lot of\ngreat points on either side of the table here [but] I was taken aback by the\ngo-ahead today when we got this report. I thought we would have a little more\ntime to absorb what was going on and [get] some of the public comments that\nwere around and whether or not we needed to further discuss some of things that\nwere addressed [in the ESR].\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

First to give their own thumbs-up to giving the six-ward\nsystem the go-ahead was Councillor Michael Thompson who made a motion that the\nproposed model be adopted for the next election.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In putting his motion forward, Councillor Thompson said\nlocal consultation had been \u201cexpansive\u201d but conceded there isn\u2019t one\n\u201cdefinitive\u201d system out there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere are benefits on both sides and I think our\ncommunity would also, probably similar to previous times, be relatively split\non the value of either one or the other\u2026 however, when I was elected in 2010, I\ncertainly believed in the at-large system and over the past 10 years I have had\nmany opportunities to either talk to other colleagues in other municipalities\nabout their system of governance, [learn] more about wards, learn how\nrepresentation works there\u2026and I felt comfortable with [their] responses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cFor myself, I truly believe that given the fact that\nwe\u2019re 60,000+ (in population), I think we\u2019re either the largest or\nsecond-largest municipality by population to still have at-large, I think as\nchanging demographics continue to unfold in Aurora and we continue to grow, the\nbest way to represent all Aurorans going forward is in a ward system \u2013 then you\nwill truly have a more diverse and representational Council in the years to\ncome.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Councillor Sandra Humfryes offered a similar viewpoint,\nstating a ward system would bring a number of benefits to Council and community\nalike.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI have heard both sides from a residential perspective,\u201d\nshe shared. \u201cSome residents think it is great because you have an accountable\nindividual. Others want to pick the best Councillor they want to work with.\nSome are afraid they might not have a Councillor who would support their area\nas well as another\u2026but what I am finding is\u2026there are six of us, the Mayor, we\nget emails and all of us are basically doing the same thing. Maybe that is a\ngood thing, maybe it is not\u2026but every area has a little bit of a different\nintricacy than others. You become more of a specialist in your area while\nyou\u2019re still considering the overall facilities for our residents to enjoy. I\nthink there is a real opportunity here to take full ownership of issues and\nreally run with them and give them the attention it deserves.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDemographics have changed so much since 2010 and I\nreally believe this is the right way to go. I think when a resident has their\nCouncillor and they\u2019re accountable to them, they have a stronger connection or\nunderstanding of who is going to help them through an issue or a concern and I\nthink that is a pretty big deal. I really do.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Councillor Harold Kim said he too was in favour of\nadopting the ward model in the interests of finding efficiencies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI think the answer [from the public] is almost always\npredictable because, in general, people believe if it ain\u2019t broke, don\u2019t fix\nit,\u201d he said. \u201cHaving a ward system contributes to that theme of [finding\nefficiencies]. I think with having a ward system, you do have that specialist\nwho understands their area. For me, it is really the efficiency aspect. We know\nthere is an accountable person.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Added Mayor Mrakas: \u201cWe always want to engage the public. I think from a public perspective, we have engaged them. We have done everything that is required and we have actually gone above and beyond that, I believe. The public has seen the map, the map hasn\u2019t changed since the last time. For me, I think this provides an efficient, more accountable government to the residents of our community, allows our community to have the best possible representation sitting at this table. The most diverse representation, I believe, will occur in moving to this system and I think it is time.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n\r\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A six-ward electoral system will be in place by the time Aurora residents go to the municipal polls in 2022. On Tuesday night, Council ratified its decision to implement wards on a vote of 4 – 3. Aurora\u2019s present at-large electoral system, whereby eligible voters select one mayor and up to six councillors to represent […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":26793,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26842","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/2020-06-18-02.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-6YW","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-22 16:20:28","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26842","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26842"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26842\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}