{"id":7454,"date":"2014-07-17T01:14:14","date_gmt":"2014-07-17T05:14:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=7454"},"modified":"2014-07-30T16:14:59","modified_gmt":"2014-07-30T20:14:59","slug":"inside-aurora-the-decision","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/inside-aurora-the-decision\/","title":{"rendered":"INSIDE AURORA: The Decision"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Scott Johnston<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m afraid we have a problem with the nominees for Councillor, Mr. Mayor.\u201d
\nWith the recent departure of Councillor Ballard, there was a vacancy on Council. With several months until the next election, the Municipal Act dictated that the Town couldn\u2019t leave the seat empty that long. It would have to be filled.
\nAfter much discussion, it was decided that the position would be open to any Aurora resident over the age of 18, who wished to apply.
\nCandidates would be given a few minutes to present their arguments for consideration. The evening of July 29 had been set aside to hear them, and for Council to render a decision.
\nIt was a bother to have to go through all this for the sake of an extra attendee at the few remaining Council meetings of the term, but the Mayor was sure that wasn\u2019t the issue the staffer was bringing to his attention.
\n\u201cWhat sort of problem?\u201d he sighed.
\n\u201cThere are too many nominees.\u201d
\n\u201cWell, that\u2019s a good thing. It\u2019ll give us a variety of skillsets to consider, and\u2026wait a minute,\u201d he paused, looking the staffer in the eye. \u201cJust how many?\u201d
\nThe man shuffled slightly and cleared his throat.
\n\u201c3,487.\u201d
\n\u201cWhat! That many?!\u201d
\nThe staffer counted off on his fingers.
\n\u201cMaybe it\u2019s because there were no restricting qualifications, or it\u2019s summer when people have time on their hands, or maybe because it would look good on a resume, or a Fall campaign sign\u2026In any case,\u201d he concluded, stating the obvious, \u201ca lot of people decided to apply.\u201d
\n\u201cBut three thousand plus\u2026\u201d
\n\u201cI agree there\u2019s no way we could hear them all in one night. In fact, my team crunched the numbers, and if Council listened to nominations for four hours a night, five days a week, we should be able to go through them all by\u2026\u201d he consulted his notes, \u201cNovember 20\u201d.
\n\u201cNovember 20!?\u201d sputtered the Mayor.
\n\u201cThat\u2019s assuming three minutes of speaking time each, plus a minute and a half for questions, and 30 seconds to line up the next person, plus a few nights off for holidays and regular Council and Committee meetings, and some time for Council to properly deliberate on the nominees before making a decision.\u201d
\n\u201cBut late November \u2026. the election is October 27, and the Act says we have to have someone in place by the end of August.\u201d
\n\u201cWell, we could speed up the process by going 5 hours a night, and throwing in a few week-ends. If we really pushed it, maybe we could be done in late October.\u201d
\n\u201cWell, that obviously won\u2019t work, either,\u201d said the Mayor. \u201cWhat other options do we have?\u201d
\n\u201cWe could allocate less time per person.\u201d
\n\u201cWould that save us enough time to do them within say, a week?\u201d
\n\u201cWell, not really.\u201d
\nThe Mayor\u2019s office was quiet for a minute as the men thought.
\n\u201cWe could go with the original idea of just choosing the 9th place finisher from the last election.\u201d
\n\u201cNo,\u201d said the Mayor, rubbing his temples. \u201cWe\u2019ve already committed to this process, and all these people have applied. We can\u2019t go back.\u201d
\nThe staffer snapped his fingers. \u201cWhy not just dispense with the meeting and questions entirely, and evaluate them based on what they included in their applications?\u201d
\n\u201cPerfect,\u201d beamed the Mayor. \u201cYour team could prepare a report and recommendations for Council.\u201d
\n\u201cI\u2019m sorry, but that won\u2019t work, Mr. Mayor. The Act specifically says that Council has to make a decision based on its own evaluation.\u201d
\n\u201cYou mean\u2026\u201d
\n\u201cYes, you and the other Council members will have to go through the applications yourselves,\u201d he confirmed, dropping a file box on the Mayor\u2019s desk.
\nThe Mayor pulled out a random bunch of papers. \u201cWell, I suppose one box isn\u2019t so\u2026\u201d
\n\u201cI\u2019ll have the other 63 boxes brought right up,\u201d interjected the staffer, stepping out of the room.
\nThe Mayor sighed again. It was going to be a long two weeks.<\/p>\n

Feel free to e-mail Scott at: machellscorners@gmail.com<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Scott Johnston \u201cI\u2019m afraid we have a problem with the nominees for Councillor, Mr. Mayor.\u201d With the recent departure of Councillor Ballard, there was a vacancy on Council. With several months until the next election, the Municipal Act dictated that the Town couldn\u2019t leave the seat empty that long. It would have to be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_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},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-1We","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-20 18:30:36","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\/7454","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=7454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7454\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}