Bowman delivers on promise to restrict secret meetings

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This article was published 14/12/2016 (3539 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Winnipeg’s mayor has made good on a promise to restrict council’s ability to hold secret meetings.

Brian Bowman moved a motion at council Wednesday to limit in-camera meetings of council to performance reviews of the city auditor only, fulfilling the commitment he made a week ago when the controversial proposal first surfaced.

“It’s a needed amendment and allows us to proceed,” he told council.

City council has never had the ability to move its formal meetings behind closed doors, away from public scrutiny. While committees meet in camera for specific, identified purposes, council cannot.

The provision for closed-door council meetings is included in an administrative report outlining procedures for the evaluations of city hall’s four statutory officers — chief administrative officer, chief financial officer, city clerk and city auditor — who report directly to council. The report recommends the city’s meeting bylaw be amended to allow council to meet in-camera when discussing the city auditor’s performance, but the original proposed bylaw amendments would allow council to hold confidential meetings for any other purpose as well.

The change would apply the same rules to formal meetings of council that now govern committee meetings. The big difference, however, is that closed-door items at committee need to be eventually approved by council, where the issue becomes part of the public agenda. If the same closed-door rules apply to council, there is no obligation for council to make any disclosure to the public.

In the past, the administration has conducted private, closed-door briefing sessions when confidential information needs to be shared with all members of council before a matter is debated publicly and voted on at council. But no formal votes can be taken during those sessions.

Bowman and his executive policy committee unanimously endorsed the proposal at its meeting Dec. 7. Bowman originally defended the controversial practice as necessary to ensure all members of council have access to confidential information shared previously only at committee meetings. However, four hours later, his office issued a statement in which Bowman conceded the proposal was too broad.

An attempt by Coun. Jason Schreyer (Elmwood-East Kildonan) to have the proposal referred back to executive policy committee for clarification was defeated.

aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca