Mayor defends reform proposal
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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 12/06/2014 (4377 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
Mayor Sam Katz has defended his plan to reform how appointments are made to the powerful executive policy committee.
Katz said his reform package will put to rest the idea EPC consists of a single-minded cabinet of councillors who dictate decisions to the rest of council.
“I personally don’t believe this (reform) will make any difference” in decision-making at city hall, Katz said. “The mayor has to build consensus.”
Katz’s reform proposes to have the mayor appoint three members of EPC and all of council appoint the remaining three members.
The plan would require the province to amend the City of Winnipeg Charter. The proposal goes to council for consideration at the end of the month.
City council currently operates under the “strong mayor” model, adopted in a major governance reform pushed through by mayor Susan Thompson in the late 1990s.
Under the structure, the mayor appoints members to EPC, which consists of the chairpersons of the five standing committees — finance, public works, downtown development, property and development, protection and community services — and a sixth councillor. The mayor also appoints one of the EPC members as deputy mayor.
Before Thompson’s reform, councillors elected the chairpersons of the standing committees and a deputy mayor, who often emerged as a rival to the elected mayor.
Katz has been accused of orchestrating council decisions by controlling the seven votes from EPC along with the support of the votes of the speaker and deputy speaker, who supposedly were elected with the backing of the mayor and his EPC members.
Councillors appointed to EPC get a salary top-up, cited as one way the mayor can entice and cajole support.
Katz has always denied he pulls the strings on council votes, and there have been many times when EPC members broke ranks with him on major issues; but, just as often, members of EPC also seem to vote as a block.
aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca