A recent town hall meeting saw about 60 people come out to express their dissatisfaction with how they see business being done in the Town of St. Paul, regarding dismissal of staff, operations of council, and financial decision-making.
Questioning decisions like tax rates or the decision to spend $25,000 to bring a World Jr. A exhibition game to St. Paul is one thing, but asking personal questions about people’s employment history is another. At the meeting, organizer Paul Emile Boisvert said that if a person was fired because of some financial crime or sexual harassment, then the “town would have no hesitation as telling us why he was dismissed,” and if there was a felony committed, people would of course understand. However, releasing information about a person’s employment history is considered “an unreasonable violation” of his or her privacy under FOIP, so that is an unreasonable ask.
Another concern is that town council is micromanaging personnel, and not acting within its proper roles. It is indeed possible that some members of council have acted in ways or overstepped their role in the past to give people that impression. If so, it is a legitimate cause for people to be concerned.
But people can’t have it both ways. On one hand, people have criticized town council for overstepping the mark and micro-managing personnel. In the next breath, there comes a complaint that council shouldn’t give up responsibility of managing town senior positions to one manager, the CAO. So should council be involved in staffing decisions, or should they not be? The answer is clear, it should not; and since council only can direct one employee under the Municipal Government Act, it must be diligent and careful in choosing a manager who is up to the job, and trust that he/she is up to the task.
As for whether or not the town is in a serious mess, no doubt this has been a tumultuous year, but the answer is similarly not black or white. One only has to look at how far the town has come in the past 10 years and weigh not just the actions of the town staff and council, but through business and volunteer efforts as well - to beautify downtown and bring purpose back to old, abandoned buildings or to bring back energy to events like Family Day or Canada Day. In a time of economic downturn, the town is seeing new development, economic investment, and is pushing forward ambitious projects like a waste to energy feasibility project, and thanks to its more diversified base, weathering this economic storm better than some other Albertan communities.
While councils of past and present have surely made mistakes, it is far easier to point a finger or complain and criticize from the sidelines. Mayor and councilors, and politicians of all stripes, deserve credit for stepping up to a job that few want, with many running to better their community. But their opponents – in this case, the organizers of a petition - deserve credit too, for taking action instead of just being armchair critics. As they point out, the petition, at the very least, will hopefully engage people in a conversation and participate in the October municipal elections, either as a voter or a candidate - and surely we can all agree that more participation is better for a healthy democracy.
