Iqaluit council defers decision on vacant seat to new year
Councillor suggests policy for public callout for potential candidates
A policy for how to fill a vacancy on Iqaluit city council will continue to be worked on, after a discussion on the proposed policy at Tuesday night’s council meeting. The updated policy will be presented at the next policy meeting Jan. 9. (File photo)
Iqaluit city council will wait until the new year to appoint its final councillor after rejecting a policy suggested by staff that essentially parrots the Nunavut Elections Act.
A seat on the eight-member council opened up when Jack Anawak resigned Nov. 6 after he was charged with impaired driving. He was elected Oct. 23 and the incident occurred days after he was sworn into office.
On Nov. 28, council deferred its selection of a new councillor and asked city staff instead to develop a policy for appointing members to fill a vacancy on council.
Staff presented that policy during Tuesday’s council meeting.
It lists two options for filling a vacancy according to the Nunavut Elections Act — either appoint the runner-up candidate from the last election or hold a public callout for applicants.
The act allows byelections to be held to fill a vacant mayor’s seat, but not for regular seats on council.
The policy proposed by staff also directs council to add the vacancy to the agenda of the next council meeting.
Coun. Romeyn Stevenson said the policy is “just a shell” of what he would like to see.
“I think the policy should outline exactly what council will do as opposed to just outlining the options given in the Nunavut Elections Act,” Stevenson said.
He suggested a number of policies to govern a public callout for applicants, including that they be given approximately three weeks to apply to fill a seat.
He also said council could identify the date when applicants would be invited to make five-minute presentations on why they should be selected.
Stevenson did not mention including the option to appoint the runner-up candidate in his proposed revisions to the policy. Nunatsiaq News asked Stevenson if the omission was deliberate.
“Yes, the proposed policy does not include ever using the method of selecting from those former candidates who were not selected for a council position during a past election,” he said in an email.
In an interview after the meeting, Stevenson expressed confidence that having the public apply to fill a vacancy is the fairest option.
“We’ve done the last four appointments this way and it’s worked out well,” he said.
The runner-up in the Oct. 23 election was Lewis Falkiner MacKay, with 525 votes compared to Anawak’s 635. MacKay has said he’d be happy to be appointed to council.
Coun. Kyle Sheppard seconded Stevenson’s proposals at the meeting. No other councillors gave feedback to administration.
Steve England, Iqaluit’s chief administrative officer, said the city will take these points and present a new version of the proposed policy at the next council meeting Jan. 9.
Speaking with Nunatsiaq News after the meeting, Stevenson said waiting months to fill the seat will not cause too much stress for the new council.
“Sadly, I’ve spent a fair amount of time on this council with vacant seats [and] you make do,” he said.
“Getting the process right is more important than the immediate [filling] of a seat.”
This is getting to a new level of ridiculous. Council is basically saying “we don’t want to make decisions and be held responsible”, while at the same time telling the municipal staff to do a policy the way they want it done, when the Nunavut Elections Act already outlines your options.
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Stevenson, you want a public callout for applicants including three weeks to apply to fill a seat and a date when applicants would be invited to make five-minute presentations on why they should be selected? Make the motion then, you’re allowed to do that.
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However, I fail to see how “the fairest option” is for the current councilors to decide for themselves who they want to work with. The fairest option to me seems like who the residents would like to choose, and with the vacancy happening so abruptly after the election, the fairest option to me is to appoint the runner up. And guess what? You’re allowed to do that, too.
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This Council is freshly elected and is already showing what they’re [in]capable of.
A disgraceful display of cowardice.
They are planning to take four months to do something that should have taken 1-3 weeks.
October 23rd — Eight councilors were elected from 15 candidates.
November 6th — Eighth place resigned.
November 14th — Ninth place could have been appointed (at the 1st meeting)
November 21st — A different person could have been appointed following a public call out.
They are waiting until nobody is paying attention so they can vote their friends.
Can they even make up a policy that excludes the options of the Nunavut Election Act?
This sure seems specifically like a delay tactic to not bring Lewis in.
They are allowed to vote the runner up. And realistically they should. As the election was only weeks before the vacancy. they just don’t want that runner up.
Embarrassing. and outright anti democratic.
Going against the
And what an embarrassment Stevenson has proven to be this term one month in. last meeting it was “I’m not ready for this conversation.” Even though it was a massive talking point going into the meeting. How unprepared can you be.
Delay delay delay, because you don’t like the person who rightfully should be there. Throw another Fit.
Sounds like a Cowardly Child.
Grow up Romeyn
Whose toady will have the support of the largest number of councilors? Tune in next time to find out!
Why even run for an elected leadership position if you end up being too afraid to lead or make a decision yourselves?
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“I think the policy should outline exactly what council will do as opposed to just outlining the options given in the Nunavut Elections Act,” Stevenson said.
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Why pass the issue onto the unelected city staff to develop a policy and complain that you were “just” listed the options in the Electoral Act, when you have been elected to make exactly these kinds of decisions, as outlined by thing like the Electoral Act?
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If the shoes are too big for you all to fill, you should resign your own positions because clearly you do not have what it takes to hold such an office!
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I know nothing at all about these councilors or Lewis or anyone involved in the repeated discussions and articles on here, but the more you see these Councilors complain that no one is telling them what to do, the more you start to realize that you shouldn’t hold these kinds of positions if you are so unwilling to make the decisions that come along with it… That, and you start to get the impression that the councilors understand their options but do not want to choose what they want because they know it will make people upset – which once again proves such people probably don’t have the right stuff to fill an elected leadership position!
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It’s baffling to see how something so simple is being drawn out and needlessly complicated – you have two options and you repeatedly reject the option of appointing the runner-up… so clearly you do not want that person on the council. You talk about what needs to be put in place for a public call to be the option followed so clearly the intention is to select and appoint the councilor rather than choose the runner up.
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It’s very clear you don’t want to select the runner-up and its very clear you want a selection process to be dictated to you all so that you don’t look bad by ignoring choosing the runner-up immediately after an election was held and you can gauge how the public felt about the runner-up.
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I know nothing at all about Lewis, but the more I see how much the existing council is coming up with excuses to appoint him to council, the more I think he should be on it.
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Anyone who makes such an incapable group of people concerned is likely a good addition to council, because the existing bunch seem ineffectual at governing as well as hiding their own self-serving personal intentions! No one is being fooled by drawing out this process any further, you are just making city council look bad!
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Keep the comedy going!
I fail to see how councillors picking someone is more fair than picking the runner up in a fair and democratic election? Maybe it is more fair for the councillors so they can pick someone they like. It is not democratic. I get that they have the two options. What we see is that they are picking the undemocratic option, and that is not inspiring confidence in their ability to act fairly and ethically. I guess we could lobby the legislative assembly to amend municipal legislation to address this.
The community asked for transparency. City council heard: “Please ignore the two-week-old public election results. Please instead handpick someone yourselves using secret ballots”
“If the office of a councilor becomes vacant for any reason before the next general election, the municipal council shall fill the vacancy AS SOON AS REASONABLY PRACTICAL by appointing a person who is eligible to be a candidate for that office”
This council seems to care as little about following the law as they do about democracy.
Katimajiit Stevenson is either misquoted or being deliberately misleading “We’ve done the last four appointments this way and it’s worked out well,”. Those four COVID-era appointments he references were made after ninth place had already been appointed, and 10th place and 11th place both declined.
In recent memory council has only faced the decision on if they should appoint the FIRST runner up a small handful of times
2011 council voted unanimously to appoint the first runner up.
2013 council voted to hold a byelection.
2014 council voted unanimously to appoint the first runner up.
2017 council voted to hold a byelection.
2020 council voted unanimously to appoint the first runner up.
SOURCES:
nunatsiaq.com/stories/article/298867_iqaluit_appoints_a_new_city_councillor
nunatsiaq.com/stories/article/65674noah_papatsie_wins_vacant_council_seat_in_close_by-election
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/north/stephen-mansell-appointed-to-iqaluit-city-council-1.2569459
nunatsiaq.com/stories/article/65674noah_papatsie_kyle_sheppard_win_vacant_iqaluit_council_seats
nunatsiaq.com/stories/article/iqaluits-next-city-councillor-appointed
Yes, but after the 2019 municipal election, the next 2 seats that became available were replaced by appointment, as is being planned now, and with the same appearance of bias against democracy and individuals next on the list. https://nunatsiaq.com/stories/article/iqaluit-looking-for-new-city-councillors/
Pathetic, the old boys want to get one of their old boy buddies to put their name forward so that the old boys can pic them and then be able to control council.
Someone should complain to CGS and see if they have the go–ds to do anything about it.
Stevenson’s judgement to exclude the previous election result as an option here is beyond outrageous, and an affront to democracy on so many levels that it’s hard to know where to begin
As a previous comment pointed out, the elections law itself provides that the results of the prior election is an option to fill the vacancy. If you exclude that as an option, you are not only thumbing your nose to democracy but your thumbing your nose to the law as well.
Basically, what Stevenson is saying is that an election is a poor way to get the most qualified person, and a far better way is to call out for applications and let one person or a small group of people go through them and decide. That approach is an insult to democracy and, when you insult democracy, you insult every voter who bothers to participate in the process.
But, you know what, maybe Stevenson is on to something: The GN should get rid of the current Mayor and all the councillors and put a call out for applicants for all of the positions. A selection committee of GN bureaucrats can carefully review the applications for Mayor and council, have oral presentations and make the selections. According to Stevenson, that kind of process is far superior to an election result and will get you better people ( Sarcasm here). And, guess what, I think the law would allow the GN to dismiss the current group, Stevenson included, and do just that.
Sarcasm aside, this is outrageous and, if their judgement is that bad on this, it makes me concerned about any decisions they are making.
Yes, it’s time for the GN to dismiss the Iqaluit council and appoint a board to support the Mayor in running Iqaluit.
As far as I know, it is incorrect that the next two runners up from the 2019 election declined when 2 more seats became available. They declined to put their names up for an appointment process because the message given by the council by choosing that undemocratic process over choosing the next runners up was they did not want the next runners up. Why would you put your name up for an undemocratic process in that circumstance? The good old boys did not want them, they wanted friends to play with, not people who might ask questions, as is happening again.
Mamianaq, I was wrong. Neither Haley Anawak (10th) or Beth Scott (11th) were offered the seat. This track record really undermines council’s claim to be choosing diversity over democracy.
HISTORY OF IQALUIT RUNNER UP APPOINTMENTS
2011: Man = Appointed
2013: Youth = Rejected (By-election)
2014: Man = Appointed
2017: Woman = Rejected (By-election)
2020: Man = Appointed
2021: Youth = Rejected (instead Hand-Picked an old man & older woman)
I think its a great idea to wait.
This way we can see if Councilor Kyle Sheppard delivers on his campaign promises to reinstate the water and garbage subsidies for this coming year 2024.
If he doesn’t deliver as promised he can resign as well, then we can install two new Councilors at the same time.
Get ready for more broken promises 🙁
“Stevenson expressed confidence that having the public apply to fill a vacancy is the fairest option.”
THEY ALREADY DID YOU ABSOLUTE FRIGGING DONKEY.
Why did any of us bother voting? I’m thankful I won’t be here for the next municipal election. Waste of all our time.
Just put Lewis in and move on for god sakes, we voted and he was next in line.
If Anawak pulled out of the race at the last minute, Lewis Falkiner MacKay would already have been on the Council. But because his incident didn’t occur until a week after the vote, he has to go through another process? This makes absolutely no sense. There is precedence for this type of appointment, and I have never heard of anyone complaining about this method when it was previously used. Lewis is competent and wants to do this job – that’s more than I can say for a lot of folks in town. Just let the voting results stand please so we can have a full Council for once.
It is pure cowardice, and that is all.
It’s just great that council is going to go through this totally not undemocratic or unnecessary process rather than just getting on with the next most voted-for candidate and moving on to actual city business.
If a five minute presentation before council and an application form are just as good as a month-long campaign where candidates have to make an effort to talk to residents and actually have platforms, maybe council should just do away with elections all together. Think of the savings!
What is the problem here? There was an election and there was a runner up in that election. The people of Iqaluit have already spoken, so what is the big delay? Empowering Council into “appointing” a new councilour is profoundly undemocratic and makes a mockery of the entire electoral process. So what exactly is the issue?
Slow sarcastic clap for democracy, Stevenson stop you BS and do the right thing rather than trying to get one of your buddies in there to create a dictatorship.
I would urge all voters to remember this debacle during the next general council election. An absolute farce and an embarrassment as a voting member of this community. We need to use our votes and make a change here, out with the old, lets try some new.
I swear, the Iqaluit Council must be made up of a bunch of Liberals/NDP. Absolutely no common sense.
What a diversion the poorly led and managed municipal government situation has become. Almost distracts from the ongoing water crisis, Canada Post debacle, and the other countless embarrassments occurring