Wyatt shows true colours

Interesting how Russ Wyatt has become so publicly outspoken about Katz & Company over the last couple of days, or rather since his removal from EPC.

Like any politician, Wyatt remained relatively silent while a member of EPC, but became vocal about his true feelings only after getting turfed from EPC. Gotta admire someone with principles that high. He should go to work for a political party that shares his values. Wait a minute........

He was relatively outspoken when on the EPC. At least compared with the rest of the EPC, but that's not saying much. Why do we have a cabinet type setup in civic politics anyway? I think we should scrap the EPC completely.

Freeman wrote: He should go to work for a political party that shares his values. Wait a minute........

Does that imply that he's already a member of a party? (I don't really care, I'm just curious)

umcrouc0 wrote:Why do we have a cabinet type setup in civic politics anyway? I think we should scrap the EPC completely.

Agreed. EPC is useless. How it even came into being is a joke, and should never have been allowed. We don't need anymore councilor-cronies at City hall, we have enough already...even after clearing out "some" of the dead wood last election!

Go figure!

Wyatt is now apparently Ashdowns campaign chair or some such thing.

yeah that will be great for the city.. frick are we ever screwed come next election.

JT Estoban wrote:

Freeman wrote: He should go to work for a political party that shares his values. Wait a minute........

Does that imply that he's already a member of a party? (I don't really care, I'm just curious)

Don't know what political party he belongs to, but he is going to run Steve Ashton's campaign to be leader of the NDP.

So why is EPC useless? Should there not be some form of Executive Committee? Most organizations have something along that line, cabinet, executive committee.

Should be less.... like 5 or 3

especially because around here, we seem to re-elect the incumbent more often than not. No matter what their record is, or how badly of a job they may be doing!

So it's probably pretty safe to say that scammn' Sammy will be back if he wants to.

depends how much of the NDP engine gets behind Wyatt.

Freeman wrote:So why is EPC useless? Should there not be some form of Executive Committee? Most organizations have something along that line, cabinet, executive committee.

That's why we elect counselors....and a Mayor. City council is exactly that, a council, or a comity if you will. They are elected by the residents of their respective districts.

If your going to have some kind of EPC, you could make that argument. However, the mayor being able to select the members of this comity, makes no sense, unless the intended goal of the EPC is to rubber stamp the mayors adjenda.

Instead, the EPC should be a rotation of councelors...set an acceptable rotation scedule, so that every councelor gets equal access to make decsions on the EPC...maybe I'm not articulating my idea very well...hopefully it makes sense.

Begin flaming......

But EPC is made up of the chairs of the various standing committees, who indeed are appointed by the Mayor. So how would the Committe chairs be appointed?

Another point is that EPC really doesn't have much authority in its own right. Their decisions/recommendations must still be ratified by Council as a whole.

The Mayor really only has authority in 2 cases, first, to appoint the chairs of the standing committees and second, to impose an overnight parking ban.

I guess another take on it is that the electorate votes for a Mayor as a stand alone individual, unlike the parliamentary process, where its the leader of the majority party is the grand pooh bah, Prime Minister, Premier, etc.
So when the electorate votes, they know full well what authority they are giving the mayor. Yes?

Makes sense to me JT and I agree the role of city council needs to be overhauled, has Wyatt not always been a NDP guy.

Should City COuncil be elected along party lines, in the same manner as the provincial and federal governments?

To some degree it is now , but the mayor should have more power and not have to get a pack of ass kissers to get what he wants, done .

Hell no!!

Decisions will then ONLY be made for political reason....presently that doesn't always occur.

Yes but it is taking way to long to get somethings off the ground . And someone has to be in charge . He would still need the majority to carry his Idea

@JTE - I like that idea....how else does one gain experience and confidence unless given a chance to bring their vision to the table?

Yes it has merit

I guess a downside with that is that an individual could push a personal or local agenda while chairing a certain standing committee. Would all the streets in the North End suddenly get fixed if Harry was to chair the public works committee?

Or, if Harry chaired Public Works, would the infrastructure fail at a greater rate cause he would be no where to be found?

Freeman wrote:I guess a downside with that is that an individual could push a personal or local agenda while chairing a certain standing committee. Would all the streets in the North End suddenly get fixed if Harry was to chair the public works committee?

So the current system doesn't allow anyone to push a personal agenda?

My biggest hangup with the EPC (other than the contributing factor, which is the fact that the mayor stocks the EPC)....is, I don't like the fact that EPC is the gatekeeper to a full council vote.

So if the mayor, and his hand picked yes men could conceivably reject anything that the mayor doesn't like/approve of and it would never get to council for a full vote.

That's my understanding of our local civic politics....I could be missing a procedural detail or two....

And no, I don't like the party system for civic politics. My overall intent here it to make sure that decisions are made on their merits, and based on what the public wants/needs.

Like JTF said above, currently there is less political decsion making in civic politics, and it should stay that way.

And I'm not ashamed to say that I havent worked out how or who would appoint the chairs to the standing committies....in fact until you pointed that out Freeman, I glossed over that part. There's got to be a different way...a better way than kissing the mayors ass in order to get a yes-men EPC appointment out of a mayor-appointed committie charimanship.

umcrouc0 wrote:

Freeman wrote:I guess a downside with that is that an individual could push a personal or local agenda while chairing a certain standing committee. Would all the streets in the North End suddenly get fixed if Harry was to chair the public works committee?

So the current system doesn't allow anyone to push a personal agenda?

DId I say that? But at least under the current system, the Mayor has the authority to give someone the boot rather than just waiting for his turn to expire.

JT Estoban wrote:So if the mayor, and his hand picked yes men could conceivably reject anything that the mayor doesn't like/approve of and it would never get to council for a full vote.

I'm under the impression that a Councillor can bring issues to the floor of Council, sort of a "private members" bill as it were. Does anyone have a quick answer to that question?