The town’s council-staff relations policy is getting an update, but some councillors worry the 13-page document is needlessly long and may duplicate with other town and provincial policies.
During their Sept. 11 committee of the whole meeting, councillors got a look at an update to the council-staff relations policy, which was first implemented in Collingwood in 2019 and has not been updated since that time.
“This is a very important policy, especially in Collingwood because we had the judicial inquiry,” said chief administrative officer Sonya Skinner. “Some of the things that triggered the need for an inquiry did involve the relationship between staff and council.”
The original policy was first adopted following new provincial requirements requiring all municipalities to have a protocol in place by March 1, 2019. Having a formal council-staff relations protocol was also one of the recommendations out of the judicial inquiry.
In the Collingwood Judicial Inquiry report, Associate Chief Justice Frank Marrocco included a recommendation to request the province implement changes in the Municipal Act to council-staff relations policies.
“The province of Ontario should amend the Municipal Act to require that the staff-council relations policy in each municipality contain specific provisions,” Marrocco said in his report, noting that policies should include that council members must respect the role of staff to provide advice based on objectivity and political neutrality and without undue influence from an individual council member or group of council members.
“No member of council shall use, or attempt to use, his or her power or authority to pressure, intimidate, threaten, coerce, or command a staff member in order to interfere with the staff member’s duties,” he noted.
The updated Collingwood policy outlines how councillors and town staff should interact with each other, defines the roles and responsibilities for both, and outlines processes to be followed to maintain a respectful working relationship. The policy is applied wherever and whenever interactions occur between councillors and staff, as well as during and outside regular business hours, and via all channels including in-person, in electronic meetings, via written correspondence, email, messaging tools and texting.
Newly added are definitions for individual roles such as the CAO and mayor and an outline of rules for inquiries by councillors of staff.
During discussions, Coun. Kathy Jeffery shared concern about the size of the policy. She said a lot of was included in this policy was duplication with other policies such as the procedural bylaw, the council code of conduct and the Municipal Act.
“I just can’t fathom why it takes about 5,000 words to describe a relationship that I think is pretty easily managed through a lot of other procedural policies,” she said. “When I think of what we sign and commit to at the inauguration, it’s one page and it’s done. I’m a little afraid this is... building walls instead of (adding) cohesiveness.”
“I’m not saying we don’t need a policy. I’m thinking we need something a little more higher-level, principled and shortened,” said Jeffery.
Deputy Mayor Tim Fryer and Coun. Deb Doherty said they shared similar concerns.
Following the events of the judicial inquiry, Coun. Christopher Baines said he felt the clearer definitions and rules were necessary.
“I really don’t see strengthening it by revising or deleting any of the points. It might be a little overkill, but under the circumstances of what Collingwood’s been through, I’d rather have overkill than under-kill,” he said.
Mayor Yvonne Hamlin said that in reviewing the policies of other municipalities, many are much shorter than what Collingwood staff were proposing. She also noted that when it came specifically to the mayor position, she felt the policy didn’t recognize the role of mayor as a representative of the municipality.
She said she felt that in practice, this sometimes conflicted with the part of the policy that says only council as a whole has the authority to direct staff to carry out specific tasks or functions through a vote at a council or committee-of-the-whole meeting.
“I have found myself going off to a meeting where I wish I had a briefing or some background information, but council didn’t vote on that,” said Hamlin. “Sometimes I need information where it doesn’t always need to go to all of council because they’re not attending that meeting.”
Hamlin clarified that she does work with staff on such conflicts and they had been helpful, but she said the more rules that are in place, the more constricted situations can be.
Fryer made further comments about how difficult coming up with such a policy can be.
“In my personal opinion, we don’t need it, the council sitting at this table right now,” he said, noting that there may be future councils that would benefit.
The committee voted unanimously in favour of deferring a decision on the policy to allow time for councillors to send input to staff. The updated policy would be brought back to council no later than October. Coun. Brandon Houston was absent from the meeting.
