The Blue Mountains Councillor Gail Ardiel would like to reverse her vote on the municipality’s draft tree bylaw.
At council’s committee of the whole meeting on Sept. 25, Ardiel signalled her intention to bring forward a resolution to reconsider her vote in favour of the tree bylaw at the Sept. 18 meeting.
Aridel called her vote “a grave error” and said she has consistently been opposed to the proposed tree bylaw for the community.
At the Sept. 18 meeting, council voted 4-3 in favour of bringing the final version of the controversial tree bylaw to its meeting on Oct. 10 meeting for official approval. Ardiel joined Mayor Andrea Matrosovs and Councillors Shawn McKinlay and June Porter in voting to bring the bylaw forward. The vote came towards the end of a lengthy council session that had seen most of the afternoon consumed by the debate about the tree bylaw.
“I should have voted not in favour as I have not been in support of this bylaw since this council was sworn in,” said Ardiel.
The draft tree bylaw has been a controversial issue in The Blue Mountains for the past few years. Ardiel announced her intentions as a notice of motion. Clerk Corrina Giles said she would ponder whether Ardiel’s motion would be to reconsider her individual vote on the tree bylaw or if it would have to be a reconsideration of council’s vote in its entirety.
