Medicine Hat CAO’s proposed committee review passed on to council

While there has been no formal council motion requesting such a review, it has been referred to in various discussions, according to Mitchell’s report.

There are six distinct recommendations Mitchell proposed at committee.

All boards, committee and commissions of council should have a clear mandate and terms of reference, Mitchell writes in her proposal.

READ: Mitchell says ‘incivility’ harms business attraction

Councillors should also attend governance training, she adds.

She proposes in her report that members should provide a brief written report at the next regular meeting of council, a procedure common at other municipalities.

Mitchell writes the mayor and councillors should no longer sit on the Administrative Committee because it largely deals with operational administration, not governance.

Having members of council on the committee “is not standard practice and should be corrected”, Mitchell says.

Council should consider integrating the Community Vibrancy Advisory Board, Municipal Planning Commission and the Municipal Names Committee, Mitchell writes.

She also says council should advise administration through a strategic planning session their direction for the external boards and should include a discussion on how these external boards fit into their strategic vision for the community and what the financial requirements or impacts may be.

READ: Mitchell claimed to have authority to revamp city hall she may not have had

Her final recommendation is to amend the administrative organizational bylaw — also known casually as the AO bylaw — to be “less prescriptive as described within this report.”

Mayor Linnsie Clark accused Mitchell of misusing the AO bylaw at a public council meeting on Aug. 21, 2023, saying the city manager restructured city hall without implicit permission from council.

That exchange led to a code of conduct complaint against Clark, a third-party investigation and report, council imposing sanctions on the mayor and an eventual judicial review that reversed most of the sanctions but left council’s finding intact.

Should the administrative and legislative review committee approve the recommendations, the proposal would move on for full council consideration at a public meeting.

Committee meetings can be viewed in-person at city hall or by joining a Teams video call.

What the experts say

Mitchell wants to remove council representation from the Administrative Committee, saying it should be staff-only to bring it up to date with “standard practice”.

Paul Salvatore, CEO of Municipal Experts Inc., agrees there’s no need for elected officials to be there.

Bringing them in could cause problems, Salvatore explained.

“Inviting councillors to attend administrative meetings introduces the potential for operational interference by elected officials and is not acceptable practice, in my opinion,” Salvatore said.

George Cuff, a renown municipal government consultant who spoke to council earlier this year, explained that Medicine Hat has historically blended political and administrative roles.

For example, Cuff said, there would be staff that served as chairs of committees when those seats should only be filled by elected officials with employees serving as advisors.

So, to separate council committees from the administrative or staff ones is the right way to go, Cuff told CHAT News.

“Is it best practice to have a combined political-administrative committee? The answer is no, that’s not best practice because that defies the sole separation of council and the chief administrative officer,” Cuff said.

“The question becomes then one of timing, and the timing of this becomes the part that’s probably more curious and therefore more suspect.”

Cuff disagreed with a step-by-step approach, saying instead a broader review — such as the one a municipal inspection could bring — is a better approach.

“All it does is raise, as this one has, the red flag in terms of are you trying to overreact to a judge’s decision? Are you trying to now pick this apart one by one? Why would you not take a look at this in a more holistic, omnibus fashion?”

Political consultant Jim Groom had a different take, saying it was a drastic step.

He said it’s been tradition going back at least to Mayor Norm Boucher that there’s been an elected ex-officio member of the administration committee.

Clugston and later, Linnsie Clark, were all members of the committee.

“By virtue of their position of mayor they have been on the admin committee on the past,” Groom wrote in a message to CHAT News.

“This change would further usurp power of council over admin,” he added.

“Power grab.”

by Eli J. Ridder

Medicine Hat CAO’s proposed committee review passed on to council

What the experts say

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