WHEREAS the Provincial Government's recent effort to reform local
government elections did not deal with the source of election campaign funds;
AND WHEREAS the appearance of a conflict of interest is created when
developers and unions that make significant contributions to election
campaigns of candidates for Council also have matters that come before
Council and that whether or not these conflicts are permitted in law, they harm
the reputation of Council and impair the legitimacy of its decisions;
BE IT RESOLVED THAT while this resolution does not have the force of law,
the City of North Vancouver strongly urges all candidates for election to
Council to abstain from accepting donations from developers with projects or
potential projects before Council or from labour unions that represent
employees of the City; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED THAT a copy of this resolution be forwarded to
the other Metro Vancouver municipalities, UBCM and the Provincial Ministry of
Community, Sport and Cultural Development.
This motion is not intended to discourage modest personal contributions from
citizens who are employees of property development companies or individual
members of unions. It is intended to discourage organizations with a direct
pecuniary interest in matters before Council from being significant contributors
to the funding of elections to City Council.
It is unclear on how this will be implemented, probably just a copy of the motion will go out with the nomination packages.
Many VOICES reps spoke for the motion during public input I put the below comment on the VOICES website this morning;
George Pringle
November 5, 2013 at 10:18am
Perhaps in spirit of the motion, which passed, Voices should not endorse candidates who have received donations in the two elections by the city hall union or developers? In the last election Amanda Nichol was almost entirely funded by her union CUPE 389 and VOICES hero Rod Clark was funded by same union two elections ago.
Amanda joined her "brothers and sisters" in receiving an endorsement and a stack of cash, Darrel Mussatto, Craig Keating, Linda Buchanan, Juliana Buitenhuis, Cheryl Leia and Amanda were on their list, it was mailed out to NDP and union member and served as the undeclared and unregistered NDP slate. Featured on a few websites as well.
The disclosure statement by Rod Clark for his 2005 Mayor's run is long gone from the City website and I bet a look through the donations would show those in the development community.
The Provincial government will be putting a Bill in the House in the spring, the Local Elections Campaign Financing Act but is waiting until the election of 2017 to put in laws restricting donations and imposing expense limits. Federal and Provincial law put in a per voter system of $1.09 per voter. The list had almost 32,000 voters last time so only the Mayor's re-election campaign would be impacted by this. If he does decide to run. A run against Andrew Saxton is possible.
Since disclosure on donors was made 120 days after the election, most voters did not know Amanda was a union candidate along with Mussatto's slate so during the next vote it is their only opportunity for this fact to influence their vote. Making this even stranger, there is a provision in the Local Government Act requiring employee of a municipality to take a leave of absence from the time they submit nomination papers to the end of the election. Amanda did not. City staff ruled that since she worked for the Rec Commission this didn't apply to her even though she was a member of CUPE 389 as that was a division of the City like the Library. The effect of this ruling went further since employees have to resign if elected but since the City did not consider her an employee we could have an 389 union rep on the Council who would be voting on personnel matters and the union contract. A good number of City employees could use this loophole to influence Council.
In the case of Rod Clark, it was probably a case of political games and I heard that the Mayor has a word with CUPE and the BC Federation of Labour that Rod was not really union friendly and should not receive union funding. He did not get a donation in 2011.
So VOICES replied to me on their website;
northvancityvoices
November 5, 2013 at 12:20 pm
We're more interested in what candidates do going forward from now on, not so much what donation they accepted for past elections (when accepting such donations wasn't as much a controversial issue). If we decline to support any candidate who has ever accepted a donation from either a union or a developer, our list of endorsed candidates will be very short and probably very inexperienced.
Or, to put it another way, a candidate's history of funding is just one of several criteria we will use to decide which ones to endorse. This is, of course, assuming that Voices will endorse any candidate.
Ah, wait, didn't you start off by asking 3 Councillors to recuse themselves based on their past donations? Is the Mayor under different rules than your candidates?
Whether the VOICES people knew of Amanda's union endorsement and union funding is unsure but as I said before there are 3 groups in municipal elections in the City. A NDP group under Mussatto who is pro-development, a NDP group under VOICES that is anti-development and a Liberal group of 3 (Bell, Heywood and Fearnley). Is there any wonder why the City can't reduce it's spending?
Since during the next election, Elections BC will have a supervisory role, rulings made by local staff in the City will be able to be challenged with Elections BC. If this is the thin edge of the wedge of CUPE taking over our Council through the back door, it may be necessary to apply for a Judical Review on this matter to reverse the City's ruling.
George Pringle
November 5, 2013 at 10:18am
Perhaps in spirit of the motion, which passed, Voices should not endorse candidates who have received donations in the two elections by the city hall union or developers? In the last election Amanda Nichol was almost entirely funded by her union CUPE 389 and VOICES hero Rod Clark was funded by same union two elections ago.
Amanda joined her "brothers and sisters" in receiving an endorsement and a stack of cash, Darrel Mussatto, Craig Keating, Linda Buchanan, Juliana Buitenhuis, Cheryl Leia and Amanda were on their list, it was mailed out to NDP and union member and served as the undeclared and unregistered NDP slate. Featured on a few websites as well.
The disclosure statement by Rod Clark for his 2005 Mayor's run is long gone from the City website and I bet a look through the donations would show those in the development community.
The Provincial government will be putting a Bill in the House in the spring, the Local Elections Campaign Financing Act but is waiting until the election of 2017 to put in laws restricting donations and imposing expense limits. Federal and Provincial law put in a per voter system of $1.09 per voter. The list had almost 32,000 voters last time so only the Mayor's re-election campaign would be impacted by this. If he does decide to run. A run against Andrew Saxton is possible.
Since disclosure on donors was made 120 days after the election, most voters did not know Amanda was a union candidate along with Mussatto's slate so during the next vote it is their only opportunity for this fact to influence their vote. Making this even stranger, there is a provision in the Local Government Act requiring employee of a municipality to take a leave of absence from the time they submit nomination papers to the end of the election. Amanda did not. City staff ruled that since she worked for the Rec Commission this didn't apply to her even though she was a member of CUPE 389 as that was a division of the City like the Library. The effect of this ruling went further since employees have to resign if elected but since the City did not consider her an employee we could have an 389 union rep on the Council who would be voting on personnel matters and the union contract. A good number of City employees could use this loophole to influence Council.
In the case of Rod Clark, it was probably a case of political games and I heard that the Mayor has a word with CUPE and the BC Federation of Labour that Rod was not really union friendly and should not receive union funding. He did not get a donation in 2011.
So VOICES replied to me on their website;
northvancityvoices
November 5, 2013 at 12:20 pm
We're more interested in what candidates do going forward from now on, not so much what donation they accepted for past elections (when accepting such donations wasn't as much a controversial issue). If we decline to support any candidate who has ever accepted a donation from either a union or a developer, our list of endorsed candidates will be very short and probably very inexperienced.
Or, to put it another way, a candidate's history of funding is just one of several criteria we will use to decide which ones to endorse. This is, of course, assuming that Voices will endorse any candidate.
Ah, wait, didn't you start off by asking 3 Councillors to recuse themselves based on their past donations? Is the Mayor under different rules than your candidates?
Whether the VOICES people knew of Amanda's union endorsement and union funding is unsure but as I said before there are 3 groups in municipal elections in the City. A NDP group under Mussatto who is pro-development, a NDP group under VOICES that is anti-development and a Liberal group of 3 (Bell, Heywood and Fearnley). Is there any wonder why the City can't reduce it's spending?
Since during the next election, Elections BC will have a supervisory role, rulings made by local staff in the City will be able to be challenged with Elections BC. If this is the thin edge of the wedge of CUPE taking over our Council through the back door, it may be necessary to apply for a Judical Review on this matter to reverse the City's ruling.
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