After a deluge of correspondence was sent by residents regarding the issue, City of Powell River councillors will consider reconsideration of its decision regarding bottling of water.
At city council meeting on June 11, prior to adoption of the agenda, councillor Rob Southcott said he wanted to introduce a motion for reconsideration of a council decision from the June 4 meeting, which reads: that staff be directed to prepare an amendment bylaw to City of Powell River Zoning Bylaw 2100, 2006 that permits water bottling, except for water from groundwater sources, with a complementary amendment bylaw to City of Powell River Business Licence Bylaw 2226, 2010 to require that a water bottling business demonstrate that the source water is not groundwater.
Councillor Maggie Hathaway said she did not have enough information to vote on the reconsideration. She said she has not had enough time to read all of the correspondence sent in.
“People are concerned and I would like to defer it to another meeting,” said Hathaway.
Southcott said he saw the justification to reconsider the June 4 motion to be the emergence of new information regarding the water bottling issue in the considerable correspondence received from residents in the last few days, opposing the decision.
Councillor CaroleAnn Leishman said due to the fact that council had received literally hundreds of emails and correspondence, council should put the reconsideration motion on the June 11 meeting agenda to at least acknowledge receipt of the massive amount of correspondence. She said if council did not consider reconsideration, then the direction to staff stands, and staff carries on working on a bylaw that will allow bottling of surface water, to which there had been hundreds of responses against.
“I’m for the reconsideration motion even if it ends up getting postponed at the time that it is on the agenda,” said Leishman.
Councillor Cindy Elliott said it was incumbent on council to consider views of the community when giving direction to staff on what bylaws the city is trying to create.
“I don’t have a problem with reconsidering the decision and having it put on the agenda,” said Elliott.
Councillor George Doubt said he received an email from the corporate officer indicating the city had received a couple of hundred letters from people. He said he’d read 50 or 60 letters and a few contained new information.
“I’m certainly not ready to say we should reconsider without having time to actually read those letters,” said Doubt. “I’d like to give respect to the people that took the time to write a letter about what they think about what council should do. There’s probably 150 letters that I haven’t read and I don’t want to disrespect people by making a decision that ignores that. I don’t expect to be able to vote on what we do with that correspondence until next week.”
Councillor Jim Palm said he was thinking along the same lines as Doubt. Palm said this was a very divisive issue.
“We’re here to hear from all residents,” said Palm. “We’re here to have a lengthy debate on the issue. I hear the residents and I think we need further discussion but the way it was whipped up on social media, it’s not the way good governance should be conducted. Good governance happens in the chamber with the seven of us that have been duly elected to have a healthy debate and then make a decision.”
Palm said he has seen a lot of misinformation in a number of the emails that have come through. He said he was greatly distressed that governance was being conducted in this manner.
“I’ve sat here for 12 years now and I’ve never seen issues being dealt with in this manner, in this community, on Facebook, to this degree,” said Palm. “It saddens me, to be perfectly frank.”
Mayor Dave Formosa said it was his understanding that if the matter was to be postponed until the June 18 council meeting, correspondence would be part of the next agenda. He said it would give everybody on council time to read what the residents have to say and council could go from there.
Doubt moved that council postpone Southcott’s reconsideration motion until the next council meeting. He said he was making the motion so he and other council members could read the information provided by a number of people on what they would like to communicate. He said the motion to postpone would allow the motion for reconsideration to come up the following week and everyone would have the chance to read the 238 submissions, and whatever comes in after the council meeting.
Council carried the motion to postpone consideration of the reconsideration motion until the June 18 meeting, with Elliott opposed.
