Duane Hicks
A suggestion by Mayor Roy Avis that councillors not receive remuneration for attending a training session in Emo this Friday was a matter for some debate at Monday night’s council meeting.
The mayor felt that because council was acclaimed and already has experience, the town would pay the $10 per person registration fee if any member of council wanted to attend, but not a per diem.
He added that five councillors went to Thunder Bay for training last January, and it cost the town $6,500 when all was said and done.
To go to the training session again would not benefit councillors as they’ve already done it, Mayor Avis reasoned.
“To my knowledge, there’s been no changes to the Municipal Act, no changes to any of the information that was being presented at that meeting [last January],” he noted.
The resolution up for vote Monday was to approve the registration and associated costs with attending the training session.
But Mayor Avis noted that if the resolution was approved as is, and all six councillors chose to go and collected per diems, it would cost the town $900.
“I just don’t think it’s really worth my while to support that at this time,” the mayor stressed.
But Coun. Rick Wiedenhoeft noted changing the resolution to cover registration costs, but not per diems, goes against the town’s travel policy.
“We have an approval by council to attend something and then we’re going to start qualifying the validity of the conference as to whether or not a person collects per diems?” he wondered.
“I think I may have a problem with that.”
Coun. Wiedenhoeft, who did not plan to attend the councillor training in Emo because he’s already taken it, pointed out that, according to town policy, members of council can get a per diem when attending any event that’s approved by council through resolution.
Coun. John Albanese said he plans to attend Friday’s session in Emo, but is doing so to support the new council there, not to get paid.
“I wasn’t even thinking about getting an honorarium,” he remarked. “I was going to go there to have a good relationship with Emo Township.”
“Here we are asking the district for support for the airport, for the policing, and everything else. . . .
“I wasn’t going to go there to get paid, I was going to go to support Emo,” Coun. Albanese stressed.
The majority of council ended up voting in favour of approving the registration and associated costs for attending the training session.
Whether individual councillors choose to file a per diem claim will be up to them.
