Rules of Procedure
Posted by auroracitizen on October 4, 2009
Thanks to one of our contributors for this post.
I’m writing this at 7:20 pm only 20 minutes into the televised Council meeting and already the procedural by-law is ignored. Ms. St. Kitts was once again allowed to appear before Council in the Open Forum time period, simply for the purpose of boosting the Farmers Market, the entertainment, and the ego’s of those involved (again).
Here is the applicable section of the procedural by-law, as posted on the Town’s website (bolding has been added for emphasis).
Section 3 – Order of Business
Open Forum
3.1 Open Forum shall be considered a part of the formal order of business of Council. Any ratepayer of the Town of Aurora is entitled to make a deputation to Council on a matter that is or is not on the Agenda of Council provided the maximum time allotted is five minutes for each delegate and the total time of all delegates for this portion of the Agenda be restricted to twenty minutes.
By-law 4912-07.C
To the best of my knowledge, Ms. Kitts is not a “ratepayer of the Town of Aurora”, but no one, not the Chair, not staff, or any Member of Council raised a legitimate point of order.
Moderators Note: When people who are not ratepayers of Aurora wish to speak to Council or make a presentation, the appropriate channel to do so is though a Delegation — which is arranged through the Clerk’s department. A simple email request is usually all that is required. This gives members of Council fair notice that an item will be discussed which may require some preparation on their part.
Aurora Citizen 
Anne said
To Hugo,
Oh please get off your high horse. This blog is a vehicle for every citizen to express their opinion, not just those with a superiority complex such as yourself (which,incidentally, usually is hiding insecurity). My husband and I are “average” citizens of this town, and didn’t pay much attention to municipal politics until we started watching Council meetings and thought “we can’t be the only ones who see how condescending, dysfunctional and corrupt this mayor is can we?”. So we started tuning into this blog as well as others and take comfort in the fact that we are not alone in our opinion, and word is spreading fast. I may not have your obviously superior intellect and savvy however I am far from blind to the fact that something is rotten in the Town of Aurora.
Knowledgeable in Aurora said
My goodness Hugo – it doesn’t take a lawyer to interprete a simple statement like: “Any ratepayer of the Town of Aurora”.
The procedural bylaw is simply meant to provide guidelines to the order of business and should be taken as written. You must have gone to the Phyllis Morris school of interpretation. Rule #1 – hire a lawyer. Rule #2 – Hire a new lawyer when you don’t agree with the opinion of the first. Rule #3 – Continue until you get the results you want.
She said
To: Hugo Kroon
You self absorbed individual! You are more about putting down people than making your point. I am a citizen of this town, and a recent contributor to this blog. I am a female…a “she” not a “he”. You have problems with opinions that oppose your point of view; you should be on council this term…you would fit in beautifully.
Your comment “this steady stream of discourteous, uninformed and plain stupid comments”, is your opinion. Why are you saturating yourself in this swampland if you are so much better? Read your post…. YOUR comments are derogatory, insulting and finger pointing. You are no better than those you insult.
You are guilty of what you accuse others….read what you wrote!!!
Hugo T. Kroon said
How sad.
This forum, this blog, this community discussion board, may have at one time been a vehicle that could have done some good for the town of Aurora.
At one time…but no more.
The reality is that is no longer the case, and it is dangerously sliding further in to an abyss of insultive, derogatory and abusive name calling and finger pointing.
The steady stream of discourteous, uninformed and plain stupid comments presented on this forum is something that at times leaves even me speechless…
Led by the moderator (ringleader?), such nameless cowardly contributors the likes of the author of this post, and supported by commentators such as “Someone who loves this town more than politics” and others, has driven this blog into nothing more than an outlet for those who either hate the business of government and those in power who represent it, and those who simply do not understand how it works.
This post is an example of the latter.
The poster, again, as I suspect, is the person who continually presents the ongoing theme of “us” (residents of Aurora) versus “them” (everybody else).
In quoting the procedural by-law, he points out that section 3.1 says that “…any ratepayer…” may avail themselves of “open forum”. In that he is correct. But, as any lawyer worth his latte will tell you, any thing or action that a law does not specifically prohibit, is permissible. Therefore, to lawfully prevent anyone other than ratepayers speaking at Open Forum, the procedural by-law must state that.
And it does not.
Not only that, but section 3.10 (a), also encourages “anyone” to speak at Open Forum. Of course that would of required the poster to both read further into the by-law, and also admit that there is something that disagrees with what he has erroneously and selfishly already decided to be the only truth.
Secondly, there is no mechanism for defining a ratepayer in this by-law. Most (heck, all) recognized dictionaries define a ratepayer as one who pays local rates. Local rates can include taxes, levies, fees, fines, tolls, assessments, surcharges or regular and/or irregular payments of any kind.
Based on that, Ms. St Kitts qualifies. As do I. So there.
But this post is simply another example of someone who has no knowledge of what they speak, twisting (spinning?, now there’s a term you folks seem to enjoy…) something to suit their own narrow agenda.
Normally this particular action is best employed by Councilor Buck, but I see it has in afflicted others as well.
As for whether or not Ms. St Kitts had anything intelligent to share with council and the assembled public, perhaps I’d best not comment on that.
Perhaps she needed a nap.
But I will say this to SWLTTMTP, in attacking her comments be careful of statements like “…One has to question the necessity for such a food drive…” those things tend to get quoted out of context.
Just ask anyone who finds themselves a target of this blog.
In light of all this, I would also like to remind all of you of one of Winston Churchill’s most famous observations regarding our democratic system. He said “…the best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.”
How true.
Perhaps were he alive today, he might remark that the best argument is now a two minute perusal of the average political blog.
And finally, a word of advice for Mr. “Someone who loves this town more than politics” in regards to your posts… yes I have read many of them…, might I be so bold as to suggest a modification to your “Nom De Plume “?
You might be better refereed to as “Someone who loves this town more than politics, but doesn’t really want to understand how it works, so I can’t really make intelligent comments.”
Yeah, that’s much better…
someone who loves this town more than politics said
Apparently being both an “Honorary” Citizen & the “Special Event Coordinator” for The Farmers market (anyone else wonder how she came by this job so quickly?) trump paying taxes and rules of procedure. They also trump common sense.
This aside did she really need to self congratulate or felate the Mayor for so long? She had the mic for 4 minutes and what little she did have to say could have been said in less than 2.
Her contributions to special events at the market are now a Thriller themed dance? what really? Could you grab onto any more coat-tails in your desperate cries for attention. Geesh. Michael Jackson hasn’t been buried for more than a couple of weeks and he’s spinning….or more likely doing the moon walk in his grave. How pathetic.
There is no doubt that items being scripted, Sher referred to a giant box that was in the center of the chambers during her speech when going off on another tangent about food donations. How conveniently staged.
One has to question the necessity for such a food drive as this is already being done at the market every week, in fact if Sher had bothered to open her eyes she might have seen all the food being donated at the booth right across from hers.
Perhaps she could have approached the vendors at the market that already do this and partner with them.
But sadly this just reinforces how disingenuous and self absorbed she really is.