Subject: Western Division Meeting - August 25, 2002
Last Chance for Democratic
Governance
At the November 16, 2002, Annual General Meeting, a move
will be made
to sanction By-Law No. 2 enacted by the Board of
Governors.
In reaction to this, the Western Division met in Calgary in
August
to discuss the draft bylaw No. 2 (version dated May 21,
2002).
Voting members from BC/YT, AB, SK, and MB were present at this
meeting.
Their conclusion:
The Voting Members of the four
councils are not able to
support the Bylaw II document (version dated May 21,
2002).
Some of the issues that were identified:
1) Article IV (d)
(v) The Executive Commissioner/CEO must be
directly responsible
to the Board of Governors and this must
be explicitly stated in
the Bylaws.
2) Article V must be amended to explicitly allow BOG
members
to place items on the BOG agenda.
3) Article IV (b)
places unreasonable restrictions on the
powers of the BOG to
dismiss a CEO.
4) In the draft Policies and Procedures document, the CEO
has
absolute authority over the creation or dissolution of
Councils.
Therefore he effectively controls the number of Voting
Members
at the AGM. The Bylaw needs to describe/define what is
a
Council and to ensure a consultative process with and
agreement
of ordinary members affected by proposed changes to
Councils.
5) Article II (a) (iii) (a) We also have to de-link the
democratic
process from the administrative process. We
believe that
there should be a democratic electoral process
which allows
ordinary members to elect the Voting Members of the
Corporation.
6) Article II (a) (iii) (b) We have some concerns about
serving
members of the BOG also being Voting Members at the
AGM.
This is a sizeable voting block (24 of 76) and dilutes
the
ability of the ordinary members through their elected
voting
members to effect election of the members of the
BOG.
7) There are a number of significant cost and funding source
impacts.
We are not aware of any Business Plans or cost impact
analysis
being completed to establish the impact of the
changes.
For example, in BC the proposed removal of
elected governance
and management organizations at the council
and group level would
reduce BC Government funding by
approximately $800k per annum.
8) There are significant holes in the proposed
Bylaw II document.
There are key pieces defined in the companion
(draft) documents.
Portions of the documents must be integrated
into the Bylaws
to improve the clarity. It would also
enhance our ability to
understand and discuss the changes.
9)
There are some flaws in the nominating and election process.
We
need to ensure that all nominations are presented to the AGM
and
that no vetting takes place by the nominating
committee.
Summary:
We cannot support the proposed
Bylaw II and it should not be presented
for vote at the upcoming
AGM.
We believe that more work and consultation is
required. Consultation
should include representation from
all Provincial Councils.
We believe we need a single
document that covers the critical factors,
instead of a
patchwork of three or four documents.
They are:
BC/YK President
Keith Martin
Commissioner
Andy Ackerman
Youth Member
not listed
AB President
William Cox
Commissioner Jon
Hall
Youth Member not
listed
SK President Peter
Hardman
Commissioner Brian
Watson
Youth Member not
listed
MB President Glenn
Armstrong
Commissioner Al
Patterson
Youth Member not
listed
NWT/NV President Chris
Hanks
Commissioner Mike
Kalnay
Youth Member not
listed
ON President
Kathryn Brown
Commissioner
Chuck Lawrence
Youth Member
not listed
QC President
Richard Morris
Commissioner
Jeff Smith
Youth Member not
listed
NB President Dean
Mundee
Commissioner Helen
Knowles
Youth Member not
listed
NS President
Robert Patzelt
Commissioner
Kevin MacDonald
Youth Member
not listed
PEI President Nial
Coulson
Commissioner
Micheline Charest
Youth
Member not listed
NF/LB President not
listed
Council
Commissioner Everett
Price
Youth Member not
listed