Lac La Biche County Council possibly reducing its membership to seven starting in 2018

Things got interesting at last week’ s county council meeting when Mayor Omer Moghrabi turned over his chair to Councillor and Deputy Mayor Robert Richard in order to put a motion on the floor to adjust ward boundaries to reflect a seven-member council.

By doing so, Moghrabi was able to actively lead the discussion, bringing up three points to support this change: the current economic climate’ s affect on the community, equitable representation of residents, and the council to lead by responsible example.

“Families are struggling financially,” said Moghrabi. “Almost all business and organizations in our area have downsized where they can in response to the current situation.”

Moghrabi felt it was the responsibility for council to do the same by decreasing its membership by two, which he said would save approximately $200,00 per year in directly related expenses.

“For the past three years, we have asked Administration for a lean budget and to cut back; now as leaders, this motion gives us an opportunity to take a hard look at our own operation and expenses,” he said. “We have an opportunity to set an example of good governance and diligent use of public funds, leading by example.”

Following his explanations, the Mayor left councillors to debate the issue.

Councillor Richard Olson started the discussion asking how much the council increased by when it first grew to the current total of eight councilors and a mayor.

“When did we go to nine and how much did it increase by,” he asked. “Did it go from seven to nine, six to nine?”
Councillor John Nowak, as the only person present that was on council at the time of the change fielded the question.

“We had two councils that came together, the former town of Lac La Biche was a council of seven and the Lakeland County of five,” said Nowak. “And the reason we decided to come together was that at the time there was a power struggle. I’ ll be frank, the county was concerned that if the town had too much representation then all the wealth would remain within the town.”

Councillor Hajar Haymour agreed with the mayor saying it was time to change to a council of seven. He agreed the decrease would show their commitment to appropriate use of funds.

“We need to do the right thing here and think about it and let the people know,” he said. “Let the people talk about it, let them decide what works best for them. We need to go public with this and let anyone come and say either ‘yes, we want to stay with nine’ or to go down to seven.”

Councillor Dave Phillips expressed concern with the possibility of disconnect between residents and their ward’ s councilor.

“I believe there will be some disconnect by having a 1400-person ward, where the distance between them is so far,” said Phillips. “How does one person represent that entire area?”

Richard said the ward populations would not need to be exact but could be changed in respect to geography and scarcity. Moghrabi’ s initial motion did include that “geographical area, history, trading areas and other relevant factors should also be taken into consideration” when dividing up wards.

Haymour meanwhile felt population per ward was irrelevant anyways saying he thinks all councillors represent every ward, not just their own.

“I feel as a councilor I don’ t represent only ward seven,” he said. “I represent every single soul in this community.”
Wanda Austin agreed with Haymour saying she is contacted by more than just people in her own ward.

The debate proved to be too lengthy to continue since a resident was waiting to speak during the public input session, so it was put on hold until later in the meeting.

“I think this issue needs more consideration,” said Richard. “I think we need a public input session or a meeting for it.”
No members of the public were present at the time to speak on the issue but the topic will be debated at the next meeting on Dec. 20 with all residents of the county welcome to attend and provide feedback of their own.