Editorial - Question Period

Exercising your right to question your elected officials is important. But to others, a lengthy speech may seem like overkill. Reminiscent of a 5th grade speech class, folks often stand at the Pointe-Claire City Council microphone and orate, but just never get to the point. With many meetings seemingly becoming a soapbox for residents pushing their own opinions and agendas, it feels like there’s a lot of room for improvement for the question period.

Pointe-Claire seems to have the most generous question period of any municipality on the island, and it is amazing that so much time is given over to residents’ voices. Democracy is government by the people. Citizen participation means citizen involvement in public decision-making. Each monthly city council meeting allows for citizen questions. And the mayor does a good job of trying to get people to focus on their questions rather than their backstories. But boy, some of us can talk! Isn’t there a better way?

At the June 4th council meeting, a woman did not get the chance to ask her question about a tear-down rebuild happening next door to her, which was voted on that same night, because they ran out of time. She eventually interrupted the session and got in a few words just before the vote was cast on the permit in question. She did not get the considered response she would have if she’d asked during question period. There is room for improvement here. 

One way to ensure that time-sensitive matters are discussed that same night would be to have a question period at the start of the meeting focused only on issues on that meeting’s agenda, followed by a second question period for general concerns, similar to the process in municipalities like Baie D’Urfé and Montreal-West. 

Many municipalities also request that questions be submitted in advance, thus allowing council to prepare a potential answer for the resident, and answer the questions of people who may not be able to arrive early enough to get their names near the top of the sign-up sheet, or who may simply be unable to attend. This would also be respectful to meeting attendees, in-person or at home, who want to see our city’s business conducted in a timely and efficient manner.

Another idea would be to have a visible timer that sounds after five minutes, at which point the citizen’s microphone gets cut off. We all want to make our voices heard. Each of us is equally important, and no resident is more important than any other. So why should some folks get to make a meandering three-page speech under the guise of a preamble while others don’t even get a turn?

Pointe-Claire needs a different process to ensure that all citizens can have their say — one that’s fair and equitable.

What are your thoughts? We’d love to hear them. Email us at editor@pcrecord.ca.