Editorial: Politics is about sitting down and speaking up; councillor calls for investigation

Take a stand. But keep your seat.

After a series of stops, starts, amendments, and ultimatums, the 2,857-unit Coronation Park project was unanimously approved Tuesday. The approval probably didn’t surprise anyone. The unanimous vote, however, was a shocker.

It turns out it wouldn’t have been unanimous if everyone on council had been there when the vote was called. However, during a three-hour public hearing, a resident said he’d obtained documents proving the majority of council and the developer held an “illegal meeting.”

(Coun. Diana Dilworth later said the meeting was a site tour at which there was no city staff, no agenda and no decisions made.)

Following the allegation, Coun. Haven Lurbiecki called for deferment.

In an email to the Dispatch, Lurbiecki explained that the majority of council cannot meet in private to talk about anything that will later be considered in council chambers.

“Call a meeting what you want (a tour, a coffee, a chat), it could still be illegal if such matters are discussed with a majority of council outside of a legally sanctioned meeting,” Lurbiecki wrote.

When her request to defer the Coronation Park vote failed, Lurbiecki’s “stomach sank,” she wrote. The councillor was faced with a decision she would have to make quickly: stay or go.

“I chose to get up and walk away from what struck me as being a potentially invalid or even unethical proceeding,” she wrote, explaining the allegation transcended typical political disagreements.

“This is an issue of the utmost integrity of our entire process of governance and it should not be ignored or silenced. It is extremely important that this allegation be fully investigated by a neutral third party. Anything less would not be acceptable,” she wrote.

An investigation sounds like a good idea. Walking away from the vote was a bad one.

Since being elected, Lurbiecki had been the lone voice against the Coronation Park project, decrying the project’s 2,700 parking spots as well its lack of affordable housing.

To be blunt, Tuesday wasn’t going to be Lurbiecki’s night. No matter how vociferously she objected or how articulately she made a case for better job creation, the project was almost certainly going to pass.

But when losing is all that’s left, how you lose matters.

Whether you have good intentions or you’re grandstanding, the moment you walk out of chambers you’ve forfeited your office, your vote and your voice. Even worse, you’ve sent a message to your colleagues that whenever things aren’t going their way, they can take their ball and go home.

For everyone who voted for Lurbiecki, for everyone opposed to the project, and for everyone committed to those principals of good governance and honest debate, it behooved Lurbiecki to stay in chambers to the bitter end, to make her case, to try.

You don’t always have to keep your cool in politics. But you should always keep your seat.