Port Moody council no longer needs to unanimously agree to extend meetings past 3-hour limit
A single Port Moody councillor will no longer be able to stop a meeting from being extended.
On Dec. 17, council amended a clause in its procedure bylaw which required unanimous consent to continue meetings beyond the three-hour schedule. Now extensions will only require a majority vote.
The change comes after a contentious meeting in October, in which council advanced the tallest development in its history to public hearing after only 10 minutes of discussion.
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PCI Development’s application for two 39-storey towers adjacent to the Moody Centre SkyTrain Station was the last item on the agenda, and Coun. Haven Lurbiecki wanted to defer the vote until the next meeting.
She claimed the agenda was too full and accused her colleagues of trying to “rush” the application through without a fulsome discussion. When council tried to vote for a 20-minute extension, Lurbiecki refused to allow it.
The meeting ended so abruptly that a motion from Coun. Amy Lubik was accidentally ignored, causing Mayor Meghan Lahti to convene a special meeting two days later to rehash the discussion, after the validity of the vote was called into question. It passed by a vote 6-1, with Lurbiecki opposed.
Council’s vote to change the bylaw on Tuesday passed unanimously without comment. Lurbiecki and Lubik were both not present at the meeting.
A second change to the policy now requires residents providing written input to include their name and city of residence in their submissions.
Staff said the housekeeping amendments are intended to “provide further clarity to the governance of council’s meetings.”
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