Coquitlam residents may have a referendum question to vote on when they head to the polls in November.
Next month, city council will decide whether to ask Coquitlam voters whether council members should be directly elected to the Metro Vancouver board. Currently, two council members are selected by council; this year, they are Mayor Richard Stewart and Coun. Lou Sekora.
The idea for the referendum came from Sekora at Monday's council meeting just as homeowners are paying their property tax bills, which include hefty utility increases from the regional authority.
Stewart said he supports such a referendum question and he voiced frustration with the unelected body, with which Coquitlam is currently embroiled in a dispute on the proposed Regional Growth Strategy, a blueprint for how Metro Vancouver will grow over the next 30 years.
Coquitlam is the only municipality in the Lower Mainland that has refused to support the plan and is now in mediation with Metro Vancouver; some regional politicians on its intergovernmental committee, including Port Coquitlam Mayor Greg Moore, are observing the negotiations - and being paid by Metro for their time.
Coquitlam Coun. Mae Reid said she would like to talk to Metro Vancouver before a civic referendum question is posed, given the bad blood that now exists between the city and the regional body. "I don't think we should be going off at this particular point in time and making our own decisions and putting them on the ballot as to what we would like to do," she said. "I think we are out there all by ourselves for a while now and I think we need to get over the issue that we've got before we do something else."
Yesterday, Coun. Barrie Lynch said he would like to see two referendum questions: one in November and one in 2014. The first would ask the public whether Coquitlam councillors should be elected to Metro; if yes, the second question - part of the 2014 civic election - would be, what two councillors should be elected to the board?
"We have the choice, as a city, to send whoever we want as a representative," Lynch said. "All we're saying is, let's us, as a city, define how we want to do that."
He added, "The problem right now is we've got ourselves in a bit of a situation with Metro with the Regional Growth Strategy, which is unfortunate and, probably, we should never have gone down this road to the point where we are. Our issues should have been resolved, seeing that the other 23 jurisdictions have."
