Kudos to Coquitlam city council for Monday's decision against accepting extended leaves of absence and opting instead for byelections to replace councillors - now MLAs - Linda Reimer and Selina Robinson.
Well done, council, you got it right.
But before we start waxing poetic about the sanctity of democracy, it should be said that a better decision would have been for councillors to recuse themselves and not decide the matter at all.
Council's deciding if, how and when its complement will be achieved is inappropriate and affords the opportunity for political chicanery.
What if the departing councillors were both right-leaning and the remaining council was left-leaning? What decision could council possibly have made that wouldn't be seen as politically self-serving?
And what if they had voted to not hold byelections?
They would have saved $150,000 (more than a loonie for each Coquitlam resident).
Council and the community would have been spared the humiliation of a byelection turnout smaller than the membership of the Senator Mike Duffy defence league.
And admittedly, the opposite politics of right-leaning Coun. Reimer and left-leaning Coun. Robinson would likely have cancelled each other out anyway, so the political equilibrium on council may not have changed appreciably.
But the message would have been a bad one.
The message would have been that council need not follow provincially established guidelines for replacing departed councillors.
The message would have been that we can function quite nicely with two fewer councillors for periods of up to 18 months. Why would we ever bother having eight councillors if six works fine?
I'm uneasy with these messages and, thankfully, Coquitlam councillors were too.
So, congratulations to Coquitlam council on its decision to hold a byelection. It was a good, gutsy call in overtime, a call made over the Hotel Gate whooping from the bench by my colleague and his paper clip-counting teammates.
The real effect of this decision will be to preserve council's political integrity, avoiding nudge-nudge political manipulations.
Still, I would feel better if this decision was completely removed from council's purview. How to replace politicians should be decided and administered solely by Elections B.C.
