The decision to provide remuneration for Halton regional council members serving on the Halton Police Board has been deferred following a lengthy debate about fairness and potential divisiveness.
At the latest regional council meeting, police board vice-chair Ingrid Hann -- surprised to learn that the three councillors are not compensated -- said the proposed remuneration is about "reasonableness and fairness."
"I have worked closely with our current chair, councillor Jeff Knoll, and see the vast time commitment, consistent availability and demanding workload in serving the Halton Police Board that he and our other two councillors manage (Sameera Ali and Lisa Kearns). In addition to carrying out effective Halton Police Board Governance, there are frequent formal and informal events requiring attention and attendance which we gladly fulfill," she said.
With an expected extra workload this year, and given the remuneration practices of other boards in Halton, Hann believes implementing the remuneration "is the right thing to do."
The other provincially-appointed members of the board, and Hann, as a citizen appointee, are compensated through the region. According to Hann, she receives a bi-weekly remuneration of about $467.
The initial proposal was to provide members with a $150 per diem per meeting, similar to compensation given to Conservation Halton board members. A regional staff noted that the police board meets on the last Thursday of every month — except July — typically from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Halton Hills regional councillor Clark Somerville, as the mover, reiterated that “it is an issue of fairness,”
"I know from serving on the board for nine years over two different times, the complexity of the board has changed dramatically. And it is a lot more complicated now, especially with the community safety and policing act," Somerville said.
While some of his colleagues supported the idea, others questioned the necessity of being paid for public service, time commitment involved and the impact on other boards that do not offer compensation.
"We’ve all signed up to do public service," said Oakville regional councillor Sean O’Meara. "I think in terms of fairness, a lot of people sit on boards, Big Brothers, Big Sisters, children's aids boards, a number of boards that we do because that's what we signed up for. And we're not asking for remuneration for all this. We're doing it because we're part of the community."
Paul Sharman, regional councillor from Burlington, echoed the sentiment.
"I'm bothered by the notion of equity because what we will introduce is inequity around this table. We all have busy agendas. We are appointed to various committees, boards and all the rest of it and we do not get compensation for those," Sharman said.
"So now we'll be competing to see who gets the jobs that get compensated for and that strikes me as being an absurdity. It is not appropriate for this service-oriented council of elected officials."
Sharman ended, "I believe it's entirely divisive."
Earlier, Burlington Mayor Marianne Meed Ward stated that "no one does this for the money."
"This is for me a governance matter. There are some boards that pay and compensate their members and there are some that don't. And there's reasons for that, and that's embedded in their governance structure," said Meed Ward.
Council eventually voted to defer the matter to their July meeting to gather more information from staff on the expected time commitment from members of council to the committees and boards to which they were appointed, along with their approximate compensation.