LSARA ACCUSED OF TRYING TO DIVIDE AND CONQUER

LSARA ACCUSED OF TRYING TO DIVIDE AND CONQUER 

To: LSARA
From: All Council LSAC

County Council and I appreciate the opportunity to attend your Annual General Meeting this evening but have concerns on your process. As such, Council will not be able to attend this evening. There is much skepticism regarding the purpose of the last minute restrictions imposed on Council by your e-mail of February 17th, along with apprehension that there is a strategy to divide and conquer this Council.   (Click to View LSARA Invitation to Attend)

LSARA has posted several articles lately where Council has concerns regarding the accuracy of the information you are distributing. Council would like to ensure all ratepayers are able to understand and comment on our decisions with an open mind. To this end, Council is reorganizing our communication practices to make sure all of our ratepayers get the information needed to understand and comment on our decisions.

Although Council will not attend tonight, we continue to extend an open offer for your executive and members to attend and address Council. If your concerns were put forward in a timely and relevant manner, we would be open to a full and candid discussion.

As you know, from operating your own organization, it is much easier to effectively provide answers to questions when you have been given the opportunity to prepare. As a large organization we would prefer to have questions forwarded and put on an agenda. When this happens, we can ensure the proper information can be brought forward and meaningful and informative answers can be given.

Council and I highly value transparency and accountability and recognize that our decisions will always be scrutinized by our ratepayers. We also acknowledge, that the communication corridors with the public have not always been accessible. We are committed to improving transparency and accountability, and look forward to showcasing these professional improvements, moving forward.


With regards,

Joe Blakeman
Reeve
Lac Ste. Anne County

Lac Ste Anne and Communities Ratepayers Association (Response to Above)

February 24, 2018

Lac Ste Anne Council Thank you for your response to LSARA'S invitation to attend our second Annual General Meeting.  We note that our communication to all council was sent on February 17th. LSARA received an email response on February 20th at 4:52 p.m. from Robert Osmond on behalf of Reeve Joe Blakeman.  It's important to note that the invitation was extended as a number of council had indicated to members of our executive that all council planned to attend, so we formalized the invitation.  We certainly did not anticipate the response we received at the ninth hour.

If you care to review the email we sent,  you will note that we indicated if there were any questions with respect to the meeting to respond to the email and we would address.  When we did not receive a query, we continued with planning our AGM. Imagine our surprise when we received the response that we did.  (Click to View LSARA Invitation to Attend)

Your first item that you brought forward was a concern with our "process". Firstly, our only "process" is to follow the guidelines set forth in the Societies Act as to how we conduct our meetings. Please enlighten us as to your concern with our process.  Indicating that there is "much skepticism" as to the purpose of adding "last minute" restrictions on council.  The only thing we told council was there would not be an opportunity for council to speak during the agenda portion of our Annual General.   We clearly indicated that all council would be welcome to participate in the question and answer segment.  This requirement was for all attending the AGM as a course of running a meeting.  Nothing untoward or restrictive at all. LSARA doesn't run council meetings and we wouldn't expect that council would run ours.

The comment made that there is apprehension as council believes there is a strategy on behalf of LSARA to "divide and conquer this council".  What a statement to make when two groups have not been able to break bread at the table and all were looking forward to change in communication. Divide and conquer?  Clearly some council forget their attendance at our meetings where we strategized on how to move forward with council and Administration.  They forget the corridors of communication between the Ratepayers and Council and Administration were closed.  Appears that they remain so.

Council in their email also indicated that they felt there were some inaccuracies in communications that we had put forward on our Blog and Facebook. Need we remind Council that all the information we used was directly obtained from the County records and the MGA. Should you find that we have in fact made an error in our posts, kindly bring the facts forward and we would be happy to address.

It was also stated that council and Administration are in the process of reorganizing communication to ensure all Ratepayers have the information to be able to comment on your decisions.  LSARA would welcome this type of communication as we have been a vehicle for these communications for the last year and a half.  We understand the importance of getting the facts out to the Ratepayers in a timely fashion.  When you indicate a full, open, candid discussion, we query how this may take place in chambers due to time restrictions, question presentation due eight days prior to the meeting and agendas that show up after meetings are held?  How can we be expected to work within that framework?

Finally, the admission of poor communication, lack of accountability, no transparency is duly noted.   This, gentleman is a platform that most of you ran on in the 2017 election. You told the Ratepayers you would fix this. As a Ratepayers Association our Mission Statement is clear in identifying what our expectations are of our elected officials and the administration.  In the same realm, you also acknowledge that proper processes and procedures, even when part of existing policies, have not been followed.

We intend to continue to strive towards our Mission Statement for the good of our Association and all the Ratepayers of LSAC.  We will hold Council and Administration to their oaths to represent the Ratepayers of Lac Ste Anne County.  LSARA has shown time and time again that we are vigilant, diligent, accountable to our membership and we will stay the course.

We can work together, we believe we can.

Regards,

Chris Yeoman, President LSARA

Please contact your LSAC Councillor and tell him what you think.