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‘Is that a threat?’ Heated moments at Langford council meeting include resident being told to leave

Mayor warns residents to be respectful, citing verbal assault on presenter outside previous meeting
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Langford Mayor Scott Goodmanson speaks outside of Langford City Hall on Jan. 6. (Bailey Moreton/News Staff)

Some heated moments at a Langford city council meeting on Monday (March 20) have exposed a growing rift between a portion of residents and council members.

During the public participation portion of Monday’s council meeting, Langford resident Scott Perry was asked to keep his comments to the agenda multiple times but then continued to speak. Perry was then asked to leave city hall by Braden Hutchins, director of corporate services for the city, but he continued speaking.

That’s when Hutchins and Mayor Scott Goodmanson asked bylaw staff to remove Perry, calling a brief recess to allow him to leave.

Another incident occurred during the meeting between Goodmanson and Langford resident Sandy Sifert. Sifert, speaking via Zoom, was told to keep her comments to the agenda, then when told she had run out of time said, “Lucky for you guys.”

“Is that a threat?” retorted Goodmanson.

Both Sifert and Perry during their comments spoke against the city’s plans to revert back to using sod on boulevards and frontages. Council ultimately voted in favour of the change.

Prior to the meeting beginning, Goodmanson called for respectful debate, adding there had been an incident that happened outside council’s previous meeting on March 6.

“Last meeting there was a fairly good verbal assault on a presenter, and that doesn’t fly,” Goodmanson said. “If you’re here to mock, abuse, yell at, or take advantage of people you can go and not come back.”

In previous meetings, several residents have voiced concerns the meeting minutes did not reflect what they said during public participation. At the beginning of the March 20 meeting, residents were directed to email city hall with specific concerns about the minutes so they could be addressed.

Under the Community Charter, municipalities must adopt a bylaw to establish procedures on how council conducts its business, including how meeting minutes are taken.

“It is up to the local government to determine clear processes around minutes in their procedure bylaw. The contents of meeting minutes are reviewed by council and typically adopted at the following council meeting,” wrote the Ministry of Municipal Affairs in a statement.

The City of Langford did not respond to a request for comment on the matter, or to questions about its procedures.

Langford’s council procedure bylaw was adopted in October 2021, after the old bylaw that was established in 2004 was rescinded. The changes included permitting electronic council meetings and limiting how long a member of the public could speak during public participation, among other changes.

The bylaw sets out that minutes must be legibly recorded, certified as correct by the corporate officer and signed by the meeting’s presiding member – usually the mayor or another appointed council member. Those requirements match the ones listed under the Local Government Act for the minutes of regional board meetings.

Social media has also been fanning the flames of division. Langford Voters started as a Facebook group and would go on to spawn the electoral organization Langford Now. All five of its slate of council candidates would go on to win during last October’s municipal election, representing a massive shift from the entrenchment of the previous mayor and council, headed by former mayor Stew Young.

In response, a separate Facebook group was started called Our Langford, a collective that is “appreciative and grateful to former mayor Stew Young’s historical 30 years of monumental achievements in the City of Langford,” according to the group’s own selection.

READ MORE: Langford opts to revert to sod as savings not seen in turf


@moreton_bailey
bailey.moreton@goldstreamgazette.com

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