It pays to have a seat at the table

Good luck to Peterborough city councillor Kevin Duguay as he heads to Calgary next month seeking one of 16 available Ontario seats on the board of the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM).

Council has given him its necessary blessing. All but two councillors, that is.

The same two, Andrew Beamer and Keith Riel, who voted against Coun. Joy Lachica running for a seat on the board of the Ontario Small Urban Municipalities (OSUM) last year.

Not having the unanimous support of council, Lachica withdrew her request. A pity, really. She would have brought a lot to that organization, which held its annual meeting just up the road in Orillia this past week.

Beamer figured Duguay’s $4,000 expense limit (from Mayor Jeff Leal’s budget) was too much for the taxpayer. Meanwhile a week earlier, $2 million for 16 pickleball courts at Bonnerworth Park was not. Riel argued that if Duguay was going to get an extra $4,000 in expenses, all councillors should.

FCM is an advocacy group representing the interests of more than 2,000 Canadian municipalities to the federal government. That’s 91 per cent of the population.

Among other activities, it negotiates with federal departments and agencies on such things as housing, infrastructure, climate change and revenue sharing.

It also administers relative federal funds and services and makes loans to municipalities.

It holds an annual conference, bringing together federal and municipal politicians and officials from across the country. This provides a great chance to exchange ideas, network, learn from and inspire each other.

To actually sit on the board of FCM is to have an opportunity to influence policy and debate beyond the council chamber at 500 George St. N.

When I was mayor, whenever the FCM conference was held in Ontario, I encouraged as many councillors who were able to attend. I knew how important it could be for them and the city.

We need to know what is happening in places beyond our borders.

The same is true of organizations such as OSUM and of the Association of Municipalities of Ontario (AMO).

Sometimes, it is casual networking that makes the most difference. Case in point is an informal dinner 10 of us had at an AMO conference in Ottawa back in 2004. Our host was the newly-appointed provincial Minister of Infrastructure, the late David Caplan.

I have no idea why I was invited to that dinner. Maybe the fact that I was mayor of a significant municipality and knew Caplan’s mother, Elinor, had something to do with it. Who knows?

In any event, I was seated directly across the table from our host and, searching for something to say, raised the issue of the new hospital the recently defeated Progressive Conservative government had promised Peterborough. Problem was, they had neglected to budget for it and it seemed to have dropped off the Liberal government’s map.

“What about our hospital?” I asked over the soup.

“Oh, every place wants a new hospital,” Caplan replied.

I fixed him with my stoniest glare.

“David, if we don’t get that hospital, there won’t be another provincial Liberal elected in Peterborough for at least a quarter of a century.”

Back in the office Monday morning, I called then-premier Dalton McGuinty and recounted our conversation.

A few weeks later, as I was driving to a friend’s cottage on Clear Lake, my BlackBerry rang.

“You’ll get your hospital,” McGuinty said.

It pays to have a seat at the table.