Vision’s supermajority status hinges on upcoming byelection
The intricacies of Vancouver city council’s vote-counting math mean the single seat up for grabs in next month’s byelection will count for a lot.
Much of the news coverage of Vancouver’s byelection has noted that regardless of the result at the polls Oct. 14, Vision Vancouver won’t lose its majority. The departure of Vision Coun. Geoff Meggs to Victoria to work for the new premier left five Vision councillors remaining, with Mayor Gregor Robertson giving the party a single-vote majority of six Vision votes out of 11, even if the party loses Meggs’s seat.
But in Vancouver city council, there are times when a simple majority isn’t enough.
Most major matters before council — decisions, motions and budgets — can be passed by a simple majority vote. However, under the Vancouver Charter — the unique piece of provincial legislation for the city — there are a number of circumstances that require a two-thirds vote for approval. This includes issuing grants and selling or swapping city-owned land.
With 10 councillors and the mayor adding up to 11 votes when all councillors attend, the supermajority threshold is eight votes.
In the three years since the last municipal election, while Meggs was on council, Vision had seven votes. That meant that even if all three NPA councillors voted against a supermajority measure, Vision would be able to pass it if they had the support of the only Green councillor, Adriane Carr.
Often these votes are uncontroversial, as when council unanimously voted last week to approve a below-market lease agreement with a non-profit organization providing housing for vulnerable youth and mothers.
But there have also been cases when such votes have turned into showdowns along party lines, which suggests Vision’s ability to pass such measures could be jeopardized if the NPA wins a fourth seat next month.
One recent example came over the summer, when a heated debate erupted in council in July over contingency funding for 16 grants totalling $601,800 to nonprofit organizations to mitigate the effects of the overdose crisis. The grant money was eventually approved by councillors from all three parties, but not until after a long and sometimes emotionally charged debate had played out between NPA and Vision councillors, in which Vision Coun. Tim Stevenson accused NPA councillors of “playing games” and “playing politics” over grant funding.
The council supermajority issue came to the forefront a decade ago, in Vancouver’s last council with an NPA majority. In December 2007, Vision Vancouver issued a media release alleging NPA councillors had “ignored council process” to push through a controversial measure. As the Georgia Straight reported at the time, council was considering a motion to expand funding for the Downtown Ambassadors street-patrolling program with $872,000 annually from the city.
Then-Vision councillor George Chow told the Straight the council meeting proceeded as if the motion was a grant, which would have required the supermajority to pass, “but when NPA councillors saw that Vision was ‘not too keen on the idea of using public money for private security,’ as Chow characterized it, the motion was changed to a contract.” That switch meant only a simple majority was required, allowing the NPA’s six votes (five councillors and a mayor) to pass the contract, a manoeuvre Chow described as a “runaround” that circumvented the rules.
The following year, Vision made the Downtown Ambassadors into a campaign issue, with mayoral candidate Gregor Robertson suggesting axing the program, on the way to his first of three consecutive electoral victories.
The NPA’s council candidate for next month’s byelection, Hector Bremner, said if his run is successful and the NPA has enough votes to block a supermajority, it will be good for the way city hall runs.
“The change of this seat towards the NPA would mean greater accountability being put on a city hall that has been largely able to govern behind closed doors,” Bremner said. “It would shed more light on decisionmaking by forcing Vision into more co-operation.”
Meanwhile, Vision candidate Diego Cardona said it’s important that a Vision majority is able to issue grants quickly to be able to respond nimbly to new realities, like an unprecedented overdose scourge.
“The reality is it’s a crisis we have not seen before,” Cardona said. “It requires actions that are outside our original limitations. Anything we can do to save people’s lives … This is an out-ofthe-box crisis. It’s not a surprise that we need out-of-the-box solutions.”
The Vision-majority council’s ability to make grants is a significant factor at play in this byelection, Cardona said: “For me, it’s definitely one of the reasons I decided to step forward. I really see the risk of having the NPA pick up one more seat.”
“There is a desire to not make a big deal out of this election, but there’s a lot at stake.”
The change of this seat towards the NPA would mean greater accountability being put on a city hall that has been largely able to govern behind closed doors.