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A step in the right direction

Despite what appeared to be some progress on the town council conflict front, whether they agree to do something about it is still up in the air.

Despite what appeared to be some progress on the town council conflict front, whether they agree to do something about it is still up in the air.

It was actually pretty impressive for the first time in quite some time that councillors who were at the meeting all agreed on something — that council is broken and needs fixing.

Representatives from the provincial government’s Municipal Dispute Resolution Services (MDRS) team visited council chambers Nov. 3 to discuss conflict resolution options.

“We know there’s some issues going on in the town, safe to say. We’re not going to get into the fray of that, I don’t think that’s what this is about here,” explained MDRS manager Michael Scheidl. “It’s to help you objectively take a look at where might we be on a spectrum of conflict escalation and what are some ways that we can deal with it, if you choose.”

The unfortunate thing was they all agreed that council is almost beyond redemption and it’s hard to say that they’re wrong. The 4-3 split has almost become legendary and when councillors start yelling at each other over who should have the right to post things on Facebook, things are starting to look a little dicey.

So maybe, just maybe, whether it be through MDRS, or some other mediation service, that the town hires, this strange stalemate can be resolved and one side, or the other, will make decisions that benefit the town, rather than whichever camp they happen to be in.

Ultimately it’s time for council as a whole to put down their hatchets. There’s a little less than two years remaining in their term — a 24-month period that needs to be productive to keep the Town of Athabasca on the right track.

“It’s important that as a council we sit and digest what was said and have a little bit of thinking process, rather than everybody getting on the bandwagon tonight and try to make this happen yesterday,” said mayor Roger Morrill.

“It’s a process and it’s not a process just to follow through for this council, but to set a framework to try to avoid the issues for future councils.”

Sounds good to us.

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