Athabasca County councillor time sheets and mileage came under scrutiny during council’s Jan. 25 meeting.
Coun. Dwayne Rawson brought the issue to light, saying the rules around mileage claims are not clear enough. Rawson said there needed to be a clearer policy on council mileage and time sheets.
“Council will get themselves in trouble. We need a policy in place,” Rawson said during the meeting, noting that over $70,000 was paid in mileage to councillors in 2016. “We need to try and cut that down a bit.”
Rawson highlighted how councillors were claiming double mileage for attending morning and afternoon meetings in town, adding those mileage claims should only be one-way.
He also highlighted issues with a half-day claim from Reeve Doris Splane on Dec. 6, which was written as a luncheon plus meeting with the minister of Advanced Education. After Splane explained the claim was for both a lunch and an entire afternoon meeting with the minister in Boyle, Rawson said more clarification on the time sheet was needed.
“People in the community are seeing this,” Rawson said. “What we need to do is be very clear on that, because people are going to ask us questions.”
Athabasca County has six policies governing councillor remuneration, according to the county’s website. These include rules on seminar and convention attendance, meals, travel time and communication allowances.
The county’s remuneration policy for councillors states rates are set at the annual county organizational meeting in October.
However, the travel time policy does not specifically outline a procedure for claiming partial or double mileage on full-day meetings in town.
Coun. Larry Armfelt said during the meeting he agreed with examining council time sheets and mileage.
“It has to be picked at. I told you guys four or five months ago that there are people out there that read our time sheets and scrutinize. Every once in a while, you get a call and you have to defend them,” Armfelt said. “Good for them. It’s their tax money.”
Coun. Christi Bilsky also spoke during the meeting in support of creating a new policy on the topic.
“It should be very easy for us and the public to look at how council gets paid,” Bilsky said.
After county manager Ryan Maier requested additional direction where council wants to go with a new policy, Splane said during the meeting council should possibly discuss councillor salaries.
“If we are looking at salaries, then let’s not send administration on this chase for time sheets or mileage. Let’s maybe have the discussion,” Splane said.
Coun. Dennis Willcott protested the idea of a salary system out of concern of cost increases.
“Nobody ever goes down. Everybody always goes up and that’s what I’m scared of,” Willcott said during the council meeting.
Coun. Kevin Haines said during the meeting council could delay administrative direction until after a policy meeting.
“We’re not going to solve it today. We’ve never been able to solve it in all the years I’ve been on council,” Haines said. “If we want to discuss it, we don’t have to give direction today.”
Rawson said during the meeting council should keep a new policy simple.
“We just need a policy and keep it simple. That’s all we have to do,” Rawson said.
Council voted unanimously on a motion by Haines to forward the issue to a future policy meeting for further discussion.
