When it’s time for a council meeting Kelowna Mayor Tom Dyas wants a distraction-free session, nothing but the agenda at hand.
“What I see happening is a lot of computer usage and what I know happens is outside sources bringing information into our meetings,” Dyas told council during Monday’s meeting.
During a discussion about council’s code of conduct, which was implemented about a year ago, the mayor put forward a motion Monday to ban all electronic devices from meetings. If it were to pass, council members would be provided a monitor set up with only the necessary information.
“It comes from a position of wanting to make certain that the decisions that we make we all have the same information and there’s no outside information coming into any of those decisions,” Dyas told Global News on Tuesday.
The motion, however, was strongly opposed with all of council turning it down.
Coun. Maxine DeHart said, “I think it’s overly restrictive. To tell you the truth I think it’s rather insulting. Personally, I’m not speaking for the rest of you. I’ve been on council for 14 years I’ve never been challenged on anything I’ve said or done.”
Coun. Luke Stack said it feels like an overreach of ‘limiting the independence of council members.’
Coun. Mohini Singh called Dyas the ‘Team Captain’ during the meeting, advising him to call out a council member if necessary.
“If he feels one of us is doing something we shouldn’t be doing, haul us up on the carpet have a talk, and just say, ‘Hey did you get extra information? If you did, it was wrong to bring it up in a discussion when nobody else has it,” Singh told Global News on Tuesday.
While council voted down the ban, they voted in favour of monitors set up around the council table.
“I think this will advance over a period of time and they’ll work with those and we’ll see what other items are implemented into the code in the future,” said Dyas.
All other items in the code of conduct were approved unanimously.