"F*** politics."
Now, I am not going to disclose who on my baseball team sent me that message after I said I couldn't make the game because I had to cover a council meeting, but that's a fairly generic response when I miss out on fun events for that purpose.
It's funny, because a lot of people tend to think council is boring, until it directly impacts them. And considering local government decisions affect taxes, recreational facilities, new development, local road and trail maintenance, and hundreds of other factors - you would assume that happens pretty frequently.
For example, my slopitch team probably won't have any late evening games this year or next because council decided lighting at Hendrickson Fields was not an appropriate Legacy Funds project.
It's these sorts of scenarios, ones I'm passionate about, where I want to raise my hand and give some input. I figure, since I've only missed one council meeting, my opinion is somewhat valid.
But really, it's not. I don't have the right to give input because I was not elected by the community to make these decisions.
But my point is whether or not the councillors were elected to do this doesn't trump the fact that they're people - normal, compassionate people with families and interests - who, like me, want to speak up on matters about which they really care.
Take Bryan Raiser, for example. He is a mountain biker and he is passionate about trails.
This week he asked to revisit a line item in the budget - including $30,000 for seasonal trails maintenance. His reasoning was that Mayor Greg Gardner was only away for one day of budget discussions, and on that day, it was the only vote that ended in a tie - which means it failed.
Doug Race, Rob Kirkham and Gardner criticized Raiser for revisiting it.
Kirkham called it "crazy" and "ludicrous" because there are several times throughout the year when councillors are away.
Gardner said it was "bad practice" to review every motion and despite the fact that he likely would have been supportive on the day, on principle he couldn't support it.
First of all, these are budget discussions so they're a little more definite than recommendations made throughout the year.
Secondly, and based on past circumstances, if this was an item Race, Gardner and Kirkham supported, they wouldn't have an issue at all with it being revisited.
No one said anything about proper practice when Raiser revisited a defeated motion, not even a tied motion (with everyone present), to allocate $25,000 from the Legacy Funds to the paddling club instead of the $10,000 passed at Committee of the Whole.
The thing is, everyone - including council members - has projects close and dear to his or her heart, and as much as politicians are meant to be objective, they're only human.
Not everyone is going to be passionate about the same thing, but that's why having a council with diversified interests (real ones, not election-time interests such as "I like economic development") is so useful.
Race likes sailing, Kirkham likes curling, Lalli likes soccer, Heintzman likes arts and theatre, Raiser likes mountain biking, Gardner likes international travel and Lonsdale loves her grandkids. These are not faults; they're part of human nature.
If Squamish wants unfeeling robots in council seats, I'm sure that's a possibility, but there probably wouldn't be a lot of community enhancement grants going around.
