After months of debate, Simcoe County council has agreed to specify the conditions that will allow the weighted votes system.
The system won’t be eliminated after all, since many councillors argue it is fundamental to fair representation across the region.
At this Tuesday’s council meeting, members approved two procedural changes to the use of weighted voting: first, separating recorded votes from weighted votes, and second, requiring that any request for a weighted vote be made before, not after, the result of a standard vote is known.
The motion passed by a weighted tally of 119 in favour and 26 against.
The changes were recommended by the county’s governance committee following a May 13 directive from council to clarify the rules surrounding the controversial voting mechanism.
Weighted voting gives councillors a number of votes proportional to the population they represent. It has come under scrutiny in recent months after many councillors walked out during a meeting where representatives were voting on a proposed bylaw that would have seen the number of councillors reduced from 32 to 16, plus a full-time warden.
Some councillors view this system as essential to equitable decision-making, but others raised concerns about the fairness and flexibility of current procedures.
Larger municipalities, like Bradford West Gwillimbury and Innisfil, have more electorates, so they are allotted more votes when council goes to a recorded vote.
Midland Mayor Bill Gordon has been vocally in favour of the way the system works now, saying that the walked out that happened in march was a “disgraceful partisan behaviour” on social media.
“Proportional representation isn’t a switch we turn on and off at will,” Gordon said at the meeting.
But not everyone agreed.
Innisfil Mayor Lynn Dollin supported changes in the system, saying that it allows for strategic manipulation. “You could have a vote, and if you didn’t like how it went, you could ask for another vote and have it weighted,” she said.
A separate idea of limiting weighted voting to budget matters only failed to gain support. That recommendation, if passed, would have granted each councillor a single vote on all issues except the annual budget.
Dollin said the governance committee declined to recommend that measure due to the reality that “at every moment, the financial impact of the issue is at hand.”
The final decision was to preserve the weighted voting system with three exceptions: it will no longer apply to council appointments, votes requiring a two-thirds majority, and to final votes on changing the composition of council itself.
