REGINA - City council meetings in Regina have been notorious for going long into the night, but the latest one was over after just a half hour.
There were only a few routine items on the agenda of council Wednesday afternoon, with presentation of the 2023 Henry Baker Scholarship winners being the main highlight.
Mayor Sandra Masters pointed to very few agenda items that came out of last week’s Executive Committee meeting as the reason, with that meeting's agenda largely devoted to the 2024 budget update.
“We don’t historically have short meetings,” said Mayor Masters. “Our Executive Committee meetings are eight hours long, sometimes they run a bit long, but there’s an extensive debate normally that happens at Executive and the thought going into council is a lot of that debate has already occurred, you should be able to get to the decisions of council which is where it’s made.”
The city has been making moves this year to try and cut down on the length of time of meetings. In June, council passed a resolution to adopt a consent agenda format, and directed the City Clerk to come back in the third quarter with a recommended consent agenda model for council to adopt, as well as bylaw amendments to the Procedure Bylaw.
The thinking has been that a consent agenda will expedite the more routine council items and get those passed quickly, allowing council to focus on other matters that require more discussion and debate.
While this was a short meeting Wednesday, it was packed with business and the highlights are as follows:
Henry Baker scholarship winners announced
A particular highlight was the announcement of the 17 recipients of the annual Henry Baker Scholarship, which goes to students pursuing their post-secondary education in Regina. The scholarships are awarded by the city in recognition of their academic accomplishments and for making a difference in their community.
“It’s always incredible and it’s a very hopeful day when you see how driven and community-focused these young folks are,” said Mayor Masters to reporters.
The 2023 recipients of the Henry Baker Scholarship, valued at $2,000 each, are as follows:
Saskatchewan Polytechnic, Oleksandr Lysenok.
First Nations University of Canada: Dayne Stevenson.
University of Regina: Aliya Donison, Aurora Shire, Emma Schmidt, Evan Arnold, Jaxon Thorne, Julia Forrest, Kaden Wood, Duncan Clark, Dylan Sies, Emily Geddes, Faith Reddekopp, Dhruval Shah, Krish Sheth, Amy Hunter and Rokhsareh Kakvand.
Council items passed
Among the items on the agenda Wednesday was the approval by council of the use of a registered voters list for the 2024 municipal election. For the city of Regina, this means they will enter an agreement with Elections Saskatchewan for information sharing, with the changes aimed at making it easier and more accurate to register voters and update voter information. Saskatoon is also planning to go this route for 2024.
Also approved was appointment of a new city solicitor. Council voted unanimously to appoint Shannon Williams, K.C., to the role effective Nov. 6. Williams has 18 years experience, with extensive background in government, and was described as extremely well-qualified. She most recently has worked as a Senior Crown Prosecutor with Public Prosecution Services of Canada.
Also approved was a land sale agreement for city-owned property along Dewdney Ave. to the numbered company 101109230 Saskatchewan Ltd. As part of the deal, the City of Regina will acquire the eastern-most portion of property at 1891 Dewdney Ave. for a new public lane, which will provide them access to their nearby pump station. The City would receive net revenues of $106,904 from the overall deal; that approval was carried.
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