PEI

Communities short on nominees given extension, minister may have to intervene

Finding enough candidates to make up a council is proving to be a challenge for several Island communities.

17 municipalities have until Friday to find enough candidates

Sarah Weeks, the municipal electoral officer for Hunter River, Darlington, and North Wiltshire, says the communities she's worked in put in the leg work to recruit new candidates. 'We've had it posted on websites, there's been notices in the newspapers, there's been stuff on social media, we've reached out to past councillors.' (Steve Bruce/CBC)

Finding enough candidates to form a council is proving a challenge for several Island communities.

Seventeen municipalities, a quarter of all P.E.I. municipalities, have had to extend their nomination deadline by a week. That new deadline is Friday, Oct. 26 at 2 p.m.

Sarah Weeks, the municipal electoral officer for Hunter River, Darlington, and North Wiltshire, said the nomination and election process is new for these communities.

She says in the past, councils were created at less formal meetings. 

"With a special elections meeting, it was one evening where people came, were nominated from the floor, and then elected," she said. 

Now, under the new Municipal Government Act, she said these communities have to follow new election rules.

'A little bit daunting'

Under the act, communities must fill six council seats and a mayor position, and nominees need to commit to holding six meetings a year. 

"There's more with the Municipal Government Act, more bylaws, more administration for smaller communities that may not have as much infrastructure or capital," she said.  

'Sometimes there's a bit of a hesitation as well. It's like, well, if they have everybody they need, I won't bother. Now, if they realize there is that need, they'll be more likely to step up,' says Sarah Weeks, the municipal electoral officer for Hunter River, Darlington, and North Wiltshire. (Steve Bruce/CBC)

"So to go to six meetings a year, passing bylaws, that type of thing, it can be a little bit daunting."

Weeks said it's also harder to convince people to run through this formal nomination process, where they have time to think about it and fill out their papers, versus what sometimes took place at community meetings. 

"I think in some cases, they felt like they were pressured. They were put on the spot," she said. 

Samantha Murphy, manager of municipal affairs with the Department of Communities, Land, and Environment, said she's not surprised. 

Murphy said even under the old process, finding six councillors for a community was a challenge. 

'We knew this would be a change in process. And while we worked with municipalities to do a lot of communication, it is a change,' says Samantha Murphy, manager of municipal affairs at the Department of Communities, Land, and Environment. (Steve Bruce/CBC)

"People couldn't always make those special elections meetings, if they were taking place at night. Other people didn't want to attend to vote because they didn't want to be nominated," she said.

"There's a whole range of reasons, why the old process, even though it was simpler, wasn't as democratically fulsome as we would've liked."

She said many councils just carried on with vacant positions. 

Under the new rules, if any of the 17 communities still have vacancies after Friday's extended nomination deadline, it will be up to Minister of Communities, Land, and Environment Richard Brown to figure out what happens next. 

"If we find that people in a certain area really just didn't know about it, maybe it's a byelection. Or, maybe it's a conversation about, 'What is it about being a municipality you value? Are there other ways to meet those needs?'" 

Murphy said the minister could decide to let councils carry on with a vacancy, recruit and appoint councillors himself, or start a discussion about amalgamation.

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With files from Steve Bruce