It wasn’t the kind of unanimous vote a Calgary city councillor would be looking for.

The first amendment put forward by Ward 14 Coun. Landon Johnston, in his first term in office, may have been well intentioned, but it failed in historic fashion at the Nov. 10 Regular Meeting of Calgary city council.

During consideration of a procedure bylaw motion setting up the upcoming budget deliberations, Coun. Johnston expressed displeasure that public submissions were being filtered through administration before appearing before councillors, or publicly. This specific motion would have only applied to the budget deliberations.

It was explained that the measure was in place to safeguard the city against publishing anything that may be defamatory, racist or containing hate speech, some of which may carry legal repercussions.

“Just so that you’re aware of the history, this provision actually was included in the procedure bylaw as a result of some problematic statements that were being made at public hearings, and council was interested in having a rule to ensure that there is a safe and respectful environment for the public, as well as to ensure that the corporation is not exposed to unnecessary liability,” said city solicitor and general counsel, Jill Floen.

Both Floen and city clerk Kate Martin said they couldn’t recall an instance where any information was withheld from the public under this provision.

Mayor Jeromy Farkas also weighed in, saying that if an item that makes defamatory allegations becomes part of the corporate record and is eventually published online, it could pose deep, unintended consequences for both the city and the individual.

“It seems like we’re curtailing freedom of expression based off of…Well, first off, we have a chair that oversees this council, and it’s your job to ensure that things go smoothly,” Johnston responded.

“If somebody does come up and start spouting out hate speech, then it would be your job to curtail that. And so, I would like to add an amendment to eliminate that policy to allow submissions to be read as is.”

The proposed amendment found a middle ground

The item was postponed so an amendment could be drafted that reflected the free speech concerns of Coun. Johnston, but considered the legal implications for the city around defamation and privacy concerns.

“This amendment tries to strike a bit of a middle ground by eliminating that safeguard whereby the city clerk and the city solicitor generally make that determination, by allowing council to see the information before it is published, receive advice, and then make a determination whether or not it would be published,” Floen said.

Johnston said he was OK with the amendment, provided council could see the submissions before a decision was made.

“My idea is just to ensure that public have a right to be here to speak with what they want to speak about, and I understand there’s an inherent risk to allow people to speak, but I think we have to set a standard that this new council is going to listen, and part of that is listening to stuff you don’t necessarily agree with.,” Johnston said.

 “My biggest fear is that administration curtails that that freedom of expression that we have in Canada, and I’ve seen it before, and I want to put it to council to just even for the budget as a test, just to see if we can trust the people to come here and be respectful, but also be able to speak with whatever they want to speak about in regards to the agenda Item.”

The item was seconded by Ward 13 Coun. Dan McLean, who later said he just wanted the matter to hit the floor to be debated. Without a seconder, it would have failed to make it to debate.

‘Not the best use of council’s time’

Fellow councillors understood the basis of the amendment but couldn’t support it. Even the motion’s seconder, Coun. McLean. He said it’s not just cases of profanity or racism or defamation; there have been cases of people have come up to sway city procurement, by putting their company in front of administration.

“A lot of this is just speeding up the process. It’s not all about suppressing free speech at all,” McLean said.

“So, I won’t support this. I understand the intent, but I just wanted to add that context.”

Ward 2 Coun. Jennifer Wyness said there’s already a process in place to protect the City.

“We don’t want to cost taxpayers more money by leading into a lawsuit. So, this is not the best use of council’s time,” she said.

Ward 5 Coun. Raj Dhaliwal said that giving councillors options to go in camera to talk about individual submissions just means more time in camera.

“We want to cut in-camera meetings, but here we are keeping an opportunity to increase in-camera, so I have no idea what this amendment is trying to achieve,” he said.

Ultimately, the motion failed 0-15. One long-term councillor said never seen a unanimous decision against something, including the original amender.

The time-spent issue was also a factor, as during last week’s organizational meeting, Coun. Johnston questioned the need to vote on a council seating plan, saying that it was a waste of taxpayers’ money.

Johnston’s amendment took roughly 30 minutes on the floor, and an unknown amount of time between he, the city clerk, and the city solicitor to craft.

He said that he, like many of the other councillors, is learning on the fly. Still, he wanted to ensure that all submissions were seen by city council and not shot down or ignored before it was daylighted to the public.

“I do apologize to the taxpayers that I wasted half an hour of their time, but the idea is that this should be a safe place for people to say and do whatever they want, in my opinion,” Coun. Johnston said.

“Obviously, we have safeguards against that. But if we can start pushing that envelope further back to freedom of expression in Canada, I’m going to try to do that, and I think that is what’s going to, in my opinion, save taxpayers a lot of money in the long run, because you’re going to start hearing more solutions to problems because you allow more people to speak freely.”