On rubber stamps

There's been plenty of coverage from last night's Regina City Council meeting, with more surely to come. But aside from the complete refusal of any current Council member to respond to the concerns of the delegations who suggested giving citizens some say in a stadium proposal, perhaps the most striking comment is this one:

Audience members groaned with Clipsham (when he) said the city isn't ready for a referendum because "we don't know what we're voting on."

Which raises a rather obvious question: what exactly is there for Council to ram through (and the Premier and Mayor to hold PR stunts about) if we don't know what the plan actually entails? And given that a Council vote is no less binding than a referendum result, wouldn't we expect our elected representatives to actually ferret out some answers before offering their approval?

Saturday Afternoon Links

Assorted material for your weekend reading.

- Armine Yalnizyan discusses how free-market economic theory fails to take into account the realities of human (and other animal) behaviour:

Observing a group of chimpanzees she had trained to use currency to trade for food, Ms. Santos found monkeys don’t like to save. They often steal from one another and from the market “salesman”. And they display a tendency towards greed. Sound familiar?

There’s more, and it speaks profoundly to what makes rapidly expanding markets so prone to increasing risk. Confronted with complex decisions we make mistakes, panic and revert to basic instincts. One such instinct is a bias towards thinking in relative, not absolute terms. Another is a bias towards loss aversion.

Both lead to a simple and potentially disruptive truth: Humans don’t like to lose anything of value that they’ve obtained, and will actually take on more risky behavior with the object of value in a misguided attempt to save what they already had.

The research gives the lie to the notion that markets are rational. It sheds important light on ways to reduce risk and improve performance. And it suggests why markets tend towards greater concentration, an inherently unstable distribution of resources and power because it reinforces both greed and fear.

- Meanwhile, it's a day ending in "y". Which means that Erin has once again exposed a Jack Mintz tax-slashing screed as containing a typical combination of factual errors, questionable assumptions and non-disclosure.

- I've supported competing candidates in each of the last two municipal elections. But it's still a plus to see Fred Clipsham pursuing the NDP's nomination in Regina Qu'Appelle - particularly since the incumbent manages to stand out even among the Cons' invisible Saskatchewan MPs for sheer uselessness.

- Let's give due credit to the Sask Party for at least one form of democratic participation that's been excised from all other parties besides the NDP, as it actually saw a sitting MLA defeated in a nomination contest. Though that type of competition would have far more meaning if it wasn't limited to changing the individual responsible for defending policies not set by the party's membership.

- I don't dispute that it would be a plus to see usage statistics for SaskConnected - both to see how it's working now, and how it can be improved. But otherwise, David Seymour's attempt to sell the service off looks to be based on little more than the usual desire to hand free assets to the private sector rather than any valid reason why wireless Internet access can't practically be treated as a freely available public good.

- Finally, pogge nicely points out what's most frustrating about the current federal landscape:

This last extended break from blogging was originally prompted by illness but more recently I've simply had difficulty getting my enthusiasm for it back. Weighing in on the endless election speculation doesn't do a whole lot for me when I don't expect the outcome of an election to make a lot of difference in the direction the country takes. And I don't. When the rallying cry "Blogging for a Harper-free Canada" first surfaced a while back, my initial reaction was to ask myself why we should set the bar so low. I still think it's a good question.

And the likes of Thomas Walkom aren't helping matters by looking to keep the bar in position through the next election campaign.

On mixed messages

In general, last night's municipal election results seem to reflect loads of narrowly-missed opportunities for positive change. And a lack of citizen interest figuring to be the main culprit.

For example, Heather McIntyre fell just short of winning ward 2 in a race whose numbers look like an instant replay of the Hutchinson/Shreesh Juyal contest of 2006 - except that the nearly 2,000 votes which went to a third candidate last time out stayed home. John Conway came within 150 votes of beating out Fred Clipsham - and again, about 2,000 less people voted in the ward this year than in 2006. Indeed, while a few of the 2006 ward vote totals look to have disappeared into the ether, it looks like the only ward where the 2009 winner had substantially more votes than the 2006 victor was Ward 1 - and that primarily due to the fact that there were only 3 candidates instead of 9.

Of course, it's disappointing both that public interest in the elections dropped off so precipitously from its already-minimal levels, and that we won't have more direct positive change to show for all the hard work that went into the elections. But it's also worth noting that the incumbents can hardly feel particularly comfortable either, particularly to the extent any may have actually believed that the "83% council approval" number would be reflected in the vote totals.

Rather than being able to rely on any favourable public impressions to coast to easy victory, two of the incumbents fell and three more hung on by the skin of their teeth. And not a single one of the council candidates actually reached 83% of the vote in yesterday's results - with 2006 upstart Mike O'Donnell coming closest at 75% in ward 8.

So while there wasn't much of a mandate for change, nor was there any particular groundswell of support for the current direction of the city council. Which should give all sides reason to spend a lot more time and effort building citizen interest than they seem to have done over the last three years.

For more about the elections, see LRT and Dog Blog.

Municipal Election Breakdown - Regina Ward 3

I've mentioned before how fiercely contested the race figures to be in Ward 3, with the top two finishers from the 2003 and 2006 races joined by longtime school board member John Conway and newcomer Shirley Dixon. And not surprisingly with four strong candidates in the race, there are plausible scenarios where any one of them emerges victorious. But what should we be expecting come Wednesday?

Fred Clipsham - video profile

While Clipsham has faced criticism from a few different angles in the lead up to this fall's election, he still ranks as the favourite to hold the seat after mounting a surprisingly strong win in the face of tough opposition in 2006.

That said, it's still an open question as to whether it's for the best if he does hold on. Clipsham looks to be splitting the difference between parroting the "vision for 2020" line recited by so many of the incumbents, and discussing some potential progress on recycling, downtown development and culture. But for Ward 3 residents who would like to see their councillor play a more forceful role rather than going along with the party line, there's ample reason to want to see Clipsham dislodged from the seat.

John Conway - website

In contrast, Conway could serve as an ideal leader of the opposition on council: as a school board member he was the lone incumbent to lend his profile to the CCFR in 2006, and of course any candidate willing to discuss the problems with a city run based on the priorities of the business lobby looks to provide a much-needed challenge to the city's conventional wisdom.

But while he'd make an ideal gadfly on council, there's reason to wonder whether Conway would face some difficulty in actually working with other councillors to the extent there's an opportunity to implement changes. Which means that while Conway us probably the strongest challenger to Clipsham on paper, there may be reason for concern about what might happen if he succeeds in winning the seat.

Shirley Dixon - video profile

Having noted the contrasting problems with Clipsham and Conway, Dixon looks to be an ideal mix of the two in theory, combining a strong progressive platform with a willingness and ability to cooperate with others to get results.

But it's not yet clear that Dixon has developed enough of a profile to put herself in contention in a race against three high-profile competitors. Which means that the issue surrounding Dixon is less whether she'd would be effective if elected than whether she's actually within striking distance of winning the seat.

Don Young - video profile

In at least half of the contested wards, two-time-runner-up Young would rank at the top of my list of candidates thanks to his mention of union relations, arts and culture, transit and downtown development as policy priorities.

But in Ward 3, the fact that he ranks those concerns behind crime and traffic leaves him to the right of his competitors. And considering that Young finished a fairly distant second in 2006 even with an election's worth of experience and support behind him, there's reason to doubt that the formula will work any better this time out in any event.

Endorsement

With four at least somewhat appealing candidates in the mix, it shouldn't be surprising that this is the one ward where I'll hedge somewhat in my endorsement. For voters who figure that there's little chance of much positive happening on the next council due to the state of the other races (or who expect Dixon to end up at the back of the pack), there would be every reason to choose Conway over his competitors to try to move the Overton window to the left over the next few years. But I'm optimistic both that there will be a chance for the next Ward 3 councillor to form alliances with a few other progressives across the city to make some real policy changes, and that the race will be close enough for all of the candidates to stay in the running - so my endorsement goes to Shirley Dixon.

Municipal roundup

The Leader-Post updates a couple more entries into Regina's council races this fall. Incumbent Fred Clipsham will jump right in to the four-candidate pileup in Ward 3, while Danny Berehula will try again in Ward 7 after losing to incumbent Sharron Bryce in 2006.

While Regina doesn't figure to suffer from any lack of competitive council races, Saskatoon is apparently lamenting the fact that over half of its incumbents currently appear to be unopposed. But it's worth noting that the Star-Phoenix isn't exactly being subtle in pointing out which candidates it wants to see elected.

While progressive candidates Sean Shaw and Derek Rope don't get either any political identifiers or policy proposals mentioned in the Star-Phoenix' coverage, right-wing candidates Carol Reynolds and Mark Horseman are actually identified as such. And what's more, Horseman receives an opportunity to complain about city spending which is then reinforced by former councillor Owen Fortosky - meaning that even non-candidates spreading a message of spending cuts are being offered more attention by the Star-Phoenix than actual candidates who actually want their municipal government to be useful.

The field expands

Regina's Ward 3 race this fall was already shaping up to be lively enough with John Conway challenging incumbent Fred Clipsham. But there's now another strong candidate taking her campaign public, as Shirley Dixon has gone online with a Facebook group in support of her own challenge to Clipsham.

Dixon's supporters already include both SFL president Larry Hubich and Ward 6 contestant Brenda Mercer, and there figure to be plenty more yet to come. Which means that while we're still waiting for challengers to a stale slate of incumbents in most of the city, Ward 3 voters will once again have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to progressive options.

The race is on

I mentioned yesterday that Ward 3 looked to be one of the Regina city council races to watch. But I hadn't expected the race to get this interesting this early, as John Conway has announced that he'll be running for the seat while highlighting the need for more progressive discussion at the municipal level:

John Conway announced on Friday that he will be running for the position of city councillor for Regina’s Ward 3 in October’s municipal election.
...
Conway suggested Clipsham hasn’t been “aggressive enough in presenting debates on fundamental issues.” Conway wants to focus on taxation, the environment, affordable housing, unions, heritage properties and affordable opportunities for culture and recreation.

“I think I share with many people a perception that the current council basically is carrying out an agenda that’s set forward by the business lobby,” he said.

“I think council has not been a forum for public debate of the big issues facing the city … in a whole variety of areas.”

On your marks...

While talk about this fall's municipal elections probably won't start up in earnest until the end of the summer, let's note a couple of interesting storylines brewing in Regina's council races.

In Ward 6, Brenda Mercer, the former president of the North Central Community Association, looks to be putting together a well-organized challenge to incumbent councillor Wade Murray. But it's not clear that Mercer will have the field to herself, as 2006 CCFR candidate Jim Elliott is turning up in the media as one of a few voices taking a strong line against stadium construction.

Meanwhile, the race in Ward 3 looks to be hotly contested once again. Councillor Fred Clipsham is already facing criticism from the Leader-Post over his choice of priorities this summer - and a combination of bad press and a strong left-labour challenger could make Clipsham's re-election effort a difficult one.

(Edit: added labels.)

Rally capped

While last night's coalition rally has already been discussed by Saskboy and Buckdog, I'll toss in my two cents' worth about the evening.

The rally itself looks to have been a significant success. Even in the wake of yesterday's prorogation, enough people turned out to nearly pack the venue - and they were treated to a well-organized event and interesting speeches from Fred Clipsham, Monica Lysack and Stephen Moore. While Saskboy has documented a good chunk of those, one additional comment is worth mentioning: it was Lysack, a Liberal candidate in the 2008 federal election, who rightly pointed out the need for coalition supporters to keep pressure on the Libs' caucus in order to ensure that the coalition is still ready to take office when Parliament resumes.

All in all, the rally succeeded in firing up the troops. The downside, though, is that it didn't do much to get them organized going forward. Only Moore made mention of the need to discuss the coalition through personal connections in addition to writing MPs and media outlets - and there was no apparent effort either to collect information to determine who attended, or to establish any ongoing organization.

It's understandable to some extent that information collection could have been a thorny issue given the different parties involved in the coalition and the rally. But if the coalition is going to hold its own in a difficult PR battle, this can't be the last time people from multiple parties get together to show their support and discuss what's at stake. And if organizers have to start from scratch every time they want to get people together rather than building off the interest of the people who attended last night, then that looks all too likely to put the coalition at a disadvantage.