There is a growing belief that Victoria city council is not listening. This belief poses a serious threat, not only to the well-being and character of our city, but also to the faith that citizens have in their local government.

As a longtime observer of city politics and as a Victoria councillor, I have witnessed over the past 10 years the systematic erosion of confidence in the way decisions are made and a corresponding coarsening of our civic dialogue.

The root cause of this decline in confidence comes from the limitations placed on citizen input to council decision making.

This reduced citizen input takes three forms.

The first is the reduction in opportunities for members of the public to address council directly at regular evening meetings. Council has only 10 meetings per year, where six people can address any topic of concern for up to five minutes each.

There is another evening meeting where members of the public may speak for five minutes each for up to a total of two hours.

Another way to influence councillors is to send an email. Before the adoption of the new Official Community Plan, councillors typically received between 500 and 1,000 emails per week, including orchestrated campaigns. In a recent week, we received about 150 emails.

A petition about the OCP from a James Bay Coalition of Residents, recently submitted to council, had 2,337 signatures. This compares to 1,457 Victorians who completed the engagement survey, which was intended to guide development in Victoria.

The James Bay petition did not affect council’s decision to proceed with its plans.

A significant sidestepping of public input occurred with the OCP discussions. Provincial direction to municipalities states that there should be one or more consultation periods after the plan has been made public. Victoria council failed to follow this directive on public input.

The 14-storey Geric building proposed at Montreal and Belleville streets is a case in point. The boundaries of the expanded downtown zone and legislative district were shifted without public discussion or awareness.

Originally zoned R-3 (low-rise, multi-family), the site under the new OCP could accommodate 12 storeys. In the words of Trevor Moat, “… rights have been transferred from the community of residents to the community of for-profit developers.”

One interesting exception to this pattern is the plan to renovate Centennial Square. It took hundreds of submissions to City Hall, plus petitions with more than 7,000 signatures, vocal protests and several councillor motions over a two-year period before the project was halted.

The second cause of reduced public input is “delegated authority,” a process approved by council in 2024 by a vote of 8 to 1.

“Delegated authority” means that city staff can approve, negotiate and administer matters affecting our city without council approval or input.

This process has its advantages. It streamlines decision-making and relieves council of minor and technical decisions. However, it also prevents councillors and the public (through councillors) from being aware of or appealing decisions made by city staff.

While the province prohibits public hearings on development proposals that fall under the OCP, it does not prohibit councils from reviewing proposals, receiving public comment and/or making decisions on proposed developments.

However, council closed this avenue of public input by preventing itself, through delegated authority, from exercising its prerogative. Another lost opportunity for public input.

The third cause of secretive city governance is the use of closed (in camera) meetings. Closed meetings are necessary to protect solicitor-client privilege, intergovernmental communications, collective bargaining matters, among other issues.

But closed meetings can be used to sideline dissenting views on council. Here is a recent example.

I put forward a controversial motion in an open meeting of council. I was informed that my motion was not to be heard in an open meeting but rather in a closed meeting.

Now, here is the problem. According to rules of this council, if my motion goes to a closed meeting, I would not be allowed to talk in public about my motion – ever.

If I did, I would be subject to removal as a councillor by a vote of council.

Motions die silently in this way. We are all losers when ideas can be killed with no opportunity for public input.

This pattern of keeping the public in the dark has had many negative consequences. No councillor ran for office on a platform of permitting six-storey apartment buildings in residential neighbourhoods or for supervised consumption sites in residential neighbourhoods.

Yet, that is what we have today, both with no allowance for public input.

This input is vital to a well-run city. Those who take time to come before council or who write emails invariably provide valuable insights into finding reasonable and workable solutions to our problems.

There is hope that we can find our way out of this problem. In Victoria, a dedicated handful of people follows council. These people have been vocal in their unhappiness with the way things are. They are clear in their opposition to the pervasive influence of narrow interest groups and to ideologically based projects.

To make our local government more accountable and to ensure that city councillors listen to all voices in Victoria, we need to become more vocal and more active in demanding open governance.

Voting for change every four years is not enough. We need voices in the media, in neighbourhood associations and in other public forums that will speak out when they are told that decisions affecting their lives have already been made.

Other jurisdictions give us examples of successful opposition to council decisions.

In Burnaby and Saanich, public backlash to council decisions (four-storey multiplex residences in local neighbourhoods and the Quadra-McKenzie plan) has forced councils to alter course.

We can do the same in Victoria.

We must do the same in Victoria – if we are to preserve a vibrant public dialogue on the many important challenges facing Victoria.