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An inquiry to administration initiated by the previous Regina City Council is resulting in changes being made to the city’s code of ethics.
Council endorsed the recommendations at its meeting on May 20.
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“I think it does put some good guardrails and governance around council to make sure that we’re kind of playing in the lanes that we should be,” Mayor Chad Bachynski said following the Wednesday meeting.
The recommendations were contained in a pair of reports forwarded to council, following a closed session of executive committee on May 13.
The first report outlined mandatory training to be required by council members, ensured compliance with policies, directed how council interacts with city employees and governed use of city property.
It also outlined options to deal with complaints informally, set a deadline for filing a complaint, and clarified the role of the integrity commissioner.
The second report recommended allowing the integrity commissioner to investigate conflict of interest complaints – authority that was given to cities in changes to the provincial Cities Act in 2020.
“This has been quite some time in the making and so that’s one of the items that really is just trying to have a robust, you know, kind of bylaw for council to be accountable,” Bachynski said.
“That’s really how I look at it, the long list of items (are) items that I think we can all get behind if we’re truly trying to govern ourselves to a high, high degree and hold ourselves to a high standard, as we should.”
It also updated how councillors should treat confidential information, guidelines for how they should communicate to the public and the media, and clarified which gifts should be publicly disclosed.
A review of other cities was requested by the previous council in April of 2024. In response, the administration looked at 20 cities, including Saskatoon.
The reports noted that comparisons with Alberta and Ontario cities were still looked at, despite the fact that since the information was gathered, those two provinces began moving towards provincial codes.
One other change that emerged from the closed executive committee meeting was that councillors should be required to attend training for 2SLGBTQIAP+ and accessibility awareness.
The administration told council the training is the same as that which all city employees are required to take part in.
The changes will now be drafted in a bylaw to be voted on at the next meeting.
Debate delayed on employee return to work
A pair of motions by Ward 10 councillor Clark Bezo were not debated as expected, but instead tabled due to Bezo’s absence from the meeting.
A proposal to require all city employees currently working from home or in hybrid arrangements to return to the office was postponed until the meeting scheduled for June 24.
Another proposal relating to overpass incidents will be discussed on June 10.
