More city councillors are sharing their thoughts and opinions on a proposed time change for Windsor city council meetings.
As heard on AM800 news Wednesday morning, administration is presenting a report to council next Monday, December 11, asking for council meetings to begin at 1 p.m. instead of 4 p.m. to address added costs and ongoing challenges posed by the current start time.
The report breaks down how meetings continue to take place in a hybrid format, requiring additional staff resources from Council Services, Information Technology and the Facilities Departments, resulting in increased resources both human and financial and budgetary dollars are limited.
Speaking on AM800's The Dan MacDonald Show, ward 9 city councillor Kieran McKenzie says he's annoyed council is debating the issue once again.
"This issue coming back once again to council and I'm strongly strongly opposed to what's being recommended," says McKenzie. "Whatever solution this is, it's a solution to a problem that affects 0.0001 per cent of the population."
He feels moving the meetings to 1 p.m. is a step in the wrong direction.
"This is very inward looking proposal," says McKenzie. "I would use the term and I will use the term here today and in council, I think it's a selfish proposal. It's only looking at a very small handful amount of people myself included."
Ward 3 city councillor Renaldo Agostino says he wouldn't mind see meetings begin at 9 a.m.
He says there are so many opportunities for the public to get online.
"People want to get engaged during the day," says Agostino. "People want to watch things, people want to sit at their desks, people either want to listen to the radio, people are more engaged during the day then they are at 4 o'clock, at 6 o'clock at night, they just are. It's human nature."
Ward 10 city councillor Jim Morrison believes there are real advantages moving the meetings.
"Before COVID it was an inconvenience to a lot of people to come down to city hall," says Morrison. "You might not even have transportation and so now you can actually participate from home or work or wherever you are on Zoom."
The report also highlights that the change in start time provides a safety net in terms of additional resources being readily available during regular office hours to troubleshoot technical issues and allow for the meetings to continue seamlessly.
A similar proposal was debated in November 2021.
At that time, council rejected a proposed 1 p.m. start time but agreed to moving meetings to 4 p.m. from 6 p.m.