Wards and Wardens

BLOG POST posted on January 14, 2013 by Grant Fraser

About four months ago I began this series with an in depth analysis of voting patterns at Vancouver City Hall.  Time to check in on their progress and discuss electoral reform issues.  What changes, if any, should be pursued?  There’s bound to be differences of opinion but perhaps consensus agreements can be reached that while not perfect, can be acceptable to as many people as possible.

To start I want to provide a brief recap of what we have done (mostly) wrong in civic and provincial politics.  We may not be perfect but we should be able to learn from our mistakes.  With a provincial election just around the corner we should consider what to expect.  Is change on the horizon or more of the same with or without a new Premier?  And what effect, if any, will it have on civic politics?  Do we even want to see changes to our political system?

The first step along the path to democracy is finding the best method of electing our representatives.  Choosing our current system is a step in the wrong direction, quite an accomplishment when you’re in the starting gate but not something to be proud of.  In actual fact Vancouver started out with a ward system (also a poor choice) and then moved backwards to the current at large system, stopping only briefly for a test run of proportional representation in annual elections from 1921-1923.

BC itself has an interesting history.  They have always held on to the ward system although in 1952-1953 an Alternative Vote method was used for two elections, bringing in WAC Bennett.  But the most interesting part of BC’s electoral history is that it was originally determined that political parties should not exist.  This lasted for 30 years.  Of course originally there were no political parties at the civic level either.  There is ample evidence to suggest that the partisan politics we struggle to avoid goes hand in hand with the weak voting systems we use.  Perhaps a discussion needs to take place as to why partisan politics does need to be avoided and why many would choose to instead defend its’ existence but I’ll save that for another day.

If we want change in our democracy then what form should it take?  Also, if we can’t get exactly what we desire then what compromise solutions would we find acceptable?  In Vancouver there is agreement among all parties that reform to existing election rules is needed, in particular campaign financing.  But come election time in 2014 you can bet there will be no change to campaign financing rules.  Why?  Because the provincial government has refused to change the rules despite acknowledging the wishes of all civic parties.  Sadly most of the rules regarding municipal elections are not permitted to be decided by its’ own residents.

What hope is there for contested change to our prison system, sorry, political system if we can’t even change something that is agreed upon by everyone?  The answer lies in the supposition that everybody does not want campaign financing rules to change, they only claim they want them changed.  That would of course be the wardens, sorry, politicians, currently in power or possibly hoping to be there soon, of Vision and NPA.  The solution would then seem to be simply removing these barriers to change, or at least reducing them to less than a majority.

In the previous election Vision and NPA received nearly 75% of the votes, an apparent mandate for supporting the status quo.  Is that just the money talking or can the results be justified by a demonstration of 11 independent voices at City Hall?  When I left off last time the question was would there be any signs of change in City Hall voting patterns.  Let’s look at how our representatives from the top two civic parties and Councillor Carr have performed recently.

Since Vision councillors recorded a perfect combined total of 355 votes in complete agreement while absent for an average of 11.25% of the votes per councillor, their agreement rate has risen to a minimum of 96%.  Councillors Affleck and Ball have dropped slightly to 90.24% overall due to Councillor Affleck’s increased opposition to Vision while Councillor Ball has actually seen a small increase in agreement with every councillor except Affleck.  Councillor Ball is easily the most improved councillor of the last four months, using this measure of independence.  Councillor Carr has seen no significant changes and as such still far outperforms all others.  The overall grades after this semester are as follows:

                         Jul                   Dec  

                        2012                2012

Carr                   B                        B

Ball                   D-                       D

Affleck              D-                      D-

Reimer              F                         F

Louie                 F                         F

Stevenson          F                         F

Tang                  F                         F

Deal                   F                         F

Jang                   F                         F

Meggs               F                         F

Robertson          F                        F

As can be seen, Vision grades reflect their reluctance to break ranks.  In comparison, there is only one difference.  Councillor Ball has moved up from her D- predominantly as a result of agreement rates with Vision councillors moving to as high as 31% and all eight being over 26% for the last four months.  Contrast this to the first analysis where typically the agreement rates ranged from 18%-22% except for Councillors Louie and Reimer at 26%.  At the same time Councillors Ball and Affleck dropped to 87.5% agreement rate.  Small differences to be sure but it’s a start.  We will watch to see if Councillor Ball continues to distance herself from her NPA colleague.

I should mention some testing of random (independent) data using the same formulas was done.  Because of sizeable variations in random results and small sample size, lower than expected scores were obtained.  A new grading scale is being developed or perhaps multiple scales for varying vote quantities which will increase grade scores by roughly one level.  With this proposed scale, six Vision councillors would have received a D- originally but only three this time around, other Vision councillors still receiving F.  Their scores remain sub par despite the enhanced grading scale.

I think the conclusion is that there is small variation but no significant change in the voting patterns.  Did we expect any different?  What will the next four months bring?  Only time will tell but another, probably redundant, report card will sum it up again and again.

To return to the discussion of where we would like to see our democracy go, let’s consider the always discussed but seldom acted on topic of wards.  Regular discussions about going back to a ward system have been going on for decades occasionally peaking with a new referendum and more often than not receiving over 50% support but never implemented.  Where do the main parties and the general public stand on this important issue now?  It’s safe to say that Vision and NPA are content with the at large system while COPE and the NSV crew are leaning towards change to a ward system.  Most of the general public seem to be unaware of the importance of the question and will simply take whatever is force fed to them.  And all the time, few people seem to champion the possibility of proportional representation.

I firmly believe that if we are to move forward with our democracy then we must have proportional representation as a starting point in order to fix all the problems that cause people to view politics negatively.  That doesn’t seem about to happen unfortunately but some think that moving to a ward system is a first step, achieving neighbourhood representation and bringing more voices to call for further improvements.  As you can guess, I also believe that independent voices are more valued than block votes.

So what do people think of the idea of wards?  I’d really like to know.  I’m not even sure what my thoughts are.  I certainly wouldn’t campaign for it because it’s ultimately not the solution I’m looking for.  But if we had another referendum?  I would likely hold my nose and say, “Well it stinks, but not as badly as what we have now”.  Kind of how I feel when I consider voting in most elections.

Does a ward system conflict with the possibility of proportional representation?  Another good question.  At first it would seem that to obtain pro-rep, we could not have more than two or three “wards” which does little to address the issue of neighbourhood representation when you consider we have 37 recognized neighbourhoods.  The City of Vancouver website amalgamates this down to 21 but even then they can’t be adequately represented at the community level by 10 councillors.

Should City Council be expanded?  Expensive if we were to maintain the current pay level.  Perhaps a second tier of “Community Councillors” that could occasionally have more power than the traditional City Councillors.  Of course this does nothing to address the problem of how people are elected.

Maybe the solution is a compromise of wards (one vote) and at large (pro-rep, not the current system).  In my opinion, debate should be started immediately but not on whether or not we should move away from the either the current at large system or wards, but rather what the compromise position would look like to allow proportional representation to finally take a lasting foothold in our democratic history.  Whatever ideas seem plausible, put them to a referendum (status quo not being an option) and continue to refine those ideas with further referendums. What’s your opinion?