Regina City Council expands ethics training, adds 2SLGBTQIAP+ and accessibility awareness

The City of Regina is reviewing its ethics bylaw, focusing on improving councillor training and tightening rules around conflicts of interest.

Regina city council amended its code of ethics bylaw to improve city councillors training and tighten any conflicts of interest members may have.

At Wednesday’s meeting, council voted 8 to 1 in favour of including mandatory 2SLGBTQIAP+ and accessibility awareness training for council members as part of its The Code of Ethics Bylaw.

Ward 1 Coun. Dan Rashovich voted against the motion raising concerns about how much the city currently spends towards integrity and ethics training for city employees and councillors.

“During the last couple of budgets, I’ve brought up the fact that we have the Charter of Rights, we have human resources, we have all these in place to protect people,” Rashovich said

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“[For] us to get granular and focus on certain segments of population, I don’t believe that’s necessary. I don’t know if I can really support the fact that certain people have to be forced to take certain types of training when we have the Charter of Rights. If you don’t treat, if I don’t treat someone well, I’m sure I would be reprimanded.”

Currently, the city budgets $50,000 annually for its integrity commissioner fees. However administration pointed out costs may fluctuate as the work is “complaint-based.”

The amendment to the ethics bylaw will cover conflicts of interest, confidential information, communications with the public and the media, gifts and benefits, support for charities, and employment of relatives.

The approved motion also proposes changes to The Cities Act, meaning the process on how formal and informal complaints are made will be adjusted. It also proposed changes to sharing anonymized complaints, timelines, and limits on complaints involving former members.

Council also voted to allow Regina’s integrity commissioner to investigate all the conflict of interest complaints made towards councillors.

The commissioner will have the authority and ability to amend reports and confidentiality requirements.

“This has been quite some time in the making. That’s one of the items of really trying to have a robust kind of bylaw for council to be accountable,” Mayor Chad Bachynski said, referring to council’s reason behind the approved motion.

“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 degree and hold ourselves to a high standard as we should.”

He added a review of The Code of Ethics Bylaw has been in the works since the previous council.