Time has come to bring back in-person council meetings: reader

Yorkregion.com
Nov. 15, 2021
Angela Grella

I would like to see the immediate return of in-person -- or at least hybrid -- council meetings.

Online council meetings must no longer be the status quo.

If fans are able to sit shoulder to shoulder to watch a Toronto Maple Leafs hockey game or Toronto Raptors basketball game at the Scotiabank Arena, and with the province lifting capacity limits in restaurants, bars, indoor meeting and event spaces, casinos, banquet halls in October, then it’s common sense that council meetings become in-person events.

After all, the council chamber is an indoor meeting space where issues and policies are discussed.

Proof of full vaccination would, and should, be required for everyone in the council chamber, councillors, York Regional staff, media and the general public.

I have contacted council members in Vaughan and elsewhere in York Region, and their respective clerks, and my question has not been answered.

Only two councillors responded back in agreement, saying that in-person is better than Zoom.

Let's open the doors to in-person democracy, where a two-way conversation may happen once again. Not just a five-minute virtual deputation and then the participant is muted or taken offscreen while the councillor is permitted to talk for as long as they want.