ABSTRACT

At the October 24, 2022 Cochrane Town Council Meeting, a motion by Councillor Fedeyko to restore the comments to the town’s official Facebook page, after the Administration had decided to disable such comments as of September 27, 2022, was defeated as a result of a tied 3-3 vote, with Mayor Genung and Councillors Flowers and Reed voting in opposition. Unfortunately, Councillor Tara McFadden, who would have voted in favour of the motion, was called away at that time before the vote took place.

Therefore, when Councillor McFadden brought forward a motion to reinstate the public’s ability to comment on the municipality’s Facebook posts at the July 10, 2023 Council Meeting, the expectation was that this time around the motion would be approved, as was the case with Council voting in 5-2 in favour, with Mayor Genung and Councillor Flowers continuing to be opposed.

While the outcome of the vote this time around, given the full complement of Council being present, was to be expected, the real story that residents of Cochrane should be aware of was the low esteem that Councillor Alex Reed showed for many residents of Cochrane. In his prepared statement arguing against the restoration of comments (that occurred between 3:08:24 minutes and 3:10:30 minutes in the video from the meeting), Councillor Reed expressed concern that an unsafe situation, whereby some will be  “intimidated, harassed, and degraded” and will have to deal with “half-truths and lies”, will be generated at the Facebook page because of “Internet trolls, social media bullies, social media bigots, and wannabe fringe politicians who lure (lurk?) in the shadows of Facebook and elsewhere”. As well, he expressed the view that it was time to pushback against “those people”.

FULL BLOG

At the October 24, 2022 Cochrane Town Council Meeting, Councillor Marni Fedeyko introduced a motion to restore the comments to the town’s official Facebook page after the Administration had decided to disable such comments as of September 27, 2022. After 33 minutes of debate where the Administration weighed in with its arguments for about 40% of the time, the motion was defeated as a result of a tied 3-3 vote.  This was a skirmish over who runs the town and the Administration prevailed because three Council members, Mayor Genung and Councillors Flowers and Reed, who also had a low regard for freedom of speech and public engagement, chose to yield to Administration’s authority on the matter.

As explained previously, the most likely reason that the town Administration decided  to disallow comments at the Town’s Facebook page was because it was upset over the pushback received at the Town’s Facebook page  with respect to Administration’s decision go along with Justin Trudeau’s decision to give federal employees a day off with pay to commemorate the Queen’s funeral, which was not supported by the Alberta government.

Unfortunately, Councillor Tara McFadden, who would have voted in favour of the motion, was called away before the vote took place at the October 24, 2022 Cochrane Town Council Meeting. Therefore, when Councillor McFadden brought forward a motion to reinstate the public’s ability to comment on the municipality’s Facebook page at the July 10, 2023 Council Meeting, the expectation was that the motion would be approved, as was the case with Council voting in 5-2 in favour, with Mayor Genung and Councillor Flowers continuing to be opposed.

The debate and vote on the motion to restore comments on the Town’s Facebook at the July 10, 2023 Council Meeting occurred between 3:05:45 and 3:23:26 minutes in the video from the meeting.

While the outcome of the vote this time, given the full complement of Council being present, was to be expected, the real story that residents of Cochrane should be aware of was the arrogant low esteem that Councillor Alex Reed showed for many residents of Cochrane.

In his prepared statement arguing against the restoration of comments that occurred between 3:08:24 minutes and 3:10:30 minutes in the video from the meeting, Councillor Reed expressed concern that an unsafe situation, whereby some will be  “intimidated, harassed, and degraded” and will have to deal with “half-truths and lies”, will be generated at the Facebook page because of “Internet trolls, social media bullies, social media bigots, wannabe fringe politicians who lure (lurk?) in the shadows of Facebook and elsewhere”, and personally thought that there was a need to “pushback against those people”. Needless to say, he didn’t provide a shred of evidence to support his outlandish accusations of his expected behaviour by residents of Cochrane.

In his view the need for a supposed “safe place” should override freedom of speech. Reminds one of the ‘safe spaces’ created at woke universities to protect snowflake students from views and opinions they don’t like and might find offensive.With such an attitude Councillor Reed would no doubt get along swimmingly with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s and his ongoing intent to censor opinions he doesn’t like.

Councillor Susan Flowers, another staunch opponent to allowing comments at the Town’s Facebook page, added to the alarm claiming there was a need to protect Town staff and the Council from abusive behaviour that can impact the “mental health” of those who are at the Ranche House.

Not expectedly, Mayor Genung, who characteristically tends to align himself with the Administration, voted against the motion along with Councillor Flowers, who generally looks over to see how Genung will vote and follows his example.

Despite his earlier spurious arguments against allowing comments on the Town’s Facebook page, Councillor Reed surprisingly broke ranks with Genung and Flowers and voted along with McFadden, Fedeyko, Nagel and Wilson. That may have to do with Mayor Genung having suggested that he and Reed “could do some behind the scenes work on some software”, presumably to find ways to moderate the content of comments made at the Town’s Facebook page.

Councillor McFadden’s presentation of herself as someone who is committed to championing public engagement rings hollow given the many occasions that she, as well as the other councillors, have chosen to ignore my email queries, the most recent being my query related to the announced study to be undertaken in partnership with the Government of Canada to plan for the electrification of the Town’s COLT buses.

UPDATE, November 16, 2023

The post below at the town’s facebook page by the town’s Administration seeking input on the draft 2024-2026 budget is laughable given that the Administration had shut the comments down in September 2022 and was forced to restore those comments in July 2023 as a result of a motion  brought forward by Councillor McFadden with Council voting in 5-2 in favour, with Mayor Genung and Councillor Flowers continuing to be opposed.