I made a presentation as a ‘delegation’ to Cochrane’s Town Council at its Regular Council’s Meeting on June 14th. 

The presentation, “Getting Down to the Facts on Covid-19”, begins at 2:45 minutes and concludes at 14:59 minutes.
https://youtu.be/LH6q0BwC1gM

A pdf copy Getting Down to Facts on COVID-19.

Response from and my interaction with the Town Council followed from 14:59 to 26:48 minutes.

While the Mayor and several Councillors thanked me for coming and making the presentation, my appearance that evening before our elected representatives may not have happened if it were up to the unelected Administration. More on that will appear in a separate post entitled, “What Might Not Have Been”. 

You can look upon this post as the local media report that never appeared. I was particularly disappointed with Noel Edey with Cochrane Now, who I had considered to be a fair and honest journalist, a rare breed in this time. When I last gave a presentation to Council in January on the CMRB, he was the only journalist who contacted me afterwards and put out what I considered to be a fair report. This time, crickets. To no surprise there was nothing in the Cochrane Eagle, but I will wait until next week before I pass judgement on their ignoring my presentation to Council even though previous ‘delegations’ to Council, such as the man arguing about his water bill and the lady complaining about her parking ticket, having received a lot of ink from the Cochrane Eagle. 

The Administration had instructed the Council to accept my presentation as information (https://cochraneab.civicweb.net/document/32182/Delegation%20-%20Mr.%20Voss.pdf?handle=4E55E262E1714E7E95CA0C95CB15AA27 ) that is, in my view, basically not to take any action on my recommendation to reject the destructive lockdowns and join Liberty Coalition’s End the Lockdowns National Caucus. I concluded my talk urging the Council to ignore Administration’s recommended response and, instead, to take action on my recommendation through an appropriate motion. Mayor Genung sidestepped such action, saying that it wasn’t Council’s “practice to make a motion right out of the gate on something like this”. While it may not have been normal practice, it certainly wasn’t prohibited. The Mayor emphasized that he was concerned about the divisiveness arising over COVID-19, which may have been a signal to the rest of the Councillors to remain neutral on this matter, that is, to accept my presentation as information. 

After putting the Administration’s recommended action, that is, to “accept the presentation as information” on the floor, Councillor Nagel, while noting that he was “not a huge fan of what went on with the lockdowns either ” and viewed it as an “an over-reaction worldwide driven by fear”, he was optimistic that the Kenney government, as promised (subject to 70% of Albertans having received their first jab of the experimental ‘vaccine’) was going to be giving our freedom back in July. However, if we did go back to lockdowns again, he would then consider signing a petition or joining whatever group opposes lockdowns. 

Seemingly, as a way to pass the buck, Councillor Fedeyko asked if I had contacted and presented my information to the Alberta government. I explained that was a laughable suggestion given, for example, that all I have ever received in response to the many submissions to our MLA (Peter Guthrie) was an automated response, and I wondered if he only existed as a robot. She continued that everyone around the table was excited about being on the verge of things opening up and hoping “never having to discuss this entire issue again” (all I can say to that, is ‘stay tuned’).

Councillor Wilson wondered whether or not this topic was the proper purview of municipal politics and expressed concern about how our civil liberties had been suspended and eroded during the last 16-18 months. While expressing optimism, like Councillor Nagel, about a light at the end of the tunnel, unlike Nagel, he declared that although not seeing a lot of support for it around the Council table, he, nonetheless, would be willing to join the Liberty Coalition’s End the Lockdowns National Caucus, which he has done 

(https://www.libertycoalitioncanada.com/end-the-lockdown-caucus). 

The discussion with the Council came to a close with Councillor Flowers saying that she trusted the government as having done “a great job” in dealing with “this horrible situation”, offering as evidence that “we are not burying bodies like they are in India”, which presumably is her expectation if the government had not introduced its restrictions related to COVID-19.

Two councillors, McFadden and Reed remained silent on the issue. 

The briefing note provided by Administration to the Council (https://cochraneab.civicweb.net/document/32182/Delegation%20-%20Mr.%20Voss.pdf?handle=4E55E262E1714E7E95CA0C95CB15AA27 ) offered Council two options in response to my presentation, either to accept my presentation as information (Administration’s recommended response) or “That Council accept the presentation as information and provide Administration with further direction.” With respect to the latter, I wish that Council had instructed Administration to take down those offensive, manipulative ‘Our Actions Make a Difference’ billboards distributed throughout the Town (mentioned early in my presentation), which basically carry the social-shaming message (propaganda) that if you don’t “follow public health orders”, then you are not “kind”; then you are not “considerate”.

UPDATE, December 17, 2024

In this interview, “How COVID Exposed Institutional Failures in Healthcare“, Dr. Roger Hodkinson, who was my primary ‘witness’ for my presentation to Town Council in June 2021, provides an in-depth look into some of the harsh realities, faced by medical professionals navigating through the COVID era. Dr. Hodkinson, a pathologist, has been outspoken in his critiques of pandemic responses that lacked scientific rigour and ignored patient rights. Everything ‘said’ by Dr. Hodkinson in my presentation has turned out to be true, wisdom that was essentially ignored by the Council and the Administration.