The appointment of Andrew Niven to fill the vacant town council seat is raising questions about the electoral and democratic process in Niagara-on-the-Lake.
The Lake Report asked a group of community members for their opinions and found, from this group’s perspective, it’s not so much that it was done, nor who was chosen, but rather that the selection was made under the veil of secrecy.
Niven, chair of the Niagara-on-the-Lake Chamber of Commerce and NOTL Tourism, was appointed in a special, closed-door meeting of council on Oct. 16, filling the seat vacated by Nick Ruller in September.
“I was kind of wondering how they came to that decision,” Blair Cowan told The Lake Report.
Cowan is a NOTL resident and an administrator of the Facebook group page NOTL 4 All, which has become a drop box of opinions on the matter.
His curiosity is well-placed.
The agenda for the special meeting posted to the town’s website, ahead of Oct. 16, read: “Options to fill vacant council seat” as an item of discussion.
When the meeting opened, council went immediately into a closed-door session.
When they emerged an hour later, the announcement that Niven had been appointed was made.
Lord Mayor Gary Zalepa told The Lake Report, following the Oct. 16 meeting, deciding in a closed-session meeting was the proper way to handle the matter.
“Any time you are in a public meeting and you’re going to begin to identify individuals and have conversations pertinent to individuals, that qualifies for what is called a closed-session meeting,” he said.
The “options” referred to in the title of the meeting were neither made public nor were they discussed in an open forum.
However, despite Cowan’s original question of how Niven was chosen, he said he has faith council made an educated decision.
“I wasn’t questioning it in a nefarious way,” he said.
“I seriously assume that it was done in the interests of Niagara-on-the-Lake.”
Cowan is aware of the other options for filling the empty seat available to council, he said, which included holding a byelection or appointing a runner-up from the last election.
He’s glad council chose the route they did.
“I don’t think we need to go through the expense of an election,” he said. “Not enough people vote municipally anyway, in my opinion.”
Cowan went as far as to message Niven on Facebook to congratulate him.
“I hope that people are kind, is what I told him. I believe that he generally cares about the community.”
Lifelong NOTL resident and local realtor Thomas Elltoft watched the council meeting from home via a livestream and was so riled up by what occurred, he took to Facebook to announce his displeasure.
He was not only upset about the secrecy of the closed-door session, but since he too knew the legal options council had to fill the role, he took exception to council going against the more electoral solution.
“Rather than going with the most democratic approach and going with the next highest votes (from the 2022 election) as previous councils have done for about 80 years, they went into a closed session and came out an hour later and chose someone who did not even run in the last election,” he wrote on his Facebook wall.
“Wow,” he continued in the same post. ”I didn’t think this crew would risk stooping so low.”
Elltoft, in a subsequent interview with The Lake Report, said he especially expected more from the lord mayor.
“Even our present mayor became a councillor originally because he was the ninth seat after the election,” he said, referring to Zalepa’s appointment to council in 2008. “Why have they gone against precedent?”
Elltoft has many questions unanswered.
“Who is Andrew Niven?” he asked. “It doesn’t matter what talents he has or how his character stands up.”
“He could be the best councillor we have but we don’t know anything about him (because) it was all done in a closed-door session.”
Mike James, who retired to NOTL about 10 years ago, is a little less forgiving in his opinion of how the process was undertaken.
“I have just two concerns,” he said.
“Number one: For democracy to be successful, we have to have confidence in the people we elect.”
“Premise two,” he added, “is that in order to gain that confidence, we have to have transparency in the decision-making process.”
That confidence and transparency is easy to deliver, said James.
“If you make a decision, whether I’m in agreement or not — that’s the normal part of democracy — I have to (know) the rationale from the person making the decision as to why they went that way.”
James would still like to hear from the lord mayor and council as to why they chose to go with an appointment and not a past runner-up.
“I know it’s legitimate, but it’s concerning because it’s gone against historic precedent.”
When stay-at-home mom Mariah Reese heard the news she, at first, wasn’t aware of who had been appointed and questioned council on its actions.
“The closed-door meeting did seem a bit odd,” she said.
However, after later learning it was Niven who had been appointed, she said her fears were lifted.
“My first reaction was true excitement, and how I honestly could not think of anyone better for the spot.”
Reese, who has been a NOTL resident for 10 years, said she’s known Niven for three years thanks to a relationship that began when he reached out to her on Joyous NOTL, the Facebook page she administrates.
Joyous NOTL is a group “with a focus on how wonderful life in NOTL is for its citizens and visitors,” said Reese.
Once a month, Reese sends out a thank you basket for the post that stands out as the most joyous.
Not long after the page was created Niven reached out to her, she said, and offered to help with the baskets.
“However, his contributions are not only material and he has demonstrated a degree of compassion, empathy, and selflessness that is above what I would expect in general from within the Joyous NOTL group,” she said.
As for how she feels about Niven as a councillor?
“Only time will tell,” said Reese.
“I do fully believe that he will do everything in his power to make this town a better place and do what he can for the people of this town.”
