North Frontenac council wrote a COVID-19 vaccination policy into the rules for itself and its committees in December 2021, and took it out fifteen weeks later. It did both without a recorded vote, so no member's name sits against a yes or a no on either. Two members of that council are seeking another term on October 26.
On the evening of December 20, 2021, seven people sat down in the council chambers in Plevna for a meeting of the township's Economic Development Task Force. Councillor John Inglis chaired it. Councillor Fred Fowler was one of the seven. One item in the meeting's notes is a single sentence: "Those present viewed the mandatory Covid-19 Vaccination Education Video."
Ten days earlier, council had passed two by-laws. One amended the procedural policy for council, committees and task forces, and its title ends "COVID 19 Vaccination Policy." The other did the same to the Committee of Adjustment. Council repealed both on March 25, 2022, fifteen weeks to the day. That day it voted to strike "the Sections regarding Vaccination Status, Testing Requirements, Education Sessions."
Both times, the by-laws went through on a bundled list with a mover, a seconder and the word "Carried." At the meeting that passed them, council took recorded votes on other business, with every member's name on each. Under the Municipal Act a vote is recorded when a member requires it, and on these by-laws no member did. In March the repeal came just before the by-law that set your tax rate for the year.
To be fair about the money, there isn't any to follow. The township's COVID fund bought gloves, sanitizer and new chairs for the chamber. No line in any year names vaccination, proof, testing or verification.
The rule went past the council table. The Committee of Adjustment is the body that decides whether your neighbour can split a lot, or build closer to the water than the zoning allows. Its members are residents appointed by council to read severance files for the rest of us. I count at least sixteen people the two by-laws reached: councillors, committee members and task force volunteers. Most of them were appointees.
The council has turned over since, though not all the way. Fred Fowler moved the motion that brought both by-laws to the table in December and seconded the one that passed them. He's acclaimed in Ward 3. Wayne Good moved both motions that repealed them in March, and he's an incumbent in Ward 1. Each of those motions carried a whole slate of by-laws at once.
Two more names are on the ballot. Cyndy Bonello, a Ward 1 candidate, sat on the Economic Development Task Force through this, the kind of body the first by-law's title reached. Gerry Lichty, now the mayor and on the ballot again, sat on the Committee of Adjustment the whole time.
I read all three regular council meetings held while the rule stood, end to end. Not one carries a vaccination item. No declaration, no session, nothing. Those present at the December task force meeting, meanwhile, had sat through the video.
Gerry Lichty, Wayne Good and Cyndy Bonello are candidates in the October 26 election; Fred Fowler is acclaimed in Ward 3.