In an issue that dates back to 2001 when current Williams Lake City Councillor Ivan Bonnell was then-Mayor, the Board of Education for School District #27 (Cariboo-Chilcotin) is proposing to change the way that School District #27 Trustees are elected
Earlier this year - the School District took the issue, along with Rural Education/SD27 Strategic Plan, to several public meetings throughout the Region in Feb/March 2016 which you can read a story on that from the Williams Lake Tribune here. You can review the Trustee Electoral Boundary Review proposal yourself here.
As a result of the City of Williams Lake boundary expanding over time and the Cariboo Regional District's (CRD) Electoral Area boundaries shrinking, also over time - the School District's Trustee Electoral Zones, particularly Zone 5 (WL Rural Fringe) and Zone 6 (City of Williams Lake) were not adjusted accordingly.
As a result, some people who reside in the City proper may vote for a Trustee in Zone 5, rather than Zone 6. Furthermore, some people on top of Fox Mountain, as a result of boundary re-alignment still vote for a Zone 5 Trustee/CRD Area F Director, even though their properties are physically within CRD Area D.
The options for review are:
1) Option 1 - Realign Trustee Boundaries to Match City of Williams Lake and Cariboo Regional District boundaries (Maintain 7 Trustees)
2) Option 2 - Reduce Zones to 3, with elections at large. Zones 1 to 3 inclusive (CRD Areas G, H, L and District of 100 Mile House) would become one Zone and elect 3; Zones 4/7 (CRD Areas F, J and K) would become 1 Zone and elect 1 and Zones 5 + 6 (CRD Area D/E + City of Williams Lake) would be one and elect 3
3) Option 3 - Reduce Zones to 2, with elections at large. Zones 1-3 would be one big "Zone" with 3 people to be elected at large and Zones 4-7 would become one big "Zone" with 4 to be elected at large
4) Option 4 - Reduce Zones to 6, with elections at large. Zones 1-4 would elect one Trustee, Zones 5+6 would elect two at large and Zone 7 would elect one at large
Williams Lake City Council, meeting as a Committee of the Whole, will review the above 4 options at their meeting on Tuesday evening
At their April meeting - the Board of Education discussed meeting dates in the month of June to review these options with elected officials from the Cariboo Regional District, City of Williams Lake and the District of 100 Mile House. As of this writing, I, as the CRD Area D Director, have not received an official request to meet from the School District
It will be interesting to see what the Board of Education does with this proposal, going forward...
~SF
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