Reasons for four-year civic terms pretty thin

FRIDAY MORNING EDITORIAL — It’s a done deal, so we may as well make the best of it.

The provincial government changed municipal terms from three years to four years this week, so when we go to the polls in November to elect city councils, regional district boards and school boards, we’ll have to live with our decisions for a year longer than we used to.

The four-year term has been up for discussion for several years. A government task force recommended it and, after some hesitation, civic politicians endorsed it.

Rationale for the change isn’t convincing. Those who support it list off the need to co-ordinate with provincial government terms of office, the fact that B.C. is out of step with what other provinces do, the supposed benefits of being able to plan things better, and savings from not having so many elections.

Of those, only the last one has any chance of standing up under scrutiny, and not much at that.

There’s no benefit to coordinating the elections of civic officials and provincial MLAs, there simply isn’t. The fact that other provinces do things differently than we’ve done is of no relevance either. How often do we hear politicians say that B.C. is better because we do it differently here?

Planning? That’s done over long periods of time and ensconced in community plans, strategic plans, zonings and bylaws, and adding a year to municipal terms has nothing to do with planning.

Saving on elections? OK, over a period of a couple of decades we’ll save the cost of one election plus a bit. But if the cost of elections is the issue, why not five-year terms? Or six? Or 10?

No, democracy is about making politicians accountable by making them return to the electorate for new mandates in a timely manner and after an appropriate length of time.

In the case of civic politicians, three years (the terms were two years until the 1990s, which was too short) has been a good compromise, a good length of time in which to judge whether our part-time representatives are the best we could find from the available gene pool.

Giving them another year will discourage some potential candidates who simply can’t commit to four years, and it will result in no improvements to our local economies or quality of life.

But it is, indeed, a done deal. The only way to make the best of it is to make the best choices we possibly can come election time.