What can Sarnia council actually promise?

A reader urges voters to distinguish between what municipal candidates can do through city council and what they can only advocate for elsewhere.

It’s election season, and one thing I’ve noticed often is confusion about levels of government and their respective powers, among both candidates and voters. Candidates can make promises they aren’t in a position to deliver, while voters may make decisions based on expectations that no mayor or city councillor could realistically fulfil.

Whether you lean Liberal or Conservative, one question is worth keeping in mind through the campaign noise: “Could Sarnia council pass a bylaw, approve a budget item or direct city staff to make this happen?”

If the answer is no, we should consider what the candidate is actually promising.

City council and the mayor should certainly advocate to Queen’s Park and Ottawa. In fact, effective advocacy is crucial to being an effective municipal leader. A mayor can push for changes to health care, immigration policy, criminal justice, provincial funding or other issues affecting our community.

However, it’s important to distinguish advocacy from authority.

“I will fix this” is a very different promise from “I will advocate for this.” Candidates should be clear about that distinction, and voters should expect them to be.

This extends to problems whose solutions involve the County of Lambton, provincial agencies, the federal government or private businesses. Municipal leaders may have influence, partnerships and a public platform, but that doesn’t mean Sarnia council has the power to make the final decision.

Municipal elections should be about holding local representatives accountable for the things they can actually influence. When candidates spend their entire campaign promising solutions outside their authority, it becomes much harder for voters to judge what they can realistically accomplish during their term.

I think there are three questions a voter should ask before accepting a campaign promise:

• Who actually has jurisdiction over this issue?
• What specifically can Sarnia council do about it?
• Is the candidate promising action or promising advocacy?

We don’t all have to agree on what Sarnia’s priorities should be, but we should at least make that decision with an accurate understanding of what the people we’re electing have the power to do.

– Josiah A