Article content continued

The city had budgeted for all 15 members of council, including the mayor, to represent the city in Halifax — though not all them are expecting to attend this year. The cost to taxpayers is usually at least $2,000 per delegation member.

At Monday’s meeting, several councillors mounted a robust defence of attendance at conferences.

“This is vital in learning to become a better councillor,” Coun. Peter Demong told council. “This is actually the only way to do it — to learn from your colleagues, from your co-councillors, to learn from the courses and study sessions (the federation) has to offer.”

Demong added that some of the ideas he and other colleagues have brought back from conferences, when implemented, resulted in the city saving millions of dollars on items like pedestrian crossings and street lighting.

The mayor and some councillors also raised concerns about the timing of the motion brought by Davison, with some arguing that it was deliberately rolled out in a way to make councillors look bad.

“There is a committee that makes these decisions,” Mayor Naheed Nenshi said regarding conference attendance. “And this was never taken to that committee, it was taken directly to council and out in public first. I think that’s where you get some members of council’s backs up.”

The mayor and councillors Demong, Gian-Carlo Carra, Diane Colley-Urquhart, Druh Farrell, Ray Jones and Evan Woolley voted against the motion.

Davison denied that he was trying to play politics with the proposal. Following the vote, he admitted he was frustrated at times during the debate with his fellow councillors.

“Definitely the room was tense all day and that’s probably why the frustration was building a bit,”Davison said. “We tend to really want to just get our point in for the sake of getting points in and sometimes we don’t listen.”

The amended motion will also require councillors to report back to council on what they learned at conferences they attend.

mpotkins@postmedia.com