Terrace City Council had an unusual meeting April 14 with just Mayor Carol Leclerc and a few city staffers sitting far apart from each other in the council chambers owing to social-distancing measures because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Other council members participated via a conference call and although members of the public could not attend, the session was livestreamed, as usual, on the city’s website and on Facebook.
Speaking later, Leclerc said the mostly-virtual meeting felt “lonely”.
“The room just doesn’t have the same presence when people are on by telephone, you miss body language, you miss inflections in voices,” she said, adding that phone participation hampers the timing of conversations. “You’ll have a topic on the table and people want to get involved in the dialogue, [but] it’s more challenging when you’re on the phone, you’re not sure when to talk.”
Councillor Lynne Christiansen told The Terrace Standard that the mostly-virtual meeting was a challenge for all involved, but she is confident everyone will adapt to the new system.
“I’ve been on council over 20 years, [and] we haven’t had anything like this quite before,” she said. “I think it’s very workable, and we’re sort of getting used to it, ironing out the wrinkles.”
Christiansen said one benefit of council practising virtual meetings is that it could help them cut down on expensive travel to various conferences that councillors typically attend each year.
“In a way it’s a good thing to get used to, because, why the expensive travel, and the air flights damaging our environment, when you really can handle a lot of these things through technology?” she said.
There was some audio delay, interference and feedback on the conference call. Some watching on Facebook commented on the interference.
“This is extremely hard to hear!” wrote Shanon Young in a Facebook comment under the livestream.
Council will likely discuss ways to improve the flow of virtual meetings before the next public meeting on April 27, Leclerc said. Councillors might appear by video conference, instead of by phone call.
Council meetings will retain the mostly-virtual format until social distancing measures are lifted, Leclerc said.