Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps hopes her upcoming meeting with Community Minister Coralee Oakes is a chance for in-depth talk about the way the capital region is run.
“The message is it’s really positive that the minister is reaching out to the mayor of Victoria, and hopefully other mayors,” Helps said.
“This has been a conversation that’s a long time coming and I look forward to seeing some action, and I look forward to working with the minister on this.
“I really hope that she and her staff get a study on regional governance underway.”
Helps first asked for a meeting in February.
The request came in a letter she wrote to Oakes on behalf of Victoria council, in which she called a regional governance study “exciting and potentially transformative.”
Asking to see Oakes came after a “clear referendum” in November that showed how Victoria voters feel, Helps said.
There were 18,351 Yes votes and 4,601 No votes to the question: “Are you in favour of reducing the number of municipalities in Greater Victoria through amalgamation?”
Eight of the capital region’s 13 municipalities had amalgamation-related questions on their Nov. 15 election ballots.
While there were differences in what was asked, a majority of voters indicated they favoured either moving in the direction of amalgamation or having a study of the issue.
“Residents of our region have made it clear that there is a real and widespread interest in studying amalgamation,” Helps wrote in her letter.
Helps asked that a study be based on 10 guidelines, as put forward by the Amalgamation Yes group, which has been advocating for amalgamation.
Those guidelines include engaging with First Nations, having opportunities for the public to meet with the study team and giving consideration of residential, commercial, urban and rural interests.
The guidelines also call for more than one option for what is done with municipal boundaries.
