The resignations of three McBride councillors, which left the village run by the two remaining community representatives, has "astronomical impacts," McBride's mayor said.
"We will be very restricted in the work that we can do as a quorum of two until there's a new by-election," said Loranne Martin, adding she expects that to happen in March.
"In the meantime we won't be able to do much business at all. The new council will have to be prepared to hit the ground running because there will be a substantial backlog of unfinished business."
On Tuesday, Community Minister Peter Fassbender signed a special order that allowed Martin and the sole remaining councillor Rick Thompson to create quorum, but severely limited their decision-making powers.
"We recognize that a number of serious concerns have been raised within the community," he said in a statement. "Their focus should only be on decisions essential to sustaining the operations of government."
The 2017 budget, strategic planning and grant applications to help pay for staff will all have to wait for the village of about 600 people.
The town's business is already behind because it's been without a financial officer since August. A new person filled that role about three weeks ago.
"She's going to be spending a great deal of time catching up on all the financial duties that haven't been done," Martin said.
An inspector of municipalities went to McBride this week to work with the community and prepare it for a provincially paid municipal advisor, who Fassbender will appoint.
That person, whose name has not been announced, will work with village staff and council "to help stabilize municipal operations in the short term."
Martin said she expected an announcement on that front next week.
Before Sharon Reichert, Ralph Bezanson and Edith Tracy resigned, Martin said she'd already called on the province to step in because of recent problems with attendance.
Over the course of the year, she said Bezanson missed five council meetings, Reichert missed four, Tracy missed three, she missed two and Thompson missed one. But she said other key meetings were missed and during a Nov. 8 session, the three walked out.
"That required me to contact the solicitor and the province and request assistance because there was a pattern of purposefully missing meetings," Martin said.
Reichert has said over Facebook this is an "outright lie."
Reichert has also said she wanted the mayor investigated but wouldn't say more due to legal reasons and in a statement the three said they had concerns, The Rocky Mountain Goat reported. The three have not spoken publicly or released a statement to say what the concerns are.
Martin said the resignation letters didn't specify a reason either.
"There's never been any detail," she said.
"They've been asked on numerous occasions what they wanted investigated and we have had significant challenges over the last year but it's all been public."
But she can point to several key moments and decisions in the village's recent history that led to the toxic relations between council members today.
"Over the last 12 months, we've really faced significant challenges," she said.
Much of it is tied to the fallout from the 2015 deficit after the lagoon road washed out, leaving the main sewer trunk suspended over two fish-bearing streams.
That repair created the deficit, but a staff member - no longer working for McBride - didn't account for the loss at the beginning of the next year's budget, she said.
Tack onto that $9,000 for an audit of the 2015 budget "plus extra staff costs to correct erroneous information," she said.
By the time they got to 2016 budget, the deliberations were "quite controversial" and ultimately passed on a first and second vote 3-2, with Martin and Thompson "adamant" in their opposition. In the end, she said, the village hired an accountant to amend the 2016 budget due to errors.
"Council members are opinionated, that's okay," she said.
"There's often lively debate and that's good but if it gets to the point where village business doesn't get done, that's our fiduciary duty and you have to put your personal differences aside when you sit at that table and concentrate on the task at hand and do what's best for the community."
Much of that problems can be connected to the fact that all members were new to council, Martin agreed.
"There's a huge learning curve and you have to be willing to put that time in and going to conferences," she said. "It's incumbent upon every councillor to learn the community charter and to know what's expected of them when they run and when they sit at council tables."
In her public statement last week, Martin said two former councillors faced human rights and WorkSafeBC complaints.
"They are there, we will have to deal with them," in the new year said Martin, who declined to say which councillors faced each complaint.
Even with the turmoil that has followed council for nearly its full term, now midway through the four years, Martin said she's confident three people will step up to take on the role.
"I've been absolutely forthright with them about the volume of work that needs to be done and responsibilities of council members," she said, adding some have expressed interest in running.
The mayor has faced criticism - most forcefully from the former councillors who questioned her leadership.
And last March, Martin was at the centre of a wrongful dismissal ruling, where the former public works supervisor claimed he was fired by Martin the day after he attended a meeting about unionizing. Village staff have since unionized.
"There's been a lot of allegations and misinformation floating around. I've been addressing it as I can," said Martin, who told the village a few months ago that she had breast cancer and her schedule would be affected because of radiation treatment in Prince George.
"Moving forward I think the proof will come out in the pudding and all I can do is to continue to work away at things and move the community forward as quickly as I can."
