This podcast interview is available on iTunes, Stitcher, Player FM, and right here:

Mary Rita Holland is in her second term as Kingston District 7 councillor and she describes the training that new councillors just received, accommodations for children in the meetings, and the choice she regrets from her first term.

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Q: The Kingston city council recently started a new four-year term and one of your brand-new councillors, Robert Kiley, wrote in the Kingstonist, “Speaking of meetings, that’s how we finished our orientation: in a mock meeting, with funny motions, like establishing a public kale bar, which articulated step by step what happens around the Horseshoe.” Were you at that practice council meeting?

A: I was. We focused on introducing some new food options, including real dairy products, at our council meetings. Currently we use powdered coffee whitener for members of the public and for staff and councillors. One of the motions for debate was whether we should move toward real dairy.

Q: What was the final outcome of that debate?

A: We voted in favor of real dairy products in our council meetings and I think we also voted in favor of the recommendation for a kale quinoa bar. That was a little less contentious. We do want to see more people come to our meetings, so the better quality the coffee and milk, hopefully the better the attendance!

Q: On April 7, 2015, you proposed having childcare for certain public meetings. What is this revolutionary, socialist utopian idea of yours?

A: I am a single parent, but I was aware of the fact that I was probably the first member of council in a situation like this–where if our meetings went really late and I had a babysitter, that was a problem for me. So it seems like there are a number of barriers for younger members of the public to participate in our democracy. I thought by introducing childcare at meetings, it might mean that for those families who wanted to get out and participate, they could do that and they could feel very comforted that their children were having a good time in the room next-door.

Q: I want to take the listeners to June 13, 2017. This was the start of what ended up being a 10-hour meeting over two days about a “third crossing”–a third bridge over the Cataraqui River. Right up top, Councillor Peter Stroud attempted to curtail that by moving that the staff presentations get cut so the question time could start sooner. The council defeated that idea. I understand that Councillor Stroud stepped out. Would you describe to me what you recall?

A: He stepped out of the room. I stepped out at the same time, although that was not coordinated in advance. But we had the same rationale for getting rid of that briefing: we’d already heard the information more than once. We thought the time would be better spent hearing from the public. In a bit of an act of protest, we both left the council chamber.

Q: What did you do?

A: I found Councillor Stroud standing at the front entryway. The two of us stood there at the door and complained a bit about the motion losing. We were frustrated with how the entire vote and decision had been proceeding all along. We were talking about it in the entryway. That didn’t seem wise and we don’t really have a private room for our own discussions at city hall. He said, maybe we should go across the street to the pub and chat a bit more.

Q: Did anyone come up to you while you were in the pub and say, “hey, wait. There’s a council meeting and you’re councillors, so…what?!”

A: No. Of course I had it in the back of my mind that it wasn’t wise to be leaving the building, but I guess given the fact that I knew I had to go back to that meeting and be composed, I thought it made a bit of sense to go and calm myself down a bit. It turns out there were members of the media in the pub. When I went back to my seat in the council chamber, there was a tweet going around about the fact that we had left.

Q: Reflecting on that tweet, do you think that take of “walking out on the job” was an accurate one?

A: Yeah, and I’m laughing about it a little bit today but that turned out to be a very difficult time. I care a lot about public engagement and the public trust and I want people to not be cynical. When I realized that this would make people cynical about politics, that it was a bigger deal than getting out for a breath of air, I felt really awful about it. I should have stayed.

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Follow Councillor Mary Rita Holland on Twitter: @MaryRitaHolland