City council shows uptick in fiscal conservatism, finds study

An analysis of the voting records of Calgary city council members by the Manning Foundation concludes the current group is more likely to hold the line on taxes than the last council.

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The pro-free market non-profit foundation for democratic education unveiled its new council vote-tracker website on Wednesday.

Using minutes from council meetings, researchers looked at how the politicians vote on key issues andhow often they vote with andagainst their colleagues.

Preston Manning, the foundations president, says the data should be of interest to Calgarians since many people dont know how their elected officials are voting in meetings.

And its harder for voters to track the voting behaviour of city politicians compared to other levels of government, he said.

Because of the freer voting, it's fairly complex at the municipal level so we're hoping that this willjust improve people's understanding of what the council does, he said.

The study also reveals that the current city council spends more time in closed-door meetings than the previous council.

The data is available at counciltracker.ca.

The Manning Foundation says it plans to regularly update the site with vote results from each council meeting.