Council voted to request the federal government continue the mandatory long-form census at its last regular meeting on Monday, Aug. 16. Coun. Diana Scott brought forward the notice of motion.

It states that the long form census provides significant statistical data about our country, population and regional information, municipalities use the information from it to inform and attract investment, business and citizens and without it those municipalities and institutions would be missing key pieces of information. It also states voluntary participation is seldom as effective as mandatory participation and would almost certainly lower the number of returned forms, skewing data and that no one has every been jailed for not filling out the mandatory long form census.

“I really think it’s important to have the long form census continue to be mandatory,” Scott said at the meeting. “My experience and observation is if something is voluntary it doesn’t get followed through, despite best intentions.

“So many people depend on this information and it’s really, really important that it’s accurate.”

Council is requesting to Tony Clement, Minister of Industry Canada and Kootenay-Columbia MP Jim Abbott that the government continue the mandatory long form census and the resolution will also be forwarded to all Union of B.C. Municipalities member municipalities and Federation of Canadian Municipalities member municipalities.

After the meeting Mayor Scott Manjak said he didn’t oppose the motion but that his opinion differs.

“I don’t have a problem with it moving to a voluntary system, I really don’t. We elect our MPs to do a job, this is what they’re doing, this is the decision they are making, it’s the government making this decision. If it is the wrong decision then they will have to account for that,” he said. “Do I understand that certain organizations or municipalities may have a valuable interest in that data? Yes I do, but let’s also look at the other side of that — the fact is that when the census data gets put out and it gets to the community and service clubs, it’s usually two or three years old.“