City councilor Dawn Luhning was unable to get the votes Monday night to pass a motion that effective immediately all outstanding, current, and future legal files and agreements be sent to outside legal counsel for review and opinion, including all legal agreements since the departure of the assistant city solicitor and up until a new city solicitor is hired.  

The city has been without a city solicitor since the retirement of Myron Gulka-Tiechko in July. Luhning felt as elected officials they need to protect themselves. 

“I want the opinion of a lawyer that these agreements have been vetted through legal because I'm on the hook,” Luhning said.  

“If something goes wrong anywhere and until we have a city solicitor in that chair, I think it's only prudent of us to ensure that we have the legal opinions that we need to execute these agreements.” 

The city has hired a head-hunting firm to go across Canada to find a new city solicitor and assistant city solicitor. 

Currently, all agreements come across the city manager’s desk. Many of these agreements follow templates set out by the past city solicitor for standard agreements.  Any agreements outside of those templates are sent to outside counsel.  

“In other cities, I worked in, we didn't have a legal counsel on staff and so we had to refer out a number of different issues to external counsels in some cases,” said City Manager Jim Puffalt.  

“We are actually very fortunate in Moose Jaw. We're one of three (cities) in the province that actually has these solicitors on staff, and it's a huge benefit to the city and our operations.” 

The majority of city councillors were concerned about sending every single standard agreement to outside legal counsel and the price tag that would come with it.  

“This motion is an every-document type of motion. I would like to see us use the city manager’s discretion and look at which things he feels put this council in some jeopardy and make sure that those are vetted by legal counsel, and which ones are standardized contracts that can go through without that additional work,” said Mayor Clive Tolley 

Puffalt estimated that the cost to the city would be $500 to $600 per hour for outside lawyers to take a look at every document. 

The motion was defeated with councilors Crystal Froese, Kim Robinson, Doug Blanc and Mayor Tolley opposed.