None of Us is as Smart as All of Us
One of the oddities of a democracy is that there is no entrance exam, no educational prerequisites, no relevant experience that a candidate is required to have before getting nominated for election. To run for Prince Albert City Council, all you need is the specified number of eligible signatures on a nomination form and a financial deposit, and your name goes on the ballot. For city councillors, you have to live within the city boundaries, but not within the ward that you plan on representing.
One hopes that the electors take a variety of factors into consideration before casting a vote for their preferred candidate, but that's another one of the oddities of democracy. An elector is free to vote for whomever they wish, for whatever reasons that they consider important. No testing of what the issues are, or awareness of who the candidates are, just prove that you are who you say you are, and you're given a ballot to mark. And you have no legal obligation to vote, which is part of the reason why voter turnout tends to decrease every year.
But this oddity is also one of the beauties of democracy. People are elected to carry forward the views of those whom they represent, and then, collectively, to develop solutions to solve the problems of the community. The democratic system does not assume that the people who are elected have all the answers; it assumes that the collective thinking of a group of representatives of a community will come up with the best solutions that will work because they will have included a wide range of information and input.
But even this group of nine, in the case of city council, doesn't have all the answers. We have experts in various fields as part of city administration, with the expectation that they will provide us with the best possible advice before we have to make the decisions that, ultimately, we are held responsible for. And we understand that our experts don't have all the answers either – they need to ask others for advice and information when circumstances require it. A good example of this is the current water situation – city staff are working with Environment employees, not just on developing a solution for making our drinking water safe, but they're also getting assistance and advice on how best to keep the public informed, because Environment employees have much more experience on how to do this during an emergency.