City Councillor Scott Elliott, also the Acting Mayor as Bob Simpson is away, is denying that the relocation of the Goldpan was done in secrecy…
“I’ve heard that claim as well and I am not exactly sure where it comes from.  We’ve been talking about moving the Gold Pan as part of the rebranding for years.  I am excited where it is located now.  The whole intention as we’ve been moving into the rebranding is to try and make Quesnel a place to stop for people, instead of stopping on the outside of town, getting a picture, and potentially just driving through. There is a brand new playground downtown at Lebourdais Park, a brand new arena.  You know, to me the placement is perfect.”
Elliott says they have been in conversations with the Ministry of Transportation about cleaning up that intersection for pedestrians getting through, so he feels it’s all coming together.
Asked about the minutes, and whether or not the moving of the Gold Pan was in them for some of the meetings, Elliott had the following response…
“The challenge with minutes is anybody that has sat in on meetings before is that they are never done verbatim, you’re never going to get every word mentioned in minutes.  You know people just don’t have the time to do that.  Quite honestly I have not gone back and looked at the minutes, but I will tell you that we have been talking about it for years.”
Elliott also denies that the public or that Council members have been muzzled on the issue…
“To me that is just a bizarre statement.  There are seven of us on Council, including the Mayor right. And we talk about everything.  Everyone gets a vote on everything that we decide so that’s just nonsensical.  I don’t know how else to reply to that, we all have the opportunity and everybody had a chance to speak about it.”
Elliott says the Gold Pan wasn’t on the agenda of one of the heritage meetings, which is why they didn’t talk about the Gold Pan.
He says they had a specific agenda that night and didn’t want to get sidetracked.
Elliott was also a little puzzled by the claim by some that the City relocated the Gold Pan “under the cover of night.”
“Why would you move something like that in the middle of the day ? We had to apply for permits weeks in advance.  When they came through it was moved and obviously, to me anyway, it had to be done at night when there is less traffic and less potential of someone getting injured or any kind of an accident so it all went smoothly as we hoped, and here we are.”
Elliott says nothing in this entire process was done in secret.