It was an awkward sentence, and nothing more.

That was the clarification from Coun. Dale Henderson after he made an eyebrow-raising comment Tuesday night as council debated delaying a decision on a contentious north London development.

“Before tonight, we had eight votes to vote what was here right now,” said Coun. Dale Henderson, who supported the development.

That drew catcalls of “Harmony Grand Buffet” – the downtown restaurant where six council members enjoyed a pre-budget buffet that’s now being probed by Ontario Ombudsman Andre Marin.

Henderson, who’s debate comments can get jumbled, said what he said sounded much different than intended.

“I’m guessing” the support was there, he said afterward. “From my assertation of what I’ve seen for the last year . . . you get to see what people are doing.

“What I meant was, the way I read the people (on council)” there were at least eight votes to support the development.

It didn’t sit well with one council colleague, Joni Baechler, in whose ward the proposed development is located.

“I’m shocked to hear there were eight votes, from Coun. Henderson, going into this meeting,” she said.

But Mayor Joe Fontana shrugged off any inference made after Henderson’s comment.

“I’m not getting into that,” he said. “I haven’t the faintest idea” what he meant.

So when is a lunch just a lunch?

And when is it enough to make some wonder whether city councillors are brushing up against Municipal Act regulations?

That’s the question raised by long-time city hall watcher Barry Wells, who first reported that last Tuesday lunch at a downtown buffet was shared by six council members who all voted together on many items later than night on the city budget. (Here’s the Free Press story.)

I raised the matter with Mayor Joe Fontana, who did tell me there was a lunch, and there were budget issues discussed, but it’s something he sees no problem with. Here’s what the mayor said:

“First of all I was invited to attend. Yes, I went. My No. 1 priority is to make sure I’m always engaging with council members so from time to time they call me, from time to time they walk into my office, from time to time two or three of them will come and say ‘you know, mayor, we think we ought to do this differently’ and so on and so forth.

“This really is no different. I was invited to this luncheon and didn’t know who was going to be there and essentially sat down for 20 minutes and talked about a whole range of issues, as per usual.”

Asked if they talked budget, he said: “Not all budget-related issues.”

But some?

“Well, sure. Budget-related issues – a lot of people wanted to talk about Paul Hubert’s survey.”

Regarding any concerns, Fontana said: “I don’t know what the issue is. I meet with council members all the time.”

Greater public access to local politics? There’s an app for that.

Or, at least, there could be if a London web developer’s push to raise enough cash to develop one hits its target — and the early indications are nothing but promising.

Prompted in part by council’s controversial budget proposals, Gavin Blair has taken steps to develop an app that would deliver city hall details, perhaps most notably how each councillor voted on a given issue, to Londoners.

To do it, Blair is trying to raise $5,000 on the online fundraising website IndiGoGo, money that would pay for someone to help design and develop the app.

He launched his effort at one o’clock Tuesday, with some fear that it would sit at zero for the 60-day fundraising period.

But after 48 hours, he’d already raised $1,760.

“It’s fantastic,” Blair said. “I put this thing up on IndiGoGo and I expected nothing to happen.”

The app, Blair explains, would include voting records that are “crowd sourced” — coming from members of the public in attendance, for votes for example — and also include related news articles and councillor tweets.

He points to Open Parliament as the kind of ideal he’d like to create at a local level.

To donate to Blair’s efforts, click right here.

It might be worth noting that Ontario Ombudsman Andre Marin’s examination of closed-door city council meetings is far from exclusive to London.

With the watchdog’s office in the midst of interviews with London politicians over a confidential November vote relating to Occupy London, Hamilton city council has been bracing for a report from Marin’s probe into a breakfast meeting between Steeltown councillors and a National Hockey League official two years ago.

This according to local media, which reported three days ago that Hamilton politicians were wrestling with how to handle an offer to privately review a draft of that report.

Here’s the link to The Spec story. Just passing it along.

Council’s decision to nix a previously approved $600,000 outdoor light show during the 2013 world figure skating championships could hurt the city’s reputation as a host of future such events, Tourism London’s board of directors says.

In a letter going to council Tuesday, Brad Rice, the board’s president, said the sport’s governing body, Skate Canada, has indicated that if the nightly light show isn’t restored, the decision “could have a serious impact on whether London will be recommended for future international events.”

If the show doesn’t go on, he adds, “existing and future partnerships would be compromised and London’s credibility as a ‘can do’ city would be severely undermined.”

That Tourism London is irked by the decision is of little surprise — that much was clear as soon as council voted to axe it — but Rice’s letter underscores what light-show supporters have said throughout: that going all-out for events like the massive figure skating showcase builds London’s case for future big-league events.

For politicians who voted to nix the lights, though, the problem is clear: It’s just too much money, with no lasting benefit, in tough economic times.

It’s of course worth noting, as Rice does in his letter, that the city is still spending some $3 million sprucing up downtown for the event.