Image credit: CFJC Today

By Mel Rothenburger

Armchair Mayor

ROTHENBURGER: A surprise piece of mail reopens the debate on mayor’s conduct

Apr 6, 2024 | 9:03 AM

THINGS SOMETIMES arrive in unexpected ways.

Take the Integrity Group report on an investigation into Mayor Reid-Hamer Jackson’s conduct at City Hall, for example.

The investigation, triggered by a shouting match between the mayor and a City councillor in the mayor’s office, was completed almost a year ago, and a report filed on May 31, 2023.

Hamer-Jackson has been trying to get hold of an unredacted copy ever since to find out the specifics of how he ran afoul of council’s code of conduct.

Not that the general contents of the report have been a total secret.

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It was leaked in whole or in part to a couple of the local media last summer and has been extensively reported on.

So the mayor has known the gist of it and the restrictions that were placed on him due to its recommendations.

After previously asking to see the actual report (the rest of the council got it in camera last June) without success, Hamer-Jackson received what was the equivalent of a plain-brown envelope in his mailbox this week.

It was mysteriously postmarked Tofino.

Let’s think about that for a moment.

Somebody in a far-flung community on the far West Coast had a copy of a confidential City of Kamloops investigation into the mayor’s conduct, but the mayor himself didn’t have one.

Now, he says, “at least I can defend myself.”

So how is the mayor going to do that?

He’s indefinite but figures the first step is via the attention afforded by media coverage since yesterday.

The incident with the councillor wasn’t by any means the only focus of the investigation conducted by the Vancouver-based Integrity Group but let’s begin there.

According to accounts of the incident, around 8:30 in the morning on Jan. 20, 2023, raised voices were heard from within the mayor’s office.

The volume apparently increased to the point that a number of staffers in nearby work spaces became concerned, one even wondering if 911 should be called.

The argument spilled outside the mayor’s office but the councillor then left the building, and Hamer-Jackson came out to apologize for the council member’s behaviour, though one staff member reflected that the mayor was “putting all the blame” on the councillor and not any on himself.

An initial investigation into the incident was conducted by the City’s safety manager and, as described in the Integrity report, interviews revealed that “this was not the first time the arguments with raised voices had taken place.

The arguments in the past have been between the Mayor and the same City Councillor, the City Councillor with multiple other City Councillors and the Mayor, and the Mayor and City staff.

None of these previous incidents have been formally reported.

When asked why other incidents were not reported, the staff state that they did not think to do so.”

Council decided to have a third-party investigation done.

That brought forward other alleged incidents between the mayor and staff members and the upshot was that Hamer-Jackson was found to have violated the code of conduct on various occasions with three employees.

Among other things, the report said he was disrespectful, insulting or demeaning at various times to those employees.

His conduct with the fourth employee didn’t violate the code of conduct, according to the report’s author, Terry Honcharuk of Integrity Group.

As per the report’s recommendations, Hamer-Jackson was prohibited from meeting alone with CAO David Trawin and certain other staffers, or even phoning them unless an approved third party is present.

Emails have to be vetted by the deputy mayor.

Hamer-Jackson’s determination to now defend himself comes with some challenges.

He could have done it when the investigation was underway but chose not to.

That resulted from Honcharuk’s insistence (which the mayor’s lawyer at the time, David McMillan, characterised as “absurd”) that the mayor consent to an appointment for an interview with Honcharuk before details of the allegations were released to him.

Now that Hamer-Jackson has the report, what’s he to do with it?

In deference to the privacy of the complainants, he surely won’t connect names to the allegations.

That’s not a total impediment to explaining his actions but it’s a matter that has to be handled very sensitively.

So, Hamer-Jackson’s new lawyers will look over the document and presumably provide him with some opinions.

Whether he’s able to delve into it in enough detail to offer a defence against the allegations, or whether Friday’s events will result in some sort of new investigation, remains to be seen.

AND MEANWHILE, Hamer-Jackson says he’s been informed that, along with the reinstatement of Byron McCorkell as Acting CAO, the mayor has formally been declared “unable to act” in future on any personnel matter involving McCorkell, including suspension.

And councillors added the complainants from the Integrity Group report as well as some other key staff members to the prohibition.

Authority for the order is council’s procedural bylaw.

Deputy mayors will now assume the suspension power as outlined in the Community Charter.

Mel Rothenburger is a regular contributor to CFJC Today, publishes the ArmchairMayor.ca opinion website, and is a recipient of the Jack Webster Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award. He has served as mayor of Kamloops, school board chair and TNRD director, and is a retired daily newspaper editor. He can be reached at mrothenburger@armchairmayor.ca.