Integrity Commissioner will ask Court to remove another BLR Councillor

For the second time in seven months Brudenell Lyndoch Raglan’s (BLR) Integrity Commissioner, Peggy Young-Lovelace of Expertise for Municipalities (E4m) will be taking Court action in an attempt to remove a BLR Councillor from office. Council was advised of this at a Special Council Meeting on June 16 held in the Palmer Rapids Community Centre. BLR provided both a video link (via Zoom) and telephone link to the meeting. Despite the links, the meeting was attended in person by Young-Lovelace as well as Sean Sparling who introduced himself as Manager of Investigative Solutions Network (ISN), who are based in Sudbury and Sault Ste. Marie respectively. Above Sean Sparling (left) and Peggy Young-Lovelace. Photo source BLR video link.

As previously reported, last November Young-Lovelace commenced proceedings against Councillor Andrea Budarick for alleged contravention of the Municipal Conflict of Interest Act (MCIA). Before this happened, Budarick was on record as publicly criticizing E4m for their charges and billing methods. Now, Councillor Trevor Lidtkie – who also publicly criticized Young-Lovelace for the same reasons– faces similar proceedings. Budarick opposed the application to remove her, in which Young-Lovelace was represented by BLR’s lawyers, Wishart Law, who E4M has described in its promotional material as a “business partner”. A hearing took place on May 11th but the judge’s decision is still awaited.

It was not clear why Young-Lovelace attended the meeting as she did not say a word. It appeared that Sparling’s purpose for being present was only to read the report which, it was revealed, was not prepared by either Young-Lovelace or himself. Sparling remarked after he had read the report, “I believe tomorrow or within the next couple of days the municipality will receive the report — the actual written report — that can be distributed.” No explanation was offered by Sparling, Young-Lovelace or Mayor Sheldon Keller for the need to call a Special Meeting of Council to consider a report which was not available in written form which is standard practice for the presentation of such reports. Keller then called upon Council to pass a Resolution to accept the report, and it was moved by Councillor John Rutledge, seconded by Councillor Iris Kauffeldt and then passed.

Budarick sought permission to ask a question, “When we accept this report it would be nice to have the written report before we accept it. Would that seem reasonable? I have to say for myself there were at least two times when I was totally unable to hear. We totally got disconnected. I would certainly like to have an opportunity to review the actual report.” Keller said she could review it when the written report was received and Acting Clerk-Treasurer Valerie Jahn said it would be posted on the BLR website.

In response, on June 18, Lidtkie released the following statement to the media:

“During a Special meeting of BLR Council this past Wednesday June 16th, a report was read to BLR Council concerning the Municipal Conflict of Interest Act and that a matter concerning me was being referred to Ontario Superior Court by the Township’s Integrity Commissioner.

Now that the matter is before the court, I am unable to make comment at this time on the advice of counsel.

A public comment I can make is to say this: Since my first moment of being in a council seat I have been consistent in demanding that our Township spend our limited money in ways that gave the taxpayers the most benefit and rooting out unnecessary expenses. My record has been public and clear.”

 

10 Comments

  1. Michael McCloskey

    In reply to Dan Murack:
    Agreed but why is that? There are a number of aspects of the most recent report that are concerning. The first is the degree of and quality of the training they received. You are right the council has a hard time with the Municipal Conflict of Interest Act but here’s the thing- the training was conducted by the Integrity Commissioner’s company. Also- our expert on all things conflict of interest just sat there at the meeting where violations were alleged to have occured and didn’t offer professional aid to the organization that pays her. I think of it like if a lifeguard just sat there and watched someone drown because they get paid more if they have to do CPR instead of just throwing someone a floatie. (as an aside the IC does have an incentive to take matters to Provincial court- a financial one- the last court case recently spawned $73k in “legal” bills for the consortium (E4m, ISN and the Wishart Law firm…this next one is going to be the same)

  2. Michael McCloskey

    In reply to Dan Murack:
    Yes it does say a lot, and if we (BLR) and other municipalities hadn’t received reports with provable false statements in them or casual slanders, I would say take it at face value but that’s not the case here. That is the problem for an integrity commissioner (or anyone that the public is looking to for the facts of what happened like a judge or an inspector…) has been caught misrepresenting something- all the work going forward becomes suspect. For some reason, we (BLR) have tied ourselves to this particular company even though there are plenty of integrity commissioners out there- Why? If we had accountants working for us and we heard from other places also employing them that they had been fired for not being honest in the financial docs they prepare for us we would have let them go a long time ago.

  3. Michael McCloskey

    3) This was supposed to be a report from the IC, Ms Young-Lovelace. Instead we listened to some E4M sub-contractor struggle through reading it like it was “Hooked on Phonics.” Integrity Commissioners, good ones, are supposed to present their own reports (or does that cost extra $$$) Clearly something odd is going on with this case.

  4. Michael McCloskey

    2) Who on Council decided to have this special meeting- I would like an answer from anyone in the majority of Council that voted for this as to what the rush was?

  5. Michael McCloskey

    Tons of questions here: 1) Why did they feel the need to physically come all this way so that they could participate in a zoom meeting? I ask because they have presented findings over zoom to other municipalities. So we all paid ($$$) for their travel and the councillors time and the staff. I don’t see anything that could not have waited until the next regular meeting.

  6. Laura Clarke Tennant

    Is there an integrity commissioner for OUR integrity commissioner and township? How can you pass a resolution to accept a report that you have not seen or read for yourself? They couldn’t wait a few days till the actual report showed up or you know, make copies of the one the guy sitting right there was reading??? That doesn’t sound sketchy at all
    ‘ No explanation was offered by Sparling, Young-Lovelace or Mayor Sheldon Keller for the need to call a Special Meeting of Council to consider a report which was not available in written form which is standard practice for the presentation of such reports.
    Keller then called upon Council to pass a Resolution to accept the report, and it was moved by Councillor John Rutledge, seconded by Councillor Iris Kauffeldt and then passed.
    Budarick sought permission to ask a question, “When we accept this report it would be nice to have the written report before we accept it. Would that seem reasonable? I have to say for myself there were at least two times when I was totally unable to hear. We totally got disconnected. I would certainly like to have an opportunity to review the actual report.” Keller said she could review it when the written report was received and Acting Clerk-Treasurer Valerie Jahn said it would be posted on the BLR website.’

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