A local mayor called police on a resident for filming council meetings, raising questions about transparency and public accountability.
By Jonathan Sher, The London Free Press
They’re camera-shy.
That’s one reason the mayor of a township west of London says he called cops last week to stop a critic from videotaping a council meeting. For years, you see, no citizens attended council meetings at the tiny township office of Adelaide Metcalfe, pop. 3,000. They just didn’t.
But that changed after energy companies proposed building up to 70 wind turbines. Since January, dozens have packed a makeshift gallery and a young woman who once babysat the mayor’s kids has been setting up a camera and posting videos to YouTube.
Videographer Esther Wrightman kept calm during the clash Monday, asking police what law she was breaking and turning the camera off after a police officer said he would otherwise physically remove her. But when the meeting ended and Wrightman made her way outside, her racing heart gave way to tears. “I did cry — it just hit me what we have all tried to do, and what we didn’t have left — how powerless we were,” she recalls.
Mayor David Bolton defends his call to the cops, saying after weeks of videos being posted on YouTube, some council members had grown frightened of speaking at all, lest they say something stupid. “That was preventing an open and full discussion,” Bolton said.
But that’s not how another council member, Kurtis Smith, sees it. “If it is something that the individual doesn’t want recorded on video, it likely shouldn’t be said at all,” he told The Free Press. “Without the public engagement . . . council members cannot make informed decision.” Smith says he had no problems with the videotaping and was caught off-guard when Bolton called police. “I was not aware of the (mayor’s) plan,” he said.
The fight over wind turbines in rural Ontario played a big role last fall when voters turfed the McGuinty Liberals from those ridings in the provincial election. But in Adelaide Metcalfe, the issue boiled over in January after council set building permit fees for turbines lower than critics had called for and did so at a meeting when that topic wasn’t on the public agenda. Read article
A prime example of all that’s gone wrong within Municipalities Province-wide. These Councillors now have an “entitlement attitude” which has never existed in such a blatant and outrageous form as it is now. Could it be the overall lobby efforts by a “McGuinty oriented” AMO that has coached Councils vis a vis their CAO’s and Planners to believe, once in power, they now ARE the power of the Townships instead of their position of being Public SERVANTS?
That word in itself should be self explanatory………..elected officials are SERVANTS of the people who elect them, pay their wages, furnish their offices and support all their day to day work activities with hard earned tax dollars.
Time to yank these people back into their real jobs and that is to listen to the people, respect the people and do the people’s bidding before anything else!
Obviously this Council has strayed a long way from that purpose!!!!
Mayor & deputy mayor each have sons who signed leases for IWTs. Automatic conflict of interest because the sons could financially benefit in some way from their father’s votes regarding IWTs. What does the town’s lawyer have to say about this situation? Demand an answer for the record.
To Barbara. If what you say is correct then both the mayor and deputy mayor have chosen to ignore the statutory Conflict of Interest clause in the Municipal Act. The Adelaide Metcalfe electorate have grounds for demanding their immediate removal. Neither had any rights to be party to any discussions regarding wind energy projects in their township and in fact acted illegally by doing so..
And BigGreenie I love your posts and you are quite correct, too many of our unelected so called public servants now believe it is they who actually make the decisions and dictate what happens at all levels of government including at the municipal level, whilst only looking to their politicians to rubberstamp staff ‘advice’.
Sadly our elected politicians are equally to blame because to take the accepted easy road is easier than actually disagreeing and it makes for less work for the politicians.
The Green Energy Act is the first time in years that a few municipal Councils have questioned this and I think there may be an ideal opportunity for some local politicians to begin to take back control.
We know McGuinty and his Green Energy Act are destroying rural Ontario for no benefit, supported by a multitude of private and mainly foreign companies jumping on the Ontario alternative energy bandwagon.
To fight them, and I do think we will win, we need our own local politicians to take back ALL the local decision making authority from unelected staff, who still don’t get it!
The hardest part is to get them to do it! They have now worked with these folk for over 12 months, and more for municipal councilors who were re-elected.
Not easy to turn on colleagues and in some cases friends and suddenly tell them that after years of being deferred to they have to sit down, shut up and do as they are told.
We have to encourage our Councilors to do just that, then I think we can beat the Green Energy Act
Since you have the written information regarding conflict of interest can you post the pertinent paragraph/paragraphs? Maybe a tab or link so that other groups can download this. Sometimes politicians get away with things only because people don’t have ready access to the needed information.
David Bolton has declared (and we have this on videotape) that he he only has to declare a conflict of interest if he personaly feels he can’t make a decision that is not neutral. His defininition would ony include bylaws that dealt specifically with properties his father has with wind leases. In a nutshell we were told if we feel he has a conflict of interest we have the right to take him to court. This option will not be inexpensive ($10000 and up). As well most of the legal advice that the township lawyer has given on this issue and the videotaping issue has taken place in closed door meetings. Any attempts by us to have access to this legal advice has been met by the response that this falls under client-solicitor privilege and the corporation (the township) is the client not the residents.
Bolton is a little off base. Public officials should
avoid matters where it may reasonably be ‘perceived’
to be a conflict of interest.
Could “pay-to-play” be involved here?
Bolton wants to slice and dice the laws in ways that only favour himself. Where money is involved these two must recuse themselves from all decisions pertaining to IWTs in their jurisdiction. On the other hand these relatives might be able to get out of their leases due to conflict of interest issues in this situation.
“some council members had grown frightened of speaking at all, lest they say something stupid”…
and that is the ENTIRE PROBLEM…
we have too many STUPID people getting conned by the wind industry!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Try presenting councils with a portfolio of information on the IWT companies wanting to install turbines in your area along with other information including links where other information can be obtained?
Oopsy! But then again – I have a very suspicious mind.
‘[excerpt] But in Adelaide Metcalfe, the issue boiled over in January after council set building permit fees for turbines lower than critics had called for and did so at a meeting when that topic wasn’t on the public agenda.
The decision led Ontario’s Ombudsman’s office to suggest changes to the way council conducts business.’
A baffling moment – ‘of obligation’ – ‘over conflict’ – so it seems
‘[excerpt] She points out the mayor and deputy mayor each have sons who have signed leases with energy companies to erect turbines — a point Bolton doesn’t dispute.
The mayor seems baffled by a conflict over wind turbines that he says he personally opposes, but is obligated to deal with when it’s the Ontario government that approves them.’
Question:
By calling the police – did the mayor accomplish anything – at all?
Yup – clueless – I’m not getting the point!
Maybe he’s paranoid?
I’m suspicious he has a ‘fig newton’ – rolling around in his head.
Blessings come in strange ways!
An opportunity!
Stop the Lambton to Longwood Transmission Upgrade Project
Put simply – Hydro One needs your help!
If citizens could direct their attention towards the transmission line
– you stop the wind turbine projects – dead.
2. Hydro One hereby applies to the Ontario Energy Board ……………………………..
……………..for an Order or Orders granting leave to upgrade approximately
70 kilometers of transmission line……
a) Ouch! please read on…….
http://www.middlesex.ca/council/2012/may/8/C%2014%20-%20CW%20Info%20-%20May%208%20-%20Longwood%20Transmission%20Upgrade%20Notice.pdf
http://www.middlesex.ca/government
Ontario citizens are champions!
The transmission grid belongs to Ontario citizens.
A re cap:
http://www.pwu.ca/issues/17.pdf
Congrats!
Hydro One pushes back!
St. Columban wind project gets year extension to build transmission lines
Hydro One informs Veresen it will not build 45-kilometre transmission line
Faced with the need to build a 45-kilometre transmission connection, St. Columban Energy LP has asked for and received an extension from the Ministry of the Environment to submit an REA (Renewal Energy Approval) application for the 15-turbine project.
A letter from the MOE to Julia Ciccaglione, VP of Regulatory and Government Affairs for Veresen Inc. was in the council package for Huron East council at its Oct. 18 meeting.
Clerk-Administrator Brad Knight told councillors that the project will be delayed by the fact that Hydro One Networks Inc. will not be building the transmission connection required by the wind project in St. Columban.
“The transmission line will be their responsibility so that will delay their process,” he said.
http://www.mitchelladvocate.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=3352700&archive=true
Veresen Inc.
http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/people/people.asp?ticker=VSN:CN
Stephen Mulherin, Veresen Board Chair. > James D. Hole, Aecon Group Inc. Board > John M. Beck, Aecon CEO & OPA Board Member
Aecon Group Inc.
http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/people/people.asp?ticker=ARE:CN
The same names keep popping up in Ontario renewable energy businessses. Too many times to be co-incindental?
Can someone say “Criminal Organization”?
Bankruptcies! – Who cares
Windsor mayor – ‘It’s a grid problem – and, I know it’
Mayor still sold on green energy
Windsor Mayor Eddie Francis said the problem isn’t with the green energy manufacturing industry. The problem is the inability for energy producers to hook up with the grid. Francis said he has met with Hydro One to discuss the problem.
“They said to me, well we’ve got infrastructure that is best described as a rural road, and we’ve got the amount of 401 truck traffic that we’re trying to put on a rural road that’s not set up for that,” Francis said.
“There certainly have been problems with grid connectivity,” Moore said.
That hasn’t deterred the mayor from still trying to attract green energy jobs. He claimed Friday that Windsor is still “a green energy hub.”
http://www.wind-watch.org/news/2012/05/15/green-energy-leaves-windsor-with-broken-promises/
Barbara! Sorry for the delay!
but the info sessions I attended before made the Conflict of Interest issue a really big deal. I do not believe it requires a private citizen to spend their own money on bringing the matter to court. If an elected Councilor is guilty of Conflict of Interest it should only require a complaint submitted to an appropriate government agency for them to have to take action and investigate it. It isn’t a civil matter it’s to do with breaking Municipal law.
Google – Municipal Conflict of Interest Act – RSO 1990, Chapter M.50
Last amended: 2009, c.33, Sched. 21,s.7.
Scroll down and look at DUTY OF MEMBER
I stood for Council – and failed!
My understanding is that no elected Councilor can take part in, or vote on, any issue at any Council meeting that may directly affect him/her economically, either positively or negatively, or any of his family and business associates.
The only ‘let out’ clause is if ignoring the Conflict of Interest requirement can be proved to be for the general good of the whole community.
The fact that there is an active Wind Action Group involved makes the above as a reason indefensible.
Incidentally, though I was not elected, I still support my Wainfleet Council, I think they are doing a pretty good job trying to fight the wind energy companies so far!
Still think it will be Councils and our elected Councilors who can kill the Green Energy Act!
Thanks! This is my understanding of conflict of interest too.