Councillor accuses mayor of ‘childish,’ ‘toxic behaviour’
Coun. Shawn Menard’s frustration boiled over onto Twitter on Tuesday with a public and profane shot at the “toxic behaviour” of Mayor Jim Watson with whom the Capital ward councillor has frequently clashed during his first term.
“I can’t tell you how shitty it is to go into work every day knowing that the Mayor despises you for wanting policy changes, and openly goes after you personally trying to label you as a hypocrite repeatedly,” Menard tweeted.
“This has come along with being barred from sitting on committees, childish things like cutting me out of pictures, pre-announcing events in my ward to try to ‘one-up’ others. It is toxic behaviour and needs to end. Won’t stop me from fighting for better policy decisions.”
The spat was sparked by a seemingly innocuous tweet by Menard on Monday suggesting that election signs should be banned from public property. Menard was responding to reports of a plague of sign vandalism during the federal election campaign.
Watson fired back at what he called Menard’s “hypocrisy.”
“I love how incumbents — once safely settled in office — now want to disadvantage challengers by not allowing signs on Public property!” the mayor tweeted.
Menard, 37, was elected to council in 2018 after previously serving as a public school trustee. He is one of a cadre of “rebel” councillors who have frequently clashed with Watson on key city decisions, such as the Château Laurier addition, a transit fare freeze, and what they say has been a lack of openness on the Phase 2 LRT construction contract awarded to SNC-Lavalin.
Menard has also been critical of the city’s planning department, even writing an op-ed for the Ottawa Citizen in July alleging that the city is too friendly to developers and that committees are stacked against councillors from the downtown core.
“But you live in Ottawa, so you know that too often city hall isn’t a place for people, at least not all people. Too often, city hall is a place for developers,” Menard wrote in the column, headlined “Let’s bring back real democracy to city hall.”
He accused the planning committee of ignoring “official plans, community agreement and past promises from developers” when it approved changes to a development in Old Ottawa East.
“We should not tolerate this disdain for residents,” Menard wrote.
Asked about the dispute Tuesday afternoon, Watson said he’s pleased with the way council is working.
“I don’t get sidetracked by Twitter wars. I think it’s healthy to have debate. Some people say, well, you shouldn’t be critical of one another. Well, you know what? That’s the messy business of democracy,” Watson said.
“I’m comfortable with standing my ground and pushing back anytime someone says something that I disagree with or that I find is completely incorrect.”
Menard was not available for an interview Tuesday but did release a statement to the media that criticized “the dysfunctional structure at City Hall.”
“Last night, I had an unfortunate twitter exchange with the mayor. Sadly, this is not an isolated occurrence,” the statement said.
“The culture at city hall needs to change. We have witnessed allegations of sexual harassment, admissions of inappropriate gestures during elections, intimidating behaviour towards residents and very personal insinuations, often on social media.
“There is a dysfunctional structure at city hall, and whenever it is challenged — by councillors, the media or the public — those who have created and who benefit from this structure will seek to shut down dissent or critiques.”
Menard pledged to keep fighting.