Ombudsman complaint filed over suspension of DSBN trustee
Activist Ed Smith is taking his criticism of District School Board of Niagara’s ban of trustee Kate Baggott from a meeting one step further by filing a complaint with the Ontario Ombudsman.
He made this announcement as a delegate at Tuesday’s board meeting, the same one Niagaraon-the-Lake and St. Catharines trustee Baggott was suspended from after the majority of her peers felt she had violated the board’s code of conduct.
The alleged breach stems from Baggott communicating with a parent from west Niagara who reached out to all 12 trustees with concerns over discipline at their child’s school. Baggott has been told that she should not have dealt with the matter— and instead should’ve left the issue with education director Warren Hoshizaki and Grimsby-Lincoln trustee Elizabeth Klassen, who later filed a code of conduct complaint.
Smith acknowledged the Education Act says boards have the ability to ban trustees from meetings — but said DSBN didn’t have the grounds to do so in this case.
“It is difficult for me to imagine a circumstance that justifies this board using an archaic part of the Education Act to remove an elected official,” said Smith, adding he believes the people of St. Catharines and Niagara-onthe-Lake were “under-represented” at the meeting.
Smith, executive director of A Better Niagara, a grassroots political watchdog group, also called the decision an “abuse of power” and that Baggott’s actions were “not a violation of any well-defined rule.”
“All of this feels far too personal, heavy-handed, and way out of touch from modern democratic principles,” said Smith in his five-minute presentation.
In an interview later, Smith also said he was frustrated that no members of the board offered any comments or asked questions when his time was up.
“I think there was a dialogue to be had there,” he said.
The Ombudsman doesn’t investigate decisions but probes the process behind them — which Smith said is the meat in the complaint he filed late last week — that a penalty was handed out even though a specific breach of the code of conduct is difficult to pinpoint.
“For the investigation to start going further, and to start manufacturing things, is a breakdown in the process,” he said.
Baggott participated in a closed committee-of-the-whole meeting prior to the regular board meeting from which she was banned.
She declined being interviewed on her way out of the chambers.
Board chair Sue Barnett, also a member of the code of conduct investigation committee, said she appreciates Smith coming forward with his concerns.
“I think it’s great that people in the Niagara Peninsula believe in democracy, and he has the right to file something with the ombudsman,” said the Welland trustee, who also admitted she’s “not a fan of the code” during an interview with The Tribune Wednesday.
“I think people are better when they are reasonable with one another and talk,” she said.
Asked if she thinks there was a flaw in the process of suspending Baggott from Tuesday’s board meeting, Barnett said “absolutely not,” and that the board followed the guidelines of the code of conduct “from start to finish very carefully.”
The code of conduct was mandated by the province in 2018, and the one used by DSBN was created by the Ontario Public School Boards’ Association, Barnett explained.
“Many boards in the province use it,” she said.
Moving forward, Barnett said tensions left over from the recent decision appear to be healing and that trustees are now “at peace with one another.”
She also explained that Baggott was permitted to take part in the private committee-ofthe-whole meeting before the open meeting she was banned from because it is considered a separate item on the schedule. The Ombudsman does not comment on whether a specific complaint has been received, said the director of communications, Linda Williamson.