‘The Region is a place that is open to all’: Caslin
Regional headquarters should “absolutely” be a place where people of all cultures and ethnic backgrounds should feel comfortable, says Niagara Region Chairman Alan Caslin.
But in light of an incident last week, when St. Catharines resident Mohammed Al Jumaily said he was the victim of racial slurs from protester Fred Bracken, regional council may need to take steps to ensure the facility remains safe for everyone.
Caslin said other levels of government have “loads of security,” while some smaller municipalities including St. Catharines have a sergeant-at-arms present during meetings.
“It’s something that in the past we have had to have, but quite frankly during this term I’ve never felt the need to have extra security or a sergeant-at-arms present, other than the building security that we have there,” Caslin said.
“If necessary, if we do get an escalation such as that, perhaps it’s time for us to look at a sergeant-at-arms. That’s really unfortunate, because quite frankly the Region is a place that is open to all and we encourage participation from the community to come in and voice their opinions and to observe the decisions that are being made by council.”
He said regional headquarters is “supposed to be an open and welcoming forum, and that’s what I’m hoping we can get back to.”
Welland Coun. Paul Grenier, who was also present when the incident occurred at a special council meeting, said council needs to ensure it never happens again.
“There is an obligation for us to have an open and accessible venue to all citizens of the community. I get that. I believe in that. But there is a responsibility to a minimum standard of behaviour, and I can’t believe that any normal person that witnessed what went on there can even try to reconcile those two things, from what I saw,” Grenier said. “We should have the ability to remove someone who was behaving that way, irrespective of what has happened in the past.”
Grenier said if he doesn’t see a motion to accomplish that goal on the agenda of “the first council meeting of January, I will be raising it.”
Al Jumaily said he would welcome the changes, because being called a terrorist while at regional headquarters “is completely unacceptable.”
“Something like that, I hear on the streets. Sometimes people tell me to go home and so on, but I wasn’t expecting this at the regional headquarters of Niagara,” he said this week.
Bracken did not respond to questions from The Standard.
In an email to the newspaper’s lawyer, he writes that prior to making the statement to Al Jumaily, he also called regional councillors “terrorists” because he was of the view they were passing a code of conduct that would “destroy free speech.”
Bracken said he called Al Jumaily a terrorist “who hates free speech” because Al Jumaily asked security to arrest him and call police — not because of his Muslim background.
Bracken said “there was no racial slur.”
Al Jumaily has received significant support from multicultural and anti-racism groups in the days since the incident occurred.
Renee Martin, a spokesperson from the Niagara Anti-racism Coalition, posted a comment on the organization’s Facebook page on Saturday, condemning the incident.
“We stand in solidarity with a member of our coalition who had to endure a racist verbal attack while simply trying to attend a Niagara Regional Council meeting,” she wrote.
Martin said part of the problem is a lack of understanding of Canadian legislation regarding free speech.
“The public needs to be educated on what constitutes hate speech in this country,” she said. “As we start to try to dismantle hate speech, it has to come through education about what people are allowed to say and that there are limits to speech.”
Niagara Folk Arts Multicultural Centre executive director Jeff Burch said he has written a letter to Niagara Region expressing his concern over the issue.
“It’s a concern to us that the response seems to be inadequate when these things happen,” Burch said.
“What should have happened without question was that the police should have been called and (Bracken) should have been asked to leave council chambers. The fact that that didn’t happen, especially considering they had no problem ejecting a reporter the week before, gives us serious concern about the lack of leadership at the Region when it comes to incidents like this.”
Caslin, however, said the Municipal Act only gives the head of council the authority to remove someone who is causing a disturbance after a meeting in underway — not before.
“I have no abilities to do anything in a public space. I have no authority to tell the public what to do in a public space, to order the public to do anything in a public space,” he said.
And once the meeting was underway, Caslin said Bracken sat quietly, giving him no reason to ask for his removal.
Caslin said the Region has experienced issues with the same individual, but past efforts to ban him from attending meetings for a oneyear period were successfully challenged in court and overturned.
Caslin was referring to a November 2015 Ontario Superior Court of Justice decision in which Justice R.J. Schlange Nightingale ruled that the Region failed to show “evidence of actual physical violence or threats of physical violence” by Bracken, and the no-trespass order “infringed on his right to freedom of expression and assembly.”
Niagara Regional Police could have been called in, said NRP spokesperson Stephanie Sabourin.
Although Sabourin couldn’t discuss the specific incident at regional headquarters because police “were not called and we are not involved in the incident,” she said police do have the authority to remove a person from a public building, “if they were causing a disturbance or contravening the posted rules of conduct.”
“Removal would not be for the racist comment per se, but for not stopping the yelling when asked.”
She said a perpetrator could be charged with “cause disturbance” under the Trespass to Property Act.
Caslin did tell Al Jumaily later during the meeting that the Region did not condone the behaviour and apologized to him for having endured it. He also asked regional staff to ensure that Al Jumaily “was provided seating away from the individual that was harassing him” once the meeting began.
But Martin said by failing to report the behaviour to police, that behaviour was inadvertently condoned.
“There was really no excuse for them not calling the police on Bracken and demanding that he leave the room instantly, which has created a hostile environment for everyone in that room,” she said. “There was no reason not to call the police.”
If someone witnesses verbal abuse, and the person facing that abuse is unable or willing to speak for themselves, Martin said: “It is your job … to speak out, to say something, to shut it down one way or another.”
Al Jumaily, too, said Caslin “failed to take leadership when there was a need for it.”
“He should have done something about it, that’s for sure,” he said.
Caslin pointed out that anyone present at the time could have called police to report the behaviour. No one did.
“Many councillors were in the room, lawyers were in the room, staff was in the room, you were in the room, so why couldn’t you call the police?” he asked. “Why does it fall on my shoulders?”