Board byelection may come down to who voters punish: Liberals or Vision trustees
The questions were nasty, the behaviour rude and disrespectful. There was bickering, eye-rolling, table thumping and loud sighing.
This wasn’t a class of Grade 8 troublemakers, but then-trustees of the Vancouver school board according to the independent investigation into allegations of bullying at the district.
The Goldner report was released five months after the board was fired by then-education minister Mike Bernier last October for failing to pass a balanced budget.
Now Vancouver is poised to return to an elected board after a year of the board being run by a single trustee appointed by Bernier. Nineteen candidates — a mix of experienced players and new faces from six parties, plus two independents — are vying for nine trustee positions in the byelection on Oct. 14.
Jason Ellis, an associate professor of education at the University of B.C., said the outcome of the election could be influenced by whether voters feel more annoyed at the former B.C. Liberal government for turfing the board or more dismayed at the former trustees for the board’s dysfunction, the complaints of a toxic workplace for board staff and the resignation of six top bureaucrats.
“If they want to punish the former government, we might see a strong slate of Vision Vancouver trustees,” said Ellis. “If voters are concerned about the actions of trustees, particularly Vision Vancouver trustees, then we might see them vote for another party.”
There is a precedent. In 1985, a Socred government fired a COPE-majority board for refusing to order cuts to balance the budget. In a byelection nine months later, voters elected a full COPE slate, a repudiation of the Socreds. Later that same year, in the general election that same year, voters turfed out most COPE trustees in favour of the NPA.
Several members of the fired 2016 board are running again this time. They are three Vision Vancouver candidates (Mike Lombardi, Joy Alexander, and Allan Wong), two NPA candidates (Fraser Ballantyne and Christopher Richardson), and the Green party’s Janet Fraser.
Earlier this month, NPA candidates took a public anti-bullying pledge. Ballantyne, Richardson, and Janet Fraser have unmasked their identities in the redacted Goldner report to clear confusion and better inform voters.
“People need to know who they’re voting for and what has happened in the past,” said Ballantyne. “My concern is that voters in the community may be unknowingly voting in bullies in a highprofile trustee position.”
DISRESPECTFUL CONDUCT
Ballantyne’s name appears once in the report in relation to disrespectful conduct, along with two other redacted names. The report did not name Richardson. It mentions Fraser once in relation to a meeting with staff.
Vision had said it did not bully or harass anyone, and that part of its job is to ask tough questions. It has refused to release an unredacted version of the report.
Former board chair Lombardi called the NPA pledge a political stunt and said he’s focused on the issues facing the district and students. “The report is there for people to look at. My name is mentioned in there,” he said. “It is not an issue to me.”
Lombardi’s name appeared four times in the redacted report, mostly for failing to maintain order in meetings as chair.
Lombardi said the dysfunction of the previous board was due to its composition — evenly split between Vision and NPA with the one Green trustee as the deciding vote — and the pressures put on by the previous government to cut budgets and close schools.
“Now that’s gone. It’ll be a whole different dynamic and I’m confident we can move together as a team,” said Lombardi.
Rob Peregoodoff, chair of the Vancouver District Parent Advisory Council, said he hopes the problems that plagued the previous board are behind the district.
“I have faith there has been enough light shone on this space and there’s just no way we could have another re-occurrence of a similar situation after the byelection,” he said.
A key to a more effective board is the hiring of a superintendent. Protocol dictates the superintendent should be the conduit between trustees and senior bureaucrats. Trustees should not deal directly with staff except for the superintendent, whether to praise or criticize, said Peregoodoff.
The search for a new superintendent to replace interim superintendent John Lewis is underway, said a VSB spokesman. The new board is expected to make an appointment shortly after it takes office with the new superintendent to start work in early 2018.
Another must-have: A consistent view on the role of trustees, which had been split in the past between an advocacy-first model and a stewardship-first model.
Gordon Swan, president of the B.C. School Trustees Association, believes trustees can be both advocates and stewards and the key is to blend the two roles, be nonpartisan, and work with whoever is in government.
The trustee’s association, which the VSB rejoined under appointed trustee Dianne Turner, is looking forward to working with the new board to ensure good governance, said Swan.
Turner, the government-appointed trustee who replaced the board, will stay on as an adviser for up to a year in part to help foster a more collaborative relationship between trustees and staff.