Trustees back code of conduct

Trustees on the Ottawa public school board overwhelmingly support adopting a code of conduct that would allow them to discipline fellow trustees they deem to have behaved badly.

But at a meeting Tuesday, they recommended watering down the most controversial penalty in a proposed conduct code by limiting the amount of time a trustee could be booted off committees to six months.

Outspoken trustee Donna Blackburn, who fears the code of conduct will be used to muzzle outspoken trustees such as herself, made little headway at the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board meeting.

Her proposal to add a clause specifying that trustees should be able to express their “personal political views” was roundly defeated. Several trustees said it wasn’t needed because they weren’t trying to interfere with freedom of speech, just deal with trustees who, in the words of trustee Sandra Schwartz, don’t behave in a civil manner or uphold the integrity of the office.

Trustee Keith Penny said Blackburn’s proposed clause would give trustees a “get out of jail free card” that would allow them to violate the code of conduct, then claim they are just expressing a personal view.

Trustees began debating the code of conduct earlier this year after Blackburn used a profanity and made rude comments about fellow trustees, calling them “whackjobs.” The proposed code, similar to those in place at many Ontario school boards, says trustees should, among other things, behave professionally, act with “decorum” and avoid making comments that are personal, demeaning or disparaging.

The code emphasizes that complaints should be resolved informally if possible, but it also sets out a detailed procedure for investigating allegations trustees make against each other, including hiring an outside investigator.

Blackburn, who fears the code is a back-handed way to shut her up, says there are already laws in place that cover conflict of interest, libel or criminal wrongdoing.

Under the proposed code, trustees could be censured, banned from a meeting, or, in what was the most controversial proposal, banned from committee meetings indefinitely. At the suggestion of board chair Shirley Seward, trustees recommended that six months should be the maximum time a trustee could be barred from committees.

Anything longer than six months is “unjust,” said Seward. She noted the case of Karen Round, a trustee in the Muskoka area who was censured at an in camera meeting by fellow trustees and banned from committee work for 3½ years, which was the remainder of her term. Round quit last fall, saying she couldn’t perform the job she was elected to do.

At Tuesday’s meeting, trustees sitting as a committee of the whole recommended adopting the code of conduct, but it must still be approved at a board meeting.

Staff reported they knew of four instances in which school boards in Ontario have used codes of conducts against trustees, but none of the penalties has been challenged in court.