Councillor, MPP square off

A month after Niagara regional council was consumed with integrity issues surrounding the conduct of St. Catharines Coun. Andy Petrowski, the stage was set for another political showdown Thursday night.

At issue is a motion asking council to condemn a political movement often regarded as anti-Semitic, but the debate is the latest salvo in the battle between Fort Erie regional councillor and Niagara Peninsula Conservation Authority chair Sandy Annunziata and Welland NDP MPP and frequent NPCA critic Cindy Forster.

Four delegations about the boycott-divestment-sanction movement, or BDS, against Israel were on the regional agenda Thursday.

The presentations, three of which are from prominent Canadian Jewish groups, are a direct response to a motion put forward last month by Annunziata asking council to condemn the BDS movement.

Annunziata says he is responding to a now dead motion put forward by the local NDP riding association in April, asking the party to endorse BDS. Annunziata has said Forster should be held accountable for that motion.

In an open letter sent to councillors Wednesday and obtained by The Standard, Forster said the motion put forward by Annunziata is an attempt to score cheap political points against her.

“I can’t help but wonder if communities across the Niagara region are as tired as I am with the headlines of scandals that have flooded our news in the last while,” wrote Forster.

“If the Niagara Peninsula Conservation Authority (NPCA) board’s recent issues weren’t enough, tomorrow the NPCA board chair, Sandy Annunziata, will attempt to appropriate a very serious, politically-charged issue in a misguided effort to smear four decades of public service with baseless charges of anti-Semitism.”

Forster accused Annunziata in engaging in “Trump-style” politics designed to distract from the “Niagara Region integrity commissioner’s recent report on the lack of accountability and transparency at the NPCA.”

Annunziata is asking council to pass a motion distancing itself from the Niagara Centre NDP riding association, which passed a motion in April asking the NDP, as a party, to endorse BDS — a movement often criticized as being as overtly anti-Semitic.

The motion asks council to “condemn the BDS Movement and in no way is attached, connected or supports the position of the NDP Niagara Centre Provincial Riding Association,” and send letters of the resolution to the NDP and some Jewish groups.

Forster was not present when the riding association passed the motion, and she has not endorsed it.

The motion then died during the NDP’s May convention, never making it to the floor to be voted on by party members.

On Thursday, Forster said if the motion had come to a vote, she would have voted against it.

The NDP does not have a policy endorsing the BDS movement. During the NDP convention, the party passed a resolution to ask the provincial government to add antiSemitism to Ontario’s anti-racism directorate.

In comments made in the council chambers, and in an interview with the Standard last month, Annunziata called the failed association motion “anti-Semitic public policy” that taints all of Niagara. He has said Forster should be held responsible for the riding association motion.

Annunziata has also said it is hypocritical for council to call Petrowski to account for making offensive statements on social media — including posting an anti-Semitic video on his Twitter page in November — but not hold Forster responsible for the association’s motion, which he called “public hate speech.”

“How egregious it is when public policy, public hate speech, is crafted right here in Niagara ... It was put forward here by MPP Cindy Forster’s Niagara Centre provincial riding association. The anti-Semitic policy was crafted right here in Niagara,” Annunziata said during the May 18 council meeting.

In an interview Thursday, Forster asked why Annunziata didn’t take a stand against Petrowski’s November tweet.

“Coun. Petrowski clearly tweeted out an anti-Semitic video. That was months ago. If Mr. Annunziata is so passionate about the issue of antiSemitism, why didn’t he raise the issue then? Why is he raising this issue about the riding association now?” said Forster, who said she wasn’t attending Thursday ’s council meeting. “The only reason that I can think of is because it is me, and it gives Annunziata another opportunity to bully.”

Annunziata has said his motion has nothing to do with Forster’s criticism of the NPCA. Nevertheless, the pair have been at odds for months over the conservation authority.

Forster has been one of the leading political voices in Niagara calling for an audit of NPCA’s operations. There has been mounting public pressure for an audit of the authority, a body with taxing powers that is responsible for conservation in Niagara and Hamilton.

Forster has raised the issue of an audit several times at Queen’s Park, and most recently was critical of Annunziata and the NPCA board for its public censure of former board member and Lincoln regional Coun. Bill Hodgson.

In a widely circulated letter, Annunziata alleged Hodgson improperly influenced the bidding process that would have hired an auditor. However, Annunziata has refused to discuss the specifics of his allegation, and the NPCA has refused to release a lawyers’ report used as the justification for the censure.

Hodgson, who had called for an audit, has since resigned from the NPCA, saying he was bullied by other board members.

Forster has criticized Annunziata over the matter and publicly defended Hodgson at Queen’s Park.

In an interview with the Standard last month, Annunziata said it was “ridiculous” to connect his motion with anything happening with the NPCA.

“For Cindy Forster to blame the NPCA or to blame me is completely ridiculous,” Annunziata said. “I believe that all elected officials need to be held to account and she should be taking responsibility for her riding association’s disgusting, anti-Semitic motion and plead for the Jewish community’s forgiveness.”

In her letter, Forster says she rejects any form of anti-Semitism and always has.

“To my colleagues at council today, and to the valued members of our community who’ll be making deputations: if I haven’t been clear, and if my years of public service haven’t spoken loudly enough, I absolutely, unequivocally, condemn anti-Semitism and all forms of racial discrimination,” she wrote. “However, I also condemn politicians who use fabricated accusations of hate speech as an attempt to distract from their own record – especially in today’s global political context.”

In an interview Thursday morning Forster said Annunziata’s claim the association motion constituted “public policy” and “hate speech” is wrong.

Public policy is only determined by the government of the day. Opposition party policies and riding association motions are not public policy, she said.

Hate speech is an offense under section 319 of the Criminal Code of Canada. Forster said Jewish groups certainly find BDS to be hateful and harmful, but the April riding association motion does not qualify as hate speech under the code.

I can’t help but wonder if communities across the Niagara region are as tired as I am with the headlines of scandals that have flooded our news in the last while.” NDP MPP Cindy Forster