Councillor not clear of campaign scrutiny
Karygiannis’s job saved after judge overruled expulsion provision in provincial law
Ejected from Toronto City Hall over campaign finances and then parachuted back into office by a sympathetic judge, Coun. Jim Karygiannis got a warm welcome at Tuesday’s council meeting.
“I want to thank everyone who supported my family, my staff, my constituents — I received hundreds of emails, numerous calls,” said the Ward 22 Scarborough-Agincourt councillor, who was stripped of his duties, and his name taken off his city hall office, by the city clerk Nov. 6.
“I’m just happy to be back. Looking forward to continuing my work,” he told reporters less than 24 hours after a judge agreed changes made to his 2018 campaign financial statements were done “inadvertently” and called part of a provincial law triggering his automatic ejection an “apparent absurdity.”
Karygiannis is not, however, clear of questions about a $27,000 post-election dinner and other campaign spending.
Adam Chaleff, the Torontonian who triggered a city review of Karygiannis’s spending, said he is “disappointed” with the ruling and is considering a possible legal challenge to the ruling.
Karygiannis also faces a compliance audit of his spending before and after the October 2018 election that saw him defeat colleague Norm Kelly in a big new ward.
If the city-ordered audit determines Karygiannis overspent his campaign
limit or broke other rules, a city committee could decide to refer the matter to a special prosecutor who would decide whether or not to prosecute Karygiannis.
Penalties for breaking Ontario’s Municipal Elections Act can range from fines to jail. But judges rarely impose more than fines and have the discretion to decide a candidate made an honest mistake and shouldn’t be turfed from office.
More than two weeks ago, Karygiannis was notified of his ejection after filing a supplementary financial statement showing he had overspent the limit for parties and other postelection “expressions of appreciation” by nearly $26,000.
He said it was a “clerical error” that a roughly $27,000 dinner two months after the election was included in a campaign expense category that is subject to spending limits. It put him well over the $6,120.80 limit for expressions of appreciation.
Municipal campaign spending rules were toughened in 2016, including a new provision that anyone filing a statement showing overspending on expressions of appreciation be immediately stripped of their duties and barred from running or being appointed to council until after the 2022 election.
Superior Court Justice William Chalmers, ruling on Karygiannis’s application for judicial relief from that penalty, said he had jurisdiction to consider the matter. Chaleff’s lawyer had disagreed.
Chalmers then ruled Karygiannis listing the over-the-limit dinner as an appreciation event was done “inadvertently.” Finally the judge said automatic expulsion for breaking that rule was unreasonable.
That lack of discretion created an “apparent absurdity” in the Municipal Elections Act which “could not have been intended
“I’m just happy to be back. Looking forward to continuing my work.”
COUN. JIM KARYGIANNIS WARD 22 SCARBOROUGH-AGINCOURT
by the legislature,” Chalmers ruled. Ted McMeekin, who as municipal affairs minister in Ontario’s previous Liberal government oversaw the toughening of campaign finance provisions, said he won’t argue with the judge’s reasoning — but his government intended tough penalties as a warning for candidates to follow rules.
“Good for him, I guess,” McMeekin, now retired from politics, said of Karygiannis in an interview on Tuesday from his Hamilton home.
“Who am I to criticize the judge? We have a legal system and process, and so be it if the judge in his or her infinite wisdom, or folly, has decided that they think the (automatic expulsion provision) is bizarre, that could be a clue to the existing government to perhaps have a look at it.
“But we normally don’t put absurd legislation in place,” said McMeekin, noting an association representing most Ontario municipalities gave advice on the changes. Karygiannis is, so far, alone among thousands of candidates in hundreds of municipalities to face expulsion over 2018 spending.
McMeekin previously told the Star the new provision was a “blunt instrument” intended to clamp down on candidates who raised far more than they needed, and then used surpluses to hold lavish parties for supporters and give them gifts, such as Rolex watches.