Formerly banned resident shares concerns about workplace policy

As the fallout from Monday night’s Stratford council meeting continues, one of the previously banned residents is calling the decision to review the city’s respectful workplace policy “smoke and mirrors,” suggesting it will likely be a long time before anything changes.

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“I don’t expect to see any change until after the next election, and hopefully they’ll all be voted for out and we’ll get somebody in there who’s a little more forward thinking,” Ken Wood said in Wednesday phone interview.

Wood was one of the three Stratford residents banned from council meetings and municipal buildings for three months through the application of the respectful workplace policy.

Wood’s comments came after a lengthy council meeting and discussion on a motion from Coun. Cody Sebben, who sought to suspend the policy and have it reviewed. Council voted 9-2 against the suspension, with only Coun. Geza Wordofa joining Sebben in support, but did vote 11-0 to have the policy reviewed.

Like the other two banned residents, Barb Shaughnessy and Mike Sullivan, Wood was exiled from city property following complaints and incident reports the city received under its respectful workplace policy following a Feb. 26 council meeting. According to Dave Bush, the city’s human resources manager, the city received seven complaints from staff and three from residents after that meeting.

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Wood has been relativity quiet about the ban when compared to his two residents, saying he didn’t want to link his situation to theirs, but he still has issues with the city’s approach and use of the policy, suggesting the municipality is “making a wide demographic of people in Stratford seem like they’re not wanted here.”

“I sincerely believe that this is a real incursion and a threat to free speech and democracy. The policy is poorly written. It’s not applied consistently or fairly. It’s being used for political purposes,” he said.

Wood also expressed concerns over comments from Coun. Mark Hunter, who, at the meeting, said he would support a review of the policy but added he didn’t “know if it should be a higher priority than other things.”

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“Hunter made it clear that it wasn’t a high priority and that it would be done some time in the future. Quite often, when the city puts something on low priority, you’re talking two, three, four, five years before something will happen,” Wood said.

During the meeting, Hunter took issue with allegations from residents the policy has been used by council to stifle dissent. Hunter claimed at the meeting that, since he’s been elected, every delegate who has tried to speak before council has “received unanimous support for the motion to hear them.”

However, this was not true in at least once instance last year.

According to the minutes from council’s July 24, 2023, meeting Hunter, along with Couns. Brad Beatty and Harjinder Nijjar, voted against a motion for resident Jane Marie Mitchell to speak about the selection of the chair of the ad-hoc Grand Trunk renewal committee.

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Much of the debate on the policy at Monday’s meeting and in the public hinges on whether council chambers can be considered a workplace and if the policy should then apply during meetings. While Wood took issue with the idea that some councillors, including Hunter, view it as a workplace, Mayor Martin Ritsma noted that senior staff members are obliged to be in chambers for meetings as part of their contracts.

“They are a big part of running the meeting. That is their workplace. We can’t say ‘no, they’re not at work.’ They are at work, and so that makes it an interesting scenario because it’s both – it is a public space and it is workplace,” Ritsma said in a Tuesday interview.

Ritsma, who voted against suspending the policy but supported the review, suggested there could end up being three separate policies — one that addresses council-to-council interactions, one for interactions between council and staff, and a third for public engagement

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“I think there is certainly an opportunity to parse it out and make it a little bit more specific to a specific group within city hall and for our residents as well,” the mayor said.

While Ritsma once again suggested the idea of ​​a town hall meeting later this year to discuss the policy, Wood described that proposal as “political BS”

“They basically call people together, supposedly to ask their opinions and listen to them, but they’ve already got an agenda, and they sell them on what they’ve already wanted to do. . . . And then they can say, ‘well, we listened to everyone, and there was some good input. We disagree with some of it, but we’re not going to change our minds. We’re just going to do what we want,’” Wood said.

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