Complaints keep Sudbury's integrity commissioner busy

Greater Sudbury (file).

David G. Boghosian, Greater Sudbury's integrity commissioner, has conducted three more investigations of city councillors, ruling that in two of the cases, councillors broke the code of conduct.

In a third, Boghosian said the comments in question were made on a personal Facebook account, so he didn't have jurisdiction to make a ruling.

Two complaints concerned Ward 5 Coun. Mike Parent and Ward 7 Coun. Natalie Labbée, who both were critical of city staff about a $5 user fee at city landfills in comments on Facebook.

Details of the investigation can be found here, but while Boghosian took issue with the way city staff dealt with the user fee, he ruled both councillors went too far in their public criticism.

He recommended no penalty for Parent, but a five-day suspension of pay for Labbée because she "made a number of misleading statements in the name of defending herself."

A third complaint, related to Ward 11 Coun. Bill Leduc, was dismissed because the incidents involved posts on his personal Facebook page.

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The first accusation involved a transphobic post on the page, but it was one that Boghosian said was not there when he checked. Leduc denied any connection to that post, arguing he had been hacked.

The other complaints involved screenshots allegedly taken from Leduc's page of jokes reposted from other pages. Whatever the content of the jokes, Boghosian said the page was Leduc's personal Facebook account.

Leduc doesn't identify himself as a councillor on that page and doesn't discuss city business, so the integrity commissioner said the code of conduct didn't apply.

Doesn't have jurisdiction

"I have found that I do not have jurisdiction to review the first and second posts," Boghosian said.

"If Coun. Leduc did in fact share these posts, he did so in his personal capacity. The conduct alleged in the complaints is not sufficiently related to the business of the city to warrant a finding of breach of the code of conduct."

His ruling doesn't mean he condones the posts, Boghosian said, adding that Greater Sudbury residents can voice their opinion on Leduc's conduct in the next election.

"This is a matter that can be addressed at the ballot box," he said.

More details about the investigation – including the content of the posts in question -- can be found here.