The City of Cambridge says public discourse has gotten too heated. “We’re seeing, definitely, an increase in online disinformation and misinformation,” said Rob Axiak, the city’s new general manager. The resulting anger has led to aggressive, and occasionally abusive, treatment toward staff. “What we’re finding is that commentary is actually leading to hate and a lot of harassment that’s happening online, all starting from a piece of misinformation or disinformation.” One hot topic has been the city’s snow clearing efforts. “We’ll have people run out of their house at operators, in the middle of the night, [and] throw things at them,” Axiak explained. “There’s pretty concerning or harassing-type behaviours that are coming out as a result.” Another issue was the city’s recent AI-generated campaign. “We tried to be a bit creative, try to have some fun with AI online, related to our snow clearing,” said Axiak. “We’re doing our best in terms of snow removal.” Online rumors sprung up about the cost of that campaign, he explained, which led to more verbal abuse directed at staff. “That couldn’t be further from the truth,” Axiak said. “You know what we did? [It] took a staff person 10 minutes to produce, on a free online platform, so it doesn’t cost the taxpayers tens of thousands of dollars.” He hopes calling out the bad behaviour will result in a healthier dialogue. “Many municipalities are facing what we’re facing,” Axiak said. “What we’re trying to do is a bit different, is to call it out and say we’re not tolerating it. We are also human beings, and we deserve respect as well. And we are good public servants.” The city promised to use more effective strategies to combat misinformation and create better avenues to address tough conversations. Axiak says the next step for the city is create strategies that allow for better communication with staff and council and they are looking at ways to protect against misinformation and disinformation. In the meantime, the city is asking residents to treat staff with respect.
