Vancouver mayor won’t be sanctioned for harassing, personally attacking councillor

Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim won’t face any sanctions for breaching the city’s code of conduct.

Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim will not be sanctioned for breaching the municipal code of conduct by misusing his office to harass and personally attack a newly elected opposition councillor last year.

An investigation into a complaint Coun. Sen Orr filed with the city’s Integrity Commissioner substantiated three allegations of misconduct and recommended Sim issue a written letter of apology to his colleague and be reprimanded if he did not produce one within 14 days.

But at a meeting Monday members of the mayor’s majority party approved a motion from ABC Coun. Brian Montague to impose “no sanctions.”

The investigation report was written by Jamie Pytel of Kingsgate Legal. She determined Sim breached the code of conduct at a news conference where he made comments that suggested—based on years-old social media posts—that Orr “was antisemitic or would incite violence or hatred.” The report found Sim “objectively harassed” and “personally attacked” the not-yet-sworn-in councillor at the news conference, which was organized by the mayor’s office and held at city hall three days after Orr won his seat.

A subsequent social media post by the mayor about Orr attending and speaking at a rally was deemed a “continuation of the harassment.”

• Read more: Vancouver mayor engaged in ‘harassing conduct’ and ‘misuse of the influence of his office’: report

Conclusions questioned

Pytel was at Tuesday’s meeting, where she was met with what one opposition councillor described as “cross-examination” by Montague.

Over three rounds of questions, Montague sought to point out what he saw as shortcomings of the investigation, leveraging his experience as an officer with the Vancouver Police Department to offer his “professional opinion” that it was inadequate.

“I have some serious concerns about the investigation itself. I’m not sure I should even use that word anymore,” he said.

“A quality investigation should be thorough, complete. It should exhaust all avenues before coming to a final conclusion. I was with the VPD for 28 years and spent many of those in various investigative spots … If one of my fellow investigators brought a report like this to me, I would have a laundry list of suggested investigative follow-ups and tasks for them before I would consider it complete.”

Montague also said he thought Orr’s complaint was emblematic of a “continued weaponization” of the Integrity Commissioner—whose role Montague once sought to eliminate entirely.

Pytel stood by the findings of her report, saying pursuing the avenues Montague suggested during his questioning—such as interviewing experts, rally attendees, rally organizers, the police and community organizations—was not necessary to come to the conclusion that the mayor’s behaviour violated the code of conduct.

“This is a fairly straightforward investigation, because the actions were done in public,” Pytel said.

No apology from mayor

Coun. Pete Fry, who is running against Sim for mayor, tabled an amendment asking council to vote to impose the consequences recommended in the report.

“I think it’s a reasonable request that the mayor self-correct his errant behaviors in this particular matter and issue an apology,” he said.

Coun. Rebecca Bligh, who is also running for mayor, said she was troubled by a “refusal to take accountability,” citing public statements made by the mayor in which he disagreed with the findings of the report.

“I think that we are held to a much higher standard in this chamber, and we ought to be by the public, and I find it just actually quite alarming,” she said.

ABC Coun. Sarah Kirby-Yung voted against the amendment with the rest of the members of the party.

“I think that the public honestly loses confidence when, and I’m choosing these words very carefully, so-called procedure appears to override their elected officials standing up for something,” she said.

Montague’s motion to impose no sanctions passed along party lines.

Sim was not present when the matter was discussed, but provided CTV News with a statement after the decision was made.

“We have received the report and respectfully disagree with the findings,” it said.

Flawed accountability mechanism?

Orr called Tuesday’s outcome disappointing.

“A letter of apology isn’t much to ask for,” he said. “It seems like the bare minimum, you know, in terms of how sanctions go.”

Orr also took issue with Montague’s line of questioning.

“What I witnessed today was further politicization and weaponization of the process. It should have just been about whether or not to sanction the mayor who was found to be in breach of that code of conduct,” he said.

As for how this leaves his relationship with Sim, Orr described it as tense, pointing to the current defamation suit he filed against the mayor over false drug allegations.

“We need to get on with the business of running the city,” he said.

“It’s just really unfortunate. I just wish all of this had never happened.”

Stewart Prest, a lecturer in political science at the University of British Columbia, called the code of conduct process flawed.

“I think you can’t help but come away with a sense of conflict, and conflict of interest of another sort when you see the mayor and his majority on council voting to put aside recommendations that referred to the problems with the mayor’s own behavior and choices,” he said.

Prest added it only further erodes public confidence in local government.

“It does give the sense that, once you have a majority on council, you can more or less say or do just about anything you want, as long as it doesn’t actually violate the law,” he said.