The following article appeared in the March 22 edition of the Guelph Tribune:
Coun. Maggie Laidlaw has apologized for mouthing a derogatory comment about another council member during a city budget debate earlier this month.
“I was unexpectedly ‘on camera’ when I mouthed a somewhat derogatory expression in a brief moment’s discussion” with Coun. June Hofland, Laidlaw wrote in an email dated March 20 and posted on Coun. Ian Findlay’s Ward 2 blog. “I had not expected to be on camera at the time, as someone else was addressing an issue and I would have expected the camera to be on that person. Nevertheless, the expression was certainly inappropriate for council chambers, regardless of whether it was actually stated or just ‘mouthed,’ and I apologize to my council colleagues, and to the mayor, for any embarrassment this has caused.”
Laidlaw wrote that she’d been out of the country for 10 days and, until she returned, hadn’t been aware of a March 4 email sent by Mayor Karen Farbridge to city councillors.
The issue came to public attention in a letter to the editor in the March 8 edition of the Tribune, in which a local resident accused Laidlaw of being clearly seen on television during the budget debate calling a fellow council an “***hole.” Laidlaw’s apology was followed on Findlay’s blog by Farbridge’s March 4 email. In it, the mayor said concerns had been “raised by members of the public and staff regarding the behavior of individual members of council last night that were caught on camera.
“While your microphone might be off, your comments, either mouthed or spoken, can be understood by viewers. This not only reflects badly on the individual but on council as a whole,” Farbridge said.
“There will always be times when we do not agree with the perspective or vote of one of our colleagues,” she said. “I would ask that we not make derogatory comments about our colleagues, whether the microphone is on or not.
“I appreciate it is a long evening. We get tired, patience wanes and tempers get frayed. However, I believe our constituents elect us because they trust we have the personal fortitude to handle the heat.” And in another memo posted on March 20 on her own blog, Farbridge elaborated on comments she made in a March 17 Tribune story about another controversial action by Laidlaw during the budget debate – namely, telling council that she’d used a Google mapping tool to check on the housing of three people who’d emailed her to complain about city spending and taxes.
“When you happen to Google Map those addresses, they are all living in pretty nice houses,” sometimes with boats as well as a number of autos, Laidlaw said March 2 during a debate on council pay raises. “I don’t pay much attention to those emails anymore,” she told council.
In the March 17 Tribune story, Farbridge said she didn’t think Laidlaw had violated council’s Code of Conduct.
However, in her March 20 message on the “Mayor’s Blog” on the city’s website, the mayor expressed some concern about the “generalization” employed by Laidlaw during the budget debate.
“On council, we hear many perspectives and points of view,” Farbridge wrote. “Trying to put them into perspective is part of the job. I have less concern with trying to put three e-mails into perspective than with the generalization – real or perceived – about people who have a nice home and a boat in the driveway. Certainly, several people in the community felt they were a victim of a ‘generalization,’ ” she wrote.
“On council, we also hear a lot of generalizations – generalizations about the character of people who ride buses, about students and about people who collect social assistance. Not too long ago, our community heard very hurtful (and false) generalizations about the Sikh community . . .
“None of this is to say that there are not real social trends that need our attention,” she continued. “In my opinion, the biggest loss in this whole affair is the distraction from the real issue of poverty in our community and the growing gap in incomes . . .”