Port Moody will ask the provincial government to create a formal code of conduct for local elected officials to ensure they have a “respectful and safe workplace.”
But council’s assent of such an entreaty didn’t come until the motion’s proponent, Coun. Diana Dilworth, was on the receiving end of a sharp rebuke by one of her colleagues.
While Coun. Hunter Madsen ultimately supported Dilworth’s motion, he said it was mostly unnecessary as Port Moody council already operates “under one of the toughest codes of conduct of any municipality in B.C.”
In 2018, Port Moody became the first municipality in the province to adopt a code of conduct bylaw for city councillors, following a template established in Alberta. It requires councillors to “act honestly and, in good faith, serve the welfare and interests of the municipality as a whole.” It also requires councillors to treat each other, city employees and the public with “courtesy, dignity and respect.”
However, Dilworth said the city’s own code doesn’t go far enough, as violations that can be punished by a range of penalties from a letter of reprimand to suspension are adjudicated by council itself.
“This is a much broader issue,” she said.
But Madsen accused Dilworth of shrugging off the effectiveness of council’s code already in place.
“Maybe the problem isn’t the local code of conduct, maybe the real problem here is the real specifics of her account lack merit to win council’s support,” he said, referring to a testy exchange between Dilworth and Mayor Rob Vagramov at a council meeting last July that sparked her motion.
“These things can look very different from different angles.”
Madsen also accused Dilworth of being “personally antagonistic” as well as “thin-skinned and prone — even eager — to take offence.”
Dilworth denied she was on a personal vendetta, prompting Coun. Zoe Royer to compare council to a “married couple with a set of triggers and accumulation of upsets and eventually people aren’t able to hear one another.”
In that case, she added, only the intervention of a neutral arbiter can bring peace.
Mayor Rob Vagramov said he’s been witness to “bullying, intimidation and high school drama stuff” his entire six-year tenure on council.
“I have been astonished at how hostile a work environment it has been here,’ he said, before shutting down both Dilworth and Madsen from speaking to the motion a second time.
Prior to the meeting, more than a dozen people rallied outside city hall to show support for Dilworth’s motion.
Organizer Laura Grist said it’s important elected officials have the same rights to feel safe at work as other employees.
“When they don’t get to do their job because the workplace is toxic, then there’s a problem with the system,” she told The Tri-City News. “We just wanted people to see that this is an issue.”
Dilworth’s motion will also be forwarded to the Lower Mainland Local Government Association and the Union of BC Municipalities to be considered as resolutions for their events next year.
