How a dispute over a hockey rink canteen led to Grand Lake councillor's suspension
Councillor says colleagues took heavy-handed approach to simple disagreement
Grand Lake is the latest community in New Brunswick to sanction a councillor for an alleged code of conduct violation. This time, the trouble began with a small dispute over the canteen at a hockey rink.
Chanda Klassen was elected to Chipman council in 2021, and remained after the village joined neighbouring Minto to form the Municipality of Grand Lake in 2023's amalgamation.
Becoming a councillor was a steep learning curve, but amalgamation of two "rival" communities was even more challenging, Klassen said. There were now two municipal offices, two sewer treatment plants, two arenas and two fire departments.
"A lot of resources go into maintaining those, and staffing and council relations can sometimes get a little stressed with those kinds of situations."
Describing herself as risk-averse, Klassen said she tended to ask many questions on council, which she admitted could "try the patience" of colleagues.
Council minutes show Klassen was not afraid to be the sole nay vote on many occasions.
But she would soon be suspended from council over an issue the mayor said could have been resolved with a simple apology.
Dispute started over arena canteen
Problems arose when the municipality had to find a new operator of the Chipman arena's canteen, which Klassen had previously run.
An interested business asked to chat with Klassen about the canteen operation, and she agreed.
"It's just natural for me to help somebody who's trying to get going in a new business," she said.
"And I was very familiar with the canteen, and I wasn't trying to tarnish the reputation."
But on arrival at the next council meeting, Klassen said, each desk had a printed out screenshot of the private communications she had with the business.
Coun. Shawn Patterson said Klassen had gone around council by speaking with the business.
The screenshots showed Klassen asking the business for permission to bring up at council that she felt the process of seeking an operator was different from what Patterson had said publicly.
The business expressed concern with that approach and said it did not want to get caught in the middle of drama because it felt nothing wrong had been done.
Klassen went on to message the business and suggest it ask for other concessions from the municipality.
"Don't be shy to ask for a freezer & stove," Klassen wrote.
Another message said, "Just because I want [Patterson] to tell the truth doesn't mean I don't support you."
In the official code of conduct violation complaint, Patterson wrote that he felt this was "undermining a fellow councillor" and gave the impression "that council is untrustworthy."
In an interview, Patterson said the business came to him and shared the screenshots.
Patterson said Klassen had acted on her own by approaching the business, and he described her comments in the messages as "disheartening."
He agreed with Mayor Kevin Nicklin that an apology would have "gone a long way."
The business, Caravan Bakery, declined an interview request.
Lawyer found Klassen did break rules
Patterson said after no one responded to the canteen tender, he reached out to a few businesses and asked them if they were interested.
He said he supported the business that initially reached out to Klassen for advice, because she had run the canteen. but then the conversation crossed a line, he said.
He brought a formal complaint against her.
Nicklin held a vote on Dec. 16 asking if council would look into the complaint, and all but Klassen voted yes.
It was sent to the municipality's lawyer, who found Klassen had violated the code of conduct.
Klassen said she never got the opportunity to give her side of the story to the lawyer, despite asking for a meeting. A request from her for mediation was also denied, she said.
Klassen received a letter on Feb. 14 informing her of the punishment that she was stripped of her committee roles and that she must make a formal apology to Patterson She refused.
On March 3, council voted to suspend Klassen without pay for three months.
"It's in my mind very trivial and could have been resolved with a simple conversation," Klassen said.
She had no malicious intent and it was the business that first approached her, she said.
There was no need for full investigation, mayor says
Nicklin confirmed in an interview that Klassen did not get the chance to speak, but said it was unnecessary because the screenshots clearly showed rules were broken.
"It is true that we did not ask to go further because the simple reason was it was right there in paper, you know, so we weren't ruling on what the entire conversation was," Nicklin said.
"What we were ruling on was, was there a breach in the code of conduct, and there was no denying that it was a breach in the code of conduct."
Nicklin said he initially thought it could be resolved.
"When it started, I felt that it might be a conversation that got away from a person and that's why we looked for an apology."
He said Klassen has since further broken the code of conduct by "negatively" posting about the situation on Facebook.
"Sometimes not all decisions go our way, but as council, we stand together and we work as one when we come out of the room and a decision is rendered," Nicklin said.
"And that's not what's happening now."
Nicklin said it will be "a journey" for the council to continue after what happened.
Sometimes council is 'too serious,' Klassen says
Klassen isn't the first councillor in a new community to be suspended this year before getting a chance to answer code of conduct allegations. The Strait Shores council in southeastern New Brunswick suspended Andy MacGregor after he proposed measures to improve accountability.
- Legality of sanctions against Strait Shores councillor questioned
- Councillor's way of proposing change violated conduct code, investigator says
Unlike Klassen, MacGregor did get a chance to speak to the lawyer who investigated the allegations.
Klassen said what happened to her shows the need for a more formal, third-party process across the province to investigate code of conduct allegations.
"When it's left to lawyers and municipalities to investigate themselves, there's a lot of room for error."
She also worries that situations like hers might discourage people from paying attention to municipal politics.
"I think a lot of times we get maybe too serious, and we forget why we're doing what we're doing and we get too committed to accomplishing something that we forget we're a team."
She said she contacted the Local Governance Commission but was told because they believed she did violate the code of conduct, they would not investigate.
Klassen said she was told she could consult a lawyer, which she did, but that the fees were not feasible.
"When you offer to be a councillor, you shouldn't have to have a lawyer on retainer in order to do it."
She said she hopes council can resolve the dispute and learn from it.
"I don't think suspending a councillor and hanging them out to dry for three months and taking them away from the residents that elected them is the right approach."
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