York Region District School Board wants same powers as municipalities on trustees

Board isn’t allowed legally to suspend trustee honorariums

Yorkregion.com
June 19, 2019
Dina Al-Shibeeb

York Region District School Board asked the minister of Education and local MPPs earlier this year to amend the Education Act to gain “similar power” to municipalities when dealing with alleged breaches by trustees, its chair Corrie McBain said in a message on June 18.

Currently, the York school board isn’t allowed legally to suspend trustee honorariums. Also, being on a similar footing in the Municipal Act will allow the integrity commissioner more clout when investigating breaches, McBain said.

“We requested school boards be provided with the right to suspend trustee honorariums as a sanction for breaching the code of conduct,” McBain added.

“To advocate for these changes, I will forward the motion from our June meeting and resend the original copy of our request to the minister of Education and York Region members of provincial parliament.”

McBain wrote this in a message following the York school board’s decision to limit East Gwillimbury/Whitchurch-Stouffville trustee Elizabeth Terrell-Tracey’s power, including barring her from meetings until 2020.

Following integrity commissioner Sandhya Kohli’s findings, the board found Terrell-Tracey to be “in breach of the code of conduct.”

“As such, the board approved several appropriate and broad-ranging sanctions connected with the inappropriate conduct of Trustee Terrell-Tracey,” McBain said.

While the slew of actions targeting Terrell-Tracey limit her power as trustee, the York school board can’t dismiss her or suspend her pay.