After complaints, York school board limits trustee Terrell-Tracey’s power

YRDSB put slew of sanctions on trustee, including barring her from private, public and advisory meetings

Yorkregion.com
June 19, 2019
Dina Al-Shibeeb

After its June 17 evening meeting, York Region District School Board decided to put a slew of limits on East Gwillimbury/Whitchurch-Stouffville Trustee Elizabeth Terrell-Tracey, including barring her from meetings until 2020.

After finding Terrell-Tracey’s "cumulative actions" as "blemishing" to YRDSB following an assessment by an integrity commissioner, the board placed sanctions on the trustee.

The sanctions include Terrell-Tracey being "immediately barred from attending the  private, advisory and public meetings until the end of June 2020".

The meetings Terrell-Tracey is not allowed to attend also include "student discipline, supervised alternative learning review and negotiations advisory committee meetings for the remainder of the 2018-22 term of office".

The trustee’s email communication access using the YRDSB account will "immediately be restricted to individuals identified by the director of education and board chair" -- instead, a separate YRDSB email account will be "established, publicized and managed by staff, so that members of the East Gwillimbury/Whitchurch-Stouffville community are able to address concerns."

The sanctions include barring Terrell-Tracey from attending any elementary or secondary graduations in her capacity as trustee until the end of June 2020.

Also, she will only be permitted to use the trustee newsletter greetings as prepared by corporate communications without amendments to keep her constituents informed of what’s happening in East Gwillimbury and Whitchurch-Stouffville.

What did the commissioner say?

Integrity Commissioner Sandhya Kohli has previously urged YRDSB to "reprimand" Terrell-Tracy after she described receiving the "third formal complaint" on the trustee.

While unable to disclose the identity of the person who filed the complaint May 17 as it's "confidential", Kohli’s investigation found Terrell-Tracey to have contravened section four of the trustee code of conduct, which deals with "integrity and dignity of office", as well as violating clauses 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10b and section 13 on discreditable conduct.

The commissioner, whose investigation took place from May 23 to June 7, also found Terrell-Tracey violated sections 14 and 15, which both deal with failure to adhere to board polices, procedures and supporting documents, as well as reprisals and obstruction.

Kohli’s investigation found Terrell-Tracey’s tweet quoting "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot", aimed at one of the activists leading the charge to get her out of office, was problematic.

Kohli wrote "notwithstanding varied scholarly interpretations of its meaning, the fact is that tweeting a verse from Swing Low, Sweet Chariot caused a negative reaction from the public, one of dismay and alarm, because it hearkens back to the era of slavery."

While this tweet varied in literal and scholarly interpretation, it "was taken as an affront to the black community by some of its members, and also by other members of the public at large."

Kohli also concluded the tweet can’t be read in isolation from her previous comments made to the Toronto Star on in December 2018 wherein she stated, "a person that doesn’t stay quiet in the kitchen is why they [the public] do not like me. I have many male qualities that traditionalists do not like."

"This comment was construed as disparaging of women and was the subject of two separate formal complaints for which I issued a report, and presented to the board on March 5, 2019," Kohli wrote.

In a message from the Board Chair Corrie McBain on June 18, she said that the trustee is “ineligible” to represent YRDSB on the Ontario Public School Boards’ Association, any government agency or outside organization seeking trustee membership from the Board for the remainder of the 2018-2022 term of office

McBain also said that people should still be able to call the local trustee, adding that YRDSB is going to “ensure” that the community continues to have access to representation through staff, including local Superintendents, central Board and Trustee Services staff members and the Chair and Vice Chair.