A complaint has been launched by the Winnipeg police board against a city councillor following her critical comments about how police handled the truck convoy protest in the city’s downtown earlier this year.
The informal complaint was brought forward to the city’s integrity commissioner by the police board’s secretary on behalf of members after Fort Rouge-East Fort Garry Garry Coun. Sherri Rollins made a presentation to the board March 4.
Rollins was critical of the police response to the protests and also said she received numerous complaints that police were not addressing harassment and abuse directed at some members of the public by protesters.
“Residents in the downtown really had questions and concerns on how the convoy was dealt with, and I raised those concerns with the oversight body because that’s my job” Rollins said in an interview with Global News.
“I’m there to raise concerns on behalf of ward residents and local downtown businesses and how the police service dealt with it.”
During her presentation, Rollins pointed to a report done on the Thunder Bay Police Board that said that city’s police board had been guilty of willful blindness to issues of systemic racism and recommended the board be temporarily replaced by an administrator.
In the report commissioned by the Ontario Civilian Police Commission, Sen. Murray Sinclair said the Thunder Bay police board had failed to deal with the “clear and indisputable pattern” of violence and systemic racism against First Nations people in the city.
The complaint, obtained by Global News, says Rollins’ comments amounted to abuse and harassment within the board’s code of conduct.
“The complaint is that your comments, in equating this board with the Thunder Bay board, in the context of Senator Sinclair’s report, amounted to abuse and harassment within the meaning of the Code of Conduct,” reads part of the complaint issued to Rollins.
Rollins says she brought up the report to suggest Winnipeg’s board use it as an “identifiable work plan” towards fixing the issues she says she has with how city police handled the local demonstrations.
“I was asserting that day that there was work to be done … and that there were questions to be answered. And those were my assertions that day. And they remain my assertions,” Rollins said.
“Many Winnipeggers — not only the residents in the downtown that I represent — have lingering questions on how the police handled the convoy.”
The protest, which began Feb. 4, set up outside the legislative building in support of a larger anti-vaccine mandate demonstration happening in Ottawa. Demonstrators at times blocked traffic and were often at odds with others in the downtown over noise, including honking.
Police maintain that their strategy of negotiating with protest organizers was the correct one, despite coming under heavy criticism from the public and city leaders — including Mayor Brian Bowman — who felt the weeks-long demonstration should have been ended much more quickly.
Board chair Coun. Markus Chambers says he wasn’t part of the complaint filed against Rollins, but adds he was offended by the councillor’s words.
“I was offended by some of the comments that were made because it directly impugned the integrity of the Winnipeg Police Board and the members of the Winnipeg Police Board in the sense that we weren’t doing our due diligence and the work that we are committed to in terms of evolving police to meet the needs, values and expectations of our community,” he said.
Chambers said he is proud of the diversity represented by members of the police board and said there are stark differences between this board and the one in Thunder Bay.
“There’s no (analogy) between what the Winnipeg Police Board is doing and what happened in the City of Thunder Bay,” said Chambers, who is also the councillor for St. Norbert-Seine River.
“There is that representation that is here that was not in Thunder Bay. So I think we have a good understanding and can speak to the issues to the Winnipeg Police Service in terms of what our city needs as we go forward.”
While Chambers acknowledges things could have been handled better around police communications through the protests, overall he thinks city police did a good job handling the situation.
“I recognize that lives were disrupted, businesses were disrupted, but the police handled it in a manner that led to no violence and ensured that public safety was kept,” he said.
Rollins says she is unsure of what the next steps moving forward will be but she stands by her comments made during the meeting
“The first thing I thought was, what is the intent here?” Rollins asked. “And then of course, it occurred to me that this was an attempt to sideline, marginalize and perhaps even intimidate political speechmaking, which is a concern.”
— with files from Global News’ Brittany Greenslade and Sam Thompson
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