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Guest host: David Menzies

Article by Rebel News staff

What unfolded at a Whitby council meeting this week was equal parts farce and frustration, and it should concern anyone who expects local government to prioritise public safety.

The meeting was meant to address a motion from Councillor Chris Leahy calling on the federal government to notify municipalities when high-risk offenders are granted unescorted temporary absences. It’s a modest proposal ... too modest. Most residents would agree: it’s not just about knowing when, but where these individuals are being released.

Yet despite the urgency, the motion was never even brought to a vote.

Why? Because councillors spent four hours bogged down debating comparatively trivial issues, from roundabouts to sunlight affecting traffic lights. By the time they got through the agenda, a procedural time limit forced the meeting to adjourn. The vote is now delayed until next month.

For the many residents who attended specifically for that issue, it was a slap in the face.

But the dysfunction didn’t stop there.

Earlier in the month, Leahy attempted to introduce another motion, one that would have prevented the town from awarding contracts to companies participating in the Temporary Foreign Worker Program. That proposal was swiftly shut down, with some councillors reacting with outright hostility. Councillor Victoria Bozinovski labelled it “garbage … xenophobic … racist,” though how race factors into a policy about labour programs was never clearly explained.

After the meeting, attempts were made to ask Bozinovski for clarification. Instead of engaging, she walked away without comment.

What followed the next day was perhaps even more troubling.

Several mainstream media outlets ran stories framing the interaction as a serious confrontation, even suggesting safety concerns and police involvement. But video of the exchange tells a very different story, one in which the only physical escalation came from a security guard, not the reporter asking questions.