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Dismissed complaints, "known critics" and secret planes
155 Plays2 years ago
Councillor Michael Janz joins host Duncan Kinney for a frank and wide-ranging discussion on the subject of policing in Edmonton. They discuss the recently dismissed complaint levelled against Janz by the president of the police association, this business around "known critics" of police, the $4.3 new secret plane replacing the old secret plane and much more.
If you like this podcast please support it! Go to https://www.theprogressreport.ca/patrons and become a monthly patron.
Links:
- MichaelJanz.ca/SaferforAll
- Integrity Commissioner's report regarding the code of conduct complaint filed by Michael Elliott
- The photo of the EPS officers at the scene where two people were shot dead
- Every single tweet that was a part of Michael Elliott's complaint
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Podcast Highlight
00:00:00
Speaker
Hey folks, Duncan Kinney here to say that The Progress Report is a proud member of the Harbinger Media Network. A podcast on the network that I want to highlight is The Return of Bread and Poppies with host Hilary Agro. And Hilary is a fantastic and incredible activist and academic and content creator on drug policy issues. She's been on the pod before, she is incredible. I am legit very excited to listen to her new stuff. But yes, so look out for it.
Personal Story: Bruce the Dog
00:00:29
Speaker
Another thing I have to address off the top here is that this podcast was originally going to have another interview in it. I was scheduled to interview Cara Zweibel of the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, but as you may have seen, if you follow me on social media, my dog, Bruce, was stolen. He literally was taken, and I obviously had to cancel that interview.
00:00:54
Speaker
Bruce is okay, he is back with me, but it was not a very fun afternoon. Thankfully he did end up being taken into animal control and we were reunited and it was a joyous time and if you want to follow all that stuff, it is on social media. A lot of people have followed it. He is a celebrity now.
Interview with Michael Jans
00:01:13
Speaker
But I do also want to talk about the podcast that we do have. And it is a very interesting chat with Councillor Michael Jans from Edmonton City Council. We obviously talk about the complaint that was filed against him by the president of the cop union that was then dismissed by the integrity commissioner. But we also talk about a number of other important policing issues here in Edmonton. Now on to the show.
00:01:51
Speaker
Friends and enemies, welcome to The Progress Report. I am your host, Duncan Kinney, recording today here in Amiskwetchu, Wisconsin, otherwise known as Edmonton, Alberta, here in Treaty 6 territory on the banks of the Kasis-Kasau, Mississippi, or the North Saskatchewan River.
00:02:05
Speaker
Joining us today is Michael Jans, City Councillor for Ward Papasteu, to talk about the recent decision by the Edmonton Integrity Commissioner to dismiss 24 complaints that were lodged against him by Edmonton Police Association President, Staff Sergeant Michael Elliott. Michael, welcome to the pod. How are you doing? It's a huge relief, Duncan, to be honest. It's been a rough couple of months and I'm just really glad that this is all out in the open now and Edmontonians can see the kind of
00:02:34
Speaker
while the kind of stress that politicians are put under.
00:02:37
Speaker
Yeah, this complaint is lodged, but you can't talk about it, right? But you're told that a complaint has been lodged against you, and the integrity commissioner is looking into it. Is that about the extent of what you knew? Yeah, kind of. It looms over you, and it makes you second guess. Well, can I ask this question, or can I say this? I may be under investigation. I may be under double investigation. It, by design, puts a chill on you.
00:03:04
Speaker
And so I think this isn't like a normal integrity commission or complaint where, say, like a politician
00:03:13
Speaker
did some, had some wrongdoing in terms of, I'm trying to think of another example, but like my nickel was found guilty of, you know, preaching the code of conduct, putting out nasty tweets about his colleague Andrew Nack, or there was some allegation, some other allegations, you could go back and look, but this was different.
Police Complaint and Its Impact
00:03:33
Speaker
This was a body, the union for all of the police officers in Edmonton,
00:03:41
Speaker
on behalf of the union filed a code of conduct complaint against me. And I became aware of it. It's important to note, not through the integrity commissioner, but through immediate inquiry by global news. So right from the jump, it had been, it appears it had been given to media. I don't know by who, but I certainly wasn't aware of it. And the fact that
00:04:01
Speaker
the media was that was concerning and then later on I got notified that the Michael Elliott had put the complaint in a newsletter to all of the police across Edmonton too for their union so there were these charges and these accusations floating out there against me and you know it feels weird like they're coming for your job in the first 90 days because you asked a couple questions they don't like
Police Accountability Discussion
00:04:26
Speaker
Yeah. And I think it, this is an important story. If you were a citizen of Edmonton or really just anyone who cares about police and police accountability, like this is incredibly disturbing. Uh, there is something I just have to mention off the top though. And it's, I can't do this podcast without at least, you know, talking about it. And that is the fact that recently the city, like Edmonton police service officers shot two people dead.
00:04:51
Speaker
Uh, one of them was a person who was just in their own home, minding their own business, totally uninvolved in, in the situation. And we still do not know the names of the victims. We do not names of, we do not know the names of the officers involved. This basic foundational information has been withheld from the community and we still have not been able to process this tragedy. Uh, and I just want to say that like, this is unacceptable. And I, I don't know if you're able or want to comment on it, but it's just like.
00:05:17
Speaker
Incredibly gross that this has happened and that there's essentially been a media blackout ever since it happened like even a cert which in almost every other case releases a photo of the
00:05:28
Speaker
firearm or the imitation firearm in this case has chosen not to release an imitation, the picture of the imitation firearm, which is like, what the hell is going on? So, okay. It's interesting too. Like in the United States, they, they've released the names of the victims as soon as the next of kin are notified. Like you'll, you'll hear, you know, in, you know, five or six hours later, what, who the names are, but we don't have the victims. We don't have, we don't have the names. We don't have any information. And that could have been you or me, Duncan. Like it was, uh, um, you look at the photo that you can link to.
00:05:58
Speaker
uh the person was was shot and there was an apartment directly behind them like where did you think the bullets were going to go yeah it is you know the we've seen if you've seen the picture of the like bullet hole in the window if you've seen the picture of the cops three cops lined up next to each other with
00:06:12
Speaker
a guy on the ground, you know, about 10 meters away from him or like five meters away from it. It's wild. But your issue is important as well. And we came here to discuss that and we can't even really discuss that one because there just isn't any information. But earlier this week, you held a press conference where you talked about the findings from the integrity commissioner.
00:06:31
Speaker
and how every single complaint against you was dismissed. Why was this complaint so potentially harmful to democracy and just the business of city government and holding police accountable here in Edmonton?
00:06:45
Speaker
Yeah, that's exactly it. Politicians need to be, especially politicians who are responsible for the resourcing and the responsibility for safety in a community, they need to be able to ask tough questions about the police. They need to ask about police budgets. They need to ask about police conduct.
00:07:05
Speaker
And when they feel that they cannot do so without the threat of discipline or sanction or punishment, that puts a chill on democracy and that means some things are off limits. And I felt it where you say, oh, can I ask this or can I tweet this or can I even share this news article or will I be facing a Kodakonda complaint?
00:07:26
Speaker
It's incredibly serious and interesting. I've received direct messages from other city councillors and elected officials across Canada who have expressed solidarity with me saying, you know, we too have felt this chill. We too have wondered, you know, can we criticize the police or else will we face punishment?
00:07:42
Speaker
And I think it's important for all of us to kind of stand up to the bullying and say, no, this is democracy. We are allowed and we are encouraged to make sure that we can be a critical friend to all institutions, especially the police. Sometimes that they may not like being held accountable, they may not like criticism, but it is, as you just highlighted, it is in some cases life or death.
00:08:10
Speaker
Yeah, and we're going to get into the specific complaints later on, but it is worth pointing out, I think, just generally speaking, that your complaints were either pretty mild or generally just fair-minded criticism that would fall within the purview of any citizen, let alone a city councilor. But as a city councilor, you obviously have a
00:08:32
Speaker
responsibility to hold these institutions accountable. You fund the Edmonton Police Service. It's $385 million this year. It's the single largest line item in the Edmonton Police Budget. And to think that you can't retweet or quote tweet or even just say what's going on with the Edmonton Police Budget, like basic accountability stuff, it's wild.
00:08:56
Speaker
But I think the complaint is also worth highlighting and just to kind of understand the frame of mind of Staff Sergeant Michael Elliott, the president of the Edmonton Police Association and like the language that was used.
Social Media Conduct Accusations
00:09:10
Speaker
And I just want to take a minute here to kind of read some sections from the complaint. So if you'll indulge me, Michael, I'm going to get to it here.
00:09:17
Speaker
In December 2021, I learned that Counselor Jans had made, retweeted, and or liked a series of social media posts about the Edmonton Police Service and its members, as well as police officers generally. The social media posts contain statements, language, and commentary that is completely inappropriate for a city of Edmonton counselor. Many of the posts show a serious lack of understanding of issues around and involving the Edmonton Police Service and its members. Further, the posts are not impartial and do not fairly consider all relevant facts, opinions, and perspective.
00:09:47
Speaker
perspectives as required by the code. The posts are often offensive and very disrespectful of and to city employees, the Edmonton Police Service members. And some of the posts are misleading in respect of the Edmonton Police Service and its members. Again, it's worth pointing out that every single one of these allegations was dismissed by the integrity commissioner. And like when we get into the specifics, it is wild that like the tweets like the examples he uses do not represent
00:10:16
Speaker
close to what he's saying in the complaint here. I'll get back to it. Councillor Jans is not a private citizen who is simply sharing his views on social media. He is now an elected official of the city of Edmonton and he is required to follow the council code of conduct with an appropriate level of decorum, respect, and professionalism.
00:10:32
Speaker
The Code of Conduct requires that Counselor Jans is accurate in his comments, that he obtains all the relevant facts before commenting, that he conducts himself in a fair, unbiased, and respectful manner, both generally as a counselor, but also specifically in respect of his communications about city employees, including members of the Edmonton Police Service, and that he conducts himself in a way that is respectful of and that benefits the people of Edmonton as a whole, including the thousands of Edmonton Police Service employees and their families who live and work in the city of Edmonton.
00:10:58
Speaker
Just a sidebar here. I've always been very curious about how many Edmonton Police Service officers live in Sherwood Park or St. Albert, but that's either here or there. That's a tangent. Unfortunately, Councillor Jans has repeatedly violated his obligations under the Council Code of Conduct through his recent social media post by A, implying that the Edmonton Police Commission was and is negligent in its duties and that there is no oversight over the Edmonton Police Service budget and its expenditures.
00:11:25
Speaker
retweeting a post that called the chief of police a quote bureaucrat accused the police chief of quote fear mongering and called the chief's comments about potential butts potential budget cuts quote predictable and quote disgusting
00:11:38
Speaker
attacking the media for its coverage of a debate and a council decision regarding the Edmonton Police Service budget, publicly liking, this is the big one, publicly liking social media posts from known critics, known critics of the Edmonton Police Service who are known for misrepresenting facts about the Edmonton Police Service and its members, retweeting social media posts from other municipalities, Lethbridge and Calgary
00:12:00
Speaker
that accuse police officers of quote malevolence and quote political bias and imply that police officers in general are not held accountable for their actions. Posting his own tweets that falsely state or imply that police officers in Edmonton are not held accountable for their actions. Accusing members of the Edmonton Police Service of egregious police brutality based on unproven and disputed allegations in a civil lawsuit. And finally, implying that members of the Edmonton Police Service may somehow be associated with the proud boys because of an event in the city of Calgary in 2020.
00:12:30
Speaker
Yeah, it's a lot. It's a lot. This is what was so important. These tweets of yours, Michael Jans, were so important that the president of the police association felt obligated that he had to write this letter and file this complaint with the integrity commissioner. But let's also contextualize this for the listeners. And this complaint was filed January 10th.
00:12:53
Speaker
In December, our Council for the first time ever did not give the police the blank check, the $11 million that they had requested. We gave them $1 million, not the $11 million. It was the first time that I think Council has really rejected a
00:13:09
Speaker
a major increase to the police budget. Prior to that, Michael Elliott and I have some history where I was a school trustee who alongside Bridget Sterling, Sheila Dunn and others voted to remove the school resource officer program from our schools. So the police have, how shall I say,
00:13:30
Speaker
they've taken Umbridge with a number of my actions and I feel like when I received this complaint I felt this was an attempt to try and settle a score and to try and shut me up and put me in the penalty box early especially when I heard that it had been given to media that to me signaled that this wasn't done in a good faith manner this was this was what I felt was an attempt to silence me in an attempt to
00:13:54
Speaker
discredit me and to make me look like I'm a wild, antifa, anti-police city councilor, which certainly I'm not. And I would challenge, I've worked with or called the police probably more than most of your listeners based on my life experience. So it just really felt like a smear campaign to me. As somebody who works in politics, when you hear about something from a reporter, not from the integrity commissioner, that to me throws good faith right out the window.
00:14:23
Speaker
The next part here, the part that follows logically from reading out that complaint is going through the actual tweets in question that Michael Elliott attached to his complaint. We're not going to go through every single one. We're going to condense it into a top five. If you do want to check this out, we do have a Twitter thread on the Progress Alberta Twitter account where we detail every single one. We will also link to the Integrity Commissioner's decision, which also goes through every single one.
00:14:47
Speaker
and has it on the screen and then the kind of the decision, the allegation dismissed and why they dismissed it. But again, it's not like you're saying like ACAB or fuck the police on Twitter here. We're going to go through the complaints. Like these are serious, like
00:15:02
Speaker
either just like things that a city councilor should be concerned about as a city councilor, or just like, again, very fair and or mild criticism of the police. And they're a public institution that receives, again, $385 million from the city of Edmonton this year. You are not above criticism. Okay, so let's go through the top five. Of the 24 allegations, there are six separate ones that Michael Elliott includes that all concern the thin blue line flag.
Thin Blue Line Flag Controversy
00:15:30
Speaker
And until recently, the Edmonton Police Association had flown the Thin Blue Line flag outside of its headquarters. It became known that they were flying the Thin Blue Line flag outside their headquarters on the anniversary of George Floyd's death.
00:15:45
Speaker
And this had been widely covered in the media and you as a city councilor had repeatedly noticed this and taken pictures of this flag and tweeted about it and informed people about this flag. In fact, one of your tweets that was that was attached as a complaint was like you quote tweeting a progress report story about how Edmonton police service officers are not allowed to wear thin blue line patches on their uniform. That is like
00:16:11
Speaker
And it's not just in Edmonton, it's across Canada. The Thin Blue Line has been widely banned by police brass for exactly this reason. It's like the Punisher symbol. Whatever it used to mean doesn't matter. It's been co-opted by many forces to represent an us versus them division. I first learned about the Thin Blue Line flight following the death of
00:16:29
Speaker
murder of George Floyd when police were flying the flag as kind of a hashtag blue lives matter as kind of a rebuke to calls for accountability and racial justice and that's certainly when I saw it present in Edmonton. It's interesting though Duncan the last time I saw the flag flying it's over by my kids daycare so I drive by it all the time and the last time I saw it flying and I got a photo was February 6th but since then it has come down so I'm not sure whether they took it down as a
00:16:57
Speaker
Concession following the result of this code of conduct complaint or something else, but I am aware mirror, so he our first non Caucasian mirror to my knowledge came to ask them in November to take the flag down and They refused and I believe
00:17:13
Speaker
It's interesting that now it's been changed out. I mean, if it wasn't a problem, then why is it a problem now? But I think you and I both know the Confederate flag does not represent state rights. It represents something else. And I think we all know what the Thin Blue Line flag has implied, and that's why it's been banned, and that's why it was just so...
00:17:35
Speaker
infuriating to many members of the BIPOC community who have expressed concern that now more than ever we need to come together in unity around policing and safety. And for the police union to basically be flying this flag, it felt like a very clear line where they wanted to draw it.
00:17:59
Speaker
One of the ways that I, if I'm forced to describe or explain the thin blue line flag to someone who might not be familiar with it, like my one sentence description is like, oh, it's like essentially like an anti black lives matter flag.
00:18:11
Speaker
Um, and at the progress report, we have done a lot of reporting on the thin blue line flag. And one of the things that came up in Elliott's complaint is that you were, uh, I think it's the last allegations that you were implying that the Edmonton police were connected to the proud boys because of an incident in Calgary in 2020. And the incident they're talking about is one that we have reported on probably most extensively out of any media outlet in Alberta. And that was a black lives rally matter, uh, black lives matter rally that was held in Calgary in August of 2020.
00:18:37
Speaker
A bunch of like Proud Boy losers like showed up and counter protested that rally and they had a thin blue line flag with them and they were pictures were taken of them with the thin blue line flag. And there's also a very famous picture of these Proud Boys with their thin blue line flag behind a line of Calgary police officers. And that image I think really is a snapshot of what the thin blue line flag means. And this is obviously, of course, before
00:19:04
Speaker
the Proud Boys were designated a terrorist organization. But still, it looks really bad. Let's clarify here too. Like who is flying the flag? It's not the Edmonton Police Service. It's the Edmonton Police Association. But who is the Edmonton Police Association? Well,
00:19:18
Speaker
It's the union or the association representing all of the police. So if they are electing leadership that are choosing to fly that sort of flag and send that sort of symbol and that sort of message, I've heard from, you know, neighbors who, BIPOC neighbors who have said, I don't feel comfortable calling the police because I don't know if I'm going to get one of the police to show up that are more on the side of the thin blue line than more on the side of me.
00:19:44
Speaker
And and we cannot have that division. It's a it's a threat to community. We need we need unity and we need we need police to remember that they're part of community and that they're just as embedded in these these neighborhoods and outcomes as we are. Yeah, the the other that the top the second one I'm going to bring up and one that was extremely concerning to a lot of people online was the known critics part.
Chilling Effects of Criticism
00:20:08
Speaker
There was three separate tweets that were a part of this allegation where you were apparently
00:20:13
Speaker
you know, retweeting disinformation skya about the police, Michael. But again, it's incredibly concerning that the president of the Edmonton Police Association is like deciding who is and isn't a known critic and who is and isn't allegedly spreading or misrepresenting facts about the Edmonton Police Service. The tweets in question that reference these known critics were you essentially quote, tweeting or retweeting Bashir Mohammed, who is well known.
00:20:41
Speaker
activists for black rights here in Edmonton and who's been on the podcast many times, as well as Tom Engel, who is a criminal lawyer and a long time person who has done a lot of activism, a lot of work and legal work with regards to police accountability. And when you saw that line about known critics, did you think it would like
00:21:04
Speaker
That's really what people glommed on to, I think, when this story came out. Did you know that it would blow up? It felt completely Stalinist. I felt like it was Senator McCarthy all over again. Am I going to have to go through my phone and I'm not allowed to talk to the following people? If I'm a city councilor, I'm not allowed to show up at the following Christmas parties. It just felt chilling and absolutely
00:21:30
Speaker
I don't even have words, Duncan. It was absolutely just wild. It was straight out of the 1950s. And that's the sort of mentality that known critics are somehow, I can't associate with them, and somehow known critics are invalid and should be canceled.
00:21:49
Speaker
But all of the worst tropes about conservative cancel culture brought up in people who were asking reasonable questions about police reform, accountability, et cetera. I've never heard that in... It felt almost like Kenny where enemies of Alberta oil industry or something like that. It was just...
00:22:11
Speaker
It was just crazy. Am I not allowed to talk to defense attorneys? Am I not allowed to talk to citizens who have problems with the police? And what constitutes a known critic? Somebody who just asks a reasonable question about a police use of force or something? Am I only allowed to just give unfettered praise? Do I have to just only associate with the Kiwanis top cops or something?
00:22:40
Speaker
Well, I think salute and shut up, Michael, is what you need to be doing here with regards to associated with known critics or just even highlighting them on twitter.com. Again, an absolutely wild decision to put those two words together in this complaint that became public. Well, and who are the known critics? Will you share a list of them? Are there a group of them? Are there a school? It's just
00:23:05
Speaker
Yeah. Do you have an enemies list? Like how much? Well, who else is on it? Okay. So I can't, I can't talk to Duncan. I can't talk to Tom. I can't talk to Bashir. I can't talk to like who, who, oh, Mac mail, he's a journalist though. Surely that would be okay. Like, you know, it's just like, how can I talk to, can I talk to Jen Reimer? Uh, can I talk to like, you know, like it just, how far down the list does this go?
00:23:26
Speaker
Well, this one was wild, but the next one, I struggle to understand why this was included in the complaint. You retweeted Shannon Phillips three separate times, and all of those times she's talking about her
00:23:41
Speaker
her experiences with the Lethbridge Police Service, which to reiterate, she was like illegally surveilled and people she was meeting with were harassed. Her information has been illegally accessed by police and police employees for non-police reasons. Like she has faced
00:24:00
Speaker
an incredible amount of abuse and harassment from the LPS, the Lethbridge Police Service. And like there has been next to no accountability for what has happened. Matthew called, like he called in an inquiry there. Like even the UCP recognized that this is like beyond the pale and that accountability must be done.
00:24:16
Speaker
And that's what I'd say to the conservative politicians listening here too. It's not because I'm a lefty and Shannon's a lefty. This could be you next, buddy. All of us, any elected official anywhere, if we cannot ask questions without threat of sanction by the police, or we're a slick Shannon, and we don't get to Lethbridge overnight. I made that point earlier.
00:24:38
Speaker
If the police think first they can get away with a code of conduct, what's next? Starting to run your data, starting to follow you home from the bar circa overtime incident? This is wild. In Toronto, they hired private investigators. In the US, there's been all kinds of examples where police unions have acted like they're private detectives and gone after their enemies, that they've been clear they have enemies and they've been out to destroy them politically or personally.
00:25:06
Speaker
You got to nip this in the bud in the first time you get a whiff of any of anything that feels like like bullying. You got to throw it out there and make sure the public's aware of it.
00:25:14
Speaker
Literally, you were just retweeting Shannon Phillips talking about her own experience. Didn't we have Dale McPhee just in this past month or the past two months retweeting some wild-ass Michael Schellenberg propaganda about people who use drugs? He's like, oh yeah, I was just tweeting that out for information or whatever. Yeah, some attacks on progressives too. He's like, well, I was just sharing. People need to be aware of this.
00:25:38
Speaker
I, yeah, you're just retweeting Sean Phillips and just, and just as a tangent about Michael Schellenberger. Uh, I did have an episode lined up with Adam Johnson of citations needed to talk about Michael Schellenberger. Unfortunately I got COVID and I haven't been able to reschedule since. Uh, but I do think, uh, I mean, I think the, the UCP is bringing him in to, to speak about a safe supply, bizarrely. And, uh, I still do want to do that. So if that is something you would be interested in, let me know. I'll try and track down.
00:26:07
Speaker
Adam Johnson again. Yeah, I think that's very needed because I know a lot of senior people in Edmonton and in the government are reading the Michael Schellenberg book and I'm worried they're taking it maybe too seriously. Yeah.
00:26:25
Speaker
The other kind of category that I think is worth highlighting in the complaints that were submitted by Staff Sergeant Michael Elliott is essentially you just retweeting or quote-tweeting journalists who were writing about police. The journalists here were Mac Mail, Kevin Myman,
00:26:41
Speaker
Uh, Jenny Russell, like integrity investigative reporter, kind of extraordinaire, uh, Kevin Myman, and even the progress report. You're just like, quote, tweeting us or retweeting us. And like, there was like five or six separate times, maybe even seven times where it's like, Michael Elliott submitted these as like, you just talking about matters. This is, this is just you talking about matters of public interest that are like about the police.
00:27:04
Speaker
And he's like, yeah, actually he can't do this. This violates his code of contact. Yeah. Well, it's interesting because like when I was first elected, um, I think in the first week or so I got, uh, it was the, the news story broke about the lawsuit regarding, uh, Pacey Dumas and Constable Bedtod who kicked a hole in, uh, uh, Pacey Dumas's head and they're suing. And, um, this, this.
00:27:26
Speaker
This story, I mean, I got so many emails come from constituents demanding that I hold the police accountable that this must take place. So I wrote a blog post, which you can see at michaeljans.ca slash police accountability, where I basically said, you know, if you want to hold the police accountable, you as a citizen can go to the police commission, you can write the police commission, like the council appoints police commissioners, but we do not direct policing. We have kind of a high level supervisory outcomes kind of based role.
00:27:56
Speaker
And we are not responsible for the day-to-day and the direction and the oversight, et cetera. So we, like I basically said, if you want to, if you're mad about this, like take it to the commission, take it to the people responsible. And I know that that rubbed many the wrong way, but it's just highlighting process. It's saying, you know, like I think there's been in the past more of a culture of a something goes wrong,
00:28:20
Speaker
there's a phone call made between leadership and there's a tut tut and then business as usual continues and you can see that by a number of a number of the cases that you know we just don't have answers to right now it's been years since something happened in Acer it's investigating and and this is just completely unacceptable. We've already seen within a year of the murder of George Floyd
00:28:41
Speaker
a trial and a verdict. But yet here in Edmonton, we still don't know who shot Stephen Nguyen or why that happened. We don't know what happens with the Pacey Dumas case. We don't know what happens with the shooting last week. There's so many cases here where it's not just on Edmonton Police. It's on ASERT, the provincial body. It's on all of us to demand that we all want to live in a safe community. We all want an accountable police service that we can all be proud of. And it's infuriating. So yeah, I'd encourage your listeners to, you know,
00:29:11
Speaker
get angry, get allies, get active, and get in touch with elected officials who can keep pushing for the accountability that we are long overdue for. Exactly. And the final allegation that I want to highlight is the one that according to the integrity commissioner came closest to violating the code.
Scrutinizing Police Budgets
00:29:33
Speaker
Which again, let's clarify, does not violate the code.
00:29:38
Speaker
Yeah, it came close, but still, this complaint was dismissed. So essentially, I'll just read what you said. Yesterday, the chief told Edmonton Media, quote, you should be prepared for how this is going to impact how police officers respond to a call going for help that you might need at one point. This is with respect to the Edmonton City Council $1 million police funding increase. Is fear mongering appropriate for a bureaucrat?
00:30:02
Speaker
Isn't this why we have a police commission to depoliticize the service and provide evidence based decision making? This is disappointing at best. Happy to share the audio recording. So the issue that was taken was this, this is the integrity commissioner here. This is, uh, so one, this, the Edmonton police chief is not a city of Edmonton employee. He's like, he's in this weird nether world.
00:30:25
Speaker
But, quote, this is from the integrity commissioner, quote, it is debatable that calling someone a bureaucrat is disrespectful conduct lacking in decorum. This is commentary on a matter of public interest relating to policing, including funding and efficiencies. So I don't know.
00:30:40
Speaker
I don't think calling Chief McPhee a bureaucrat somehow violates this code of conduct. You have to be in some weird conservative circles for the word bureaucrat or public servant to be a swear word. You know what I mean? That's a very, very anti-government lingo.
00:31:02
Speaker
Chief McVie is a high level bureaucrat before he was the chief of police for the city of Edmonton. He was like, he was the deputy minister and like, like, yeah, like the highest level of bureaucrat you can get to a careful dunk in the beer. That's a dirty word. Now civil servant. Yeah. I don't know.
00:31:21
Speaker
But but this is this. So let's go back to the substance as a complaint or the substance of the tweet here. The day after we passed a budget still giving the police one million dollars more than last year. No cut. One million dollars more. The chief went on media and did a tour saying, you know,
00:31:38
Speaker
You need to think about how this is going to affect you if you call the police and during the budget deliberations he said like, well, if you don't give us the ask, you're going to see reductions in traffic and traffic safety will have to do photo radar or like it will have to.
00:31:53
Speaker
take resources away from the lrt like like it it just was it really felt it felt to me like like extortion it felt to me like you do you like you like you give us what we want or else dot dot dot and for the media to to allow the chief to go on and and to to share those sorts of stories and and to see that kind of sustained um
00:32:14
Speaker
pressure is not acceptable. Can you imagine if the UCP cut the health budget and then you had Verna you at AHS saying children are going to die? No, you do the best you can with what you have and you leave the politics up to the politicians or the commission. I don't see why.
00:32:33
Speaker
the chief would ever be talking to the media, to be honest. When I was at the school board, the superintendent was only supposed to talk to the media on very narrow operational matters. Anything related to politics, advocacy, government, budgets, et cetera, always went to the trustees and the board chair. So I think we've got a situation here where even at city council, when there's a presentation from the police about the budget,
00:32:54
Speaker
the commission is there, but it's very much the chief leading the show. And that to me is, again, the chief and the service should be asking and presenting a budget to the commission. And then the commission needs to be holding that budget accountable, asking the tough questions, doing the scrutiny, and then bringing it forward to city council. So when you have the chief on the radio telling people that their communities are
00:33:17
Speaker
giving that very personal, you need to think about what will happen when you call the police. To me is absolutely beyond the pale and he should be held accountable by the commission for those messages.
00:33:31
Speaker
That is a very fair point. Okay, so this has been dismissed. You're vindicated. This isn't looming over your head any longer. What's next? How are you going to hold the police accountable from your position as an Edmonton City Counselor? Well, people need to remember that.
00:33:50
Speaker
The Edmonton Police are the largest line item in the City Council budget. It's almost a quarter of your tax bill. So when you're paying your taxes this year, you think about it, take a quarter of it, that's going towards the police. So naturally, City Councilors must demonstrate fiscal and political scrutiny over these expenditures. We all want a community where we can feel safe.
00:34:11
Speaker
We all want a police service that we can be proud of. It's just asking the questions to help us get there. I think we've been running an outdated sort of software system that's been very siloed in the public safety realm over the last century. And I think we need to now talk about updates in three main areas. So for me, my focus for the police are number one cost.
00:34:33
Speaker
making sure that we have a sustainable cost, making sure expenditures are scrutinized, making sure whether it's the number of guns or cars or airplanes that we're asking the tough questions about that. Number two, it's conduct. It's making sure that justice is transparent and accountable and swift so we can all feel comfortable in the service we're receiving.
00:34:54
Speaker
And third, it's around this whole question of detasking where Halifax and others have started this conversation about what are the, you know, how do we make sure that our highly trained, highly resourced police officers are doing the right job at the right time in the right place. That means taking police out of some of these more banal matters around say traffic or paperwork or fender benders and putting them into actual violent crime and rapid response that
00:35:18
Speaker
if there's a function that could be done more effectively by civilians, whether it's in the dispatch or whether it's in animal welfare, whether it's in social work domains that should be done by social workers, I think we're all talking about getting to this idea of detasking, making sure that we have the police doing the right thing. It's important. I think you flagged it in your news that in Canada, Edmontonians pay the second highest amount for
00:35:43
Speaker
for police next to Windsor, Ontario per capita. So we are paying more than any other city. We're paying more than Vancouver. We're paying more than others. And, you know, that at some point is, you know, we need to scrutinize that. You also flagged that our unit costs for officers are higher. So, you know, I'm all for well compensated workers, but let's make sure that let's make sure they're doing the right things that we need them to be doing. And then there's many other questions here around conduct from I think
00:36:12
Speaker
Professor Oriola has written about and spoke about about the need to look at entrance standards and training and all these other pieces, and those must be incorporated. But there's things that we as a city council need to do. There's things that the provincial government and the solicitor general need to do through the police act. But ultimately, it's public pressure. It's sustained public pressure that will drive change, that it's your listeners of this podcast flipping open their phones, signing up, getting involved.
00:36:42
Speaker
marshalling public pressure to help drive the change in the outcomes we want because bureaucracy doesn't change overnight and it needs constant and rigorous oversight from everyone, not just city councillors, to help move things forward.
00:36:58
Speaker
Yeah, I remember to talk to your friends about this issue as well, not just elected officials. You brought it up, so I have to talk about it. The secret plane, the now not secret plane. Some information has come to light, but not nearly enough, I would argue.
Lack of Transparency and Oversight
00:37:15
Speaker
We now know that
00:37:17
Speaker
The City of Edmonton Police Service has a plane. We know that they're getting another plane. We know that they're going to spend $4.3 million in that plane and that it is arriving sometime this year. What we still don't know is very numerous. We still don't know the business case. We still don't know why it costs so much. $4.3 million is a lot of money. We don't even know what kind of plane it is.
00:37:39
Speaker
Because it's been such a black box, we don't know if there's more costs related to the plane with regards to surveillance equipment. Does that $4.3 million only cover the plane? Does it cover plane plus surveillance equipment? We don't know. So there is just a lot we still don't know about the secret plane.
00:37:57
Speaker
And it speaks to this kind of culture of secrecy at the Edmonton Police. They didn't tell anyone about it. There was a CBC report by Janice Johnson. They talked to a city councilor who was on city council in 1993.
00:38:15
Speaker
Uh, well, Allen said, Allen said, there's no way this would have been passed. We were laying off staff. We were in the client cuts. There's no way that this plane would have been approved. So I can't, I can't speak to that to me, like coming from a background in, in, you know, in, in governance, I was a school trustee for 11 years.
00:38:32
Speaker
you can't have secret capital purchases. Like they have to appear somewhere in your audit or something else. So when I learned about the plane, like it was absolute, like I never even for a moment thought it would be secret. Like undercover officers are secret. Planes are not secret. You know what I mean? Like it's like, it has a call sign. It's a plane. It's up in the air. People can
00:38:54
Speaker
Well, and it's interesting too because airplanes are not like an airplane that's from the 90s may seem old to you or me, but it's not. If you talk to pilots and airplane aficionados, like airplanes are incredibly resilient. So the idea, like I've had people write me saying, that's not an old plane. I have a plane of that vintage and it's just fine. So there's questions there about procurement. There's questions about
00:39:21
Speaker
just in general, as you said, why we have the plane, but then that's just the capital costs. It appears to be, you know, we have no transparency on, we have no, yeah, transparency on operating. It's again, all secret, uh, you know, and, and was secret until recently. So.
00:39:37
Speaker
Well, and I had another constituent call me and say, did you know Edmonton Police has a flying club? And they used to help officers get their licenses. There's the Edmonton Police Flying Club. And I mean, that took place in the 80s. I have no idea if it's connected to the airplane. I'd like to say that it's not. But I can't. I don't know, right? This is part of the problem. And so
00:39:58
Speaker
Yeah, I imagine it'll come up at budget this year and I imagine at some point the police will have to account for this and all of the other expenditures. I mean, the plane is a sexy one, but remember all these little expenditures add up. They spent $8 million on cars last year, $8 million on cars the year before, $7 million on cars the year before that.
00:40:19
Speaker
Like how much do they spend on computers, on guns, on machine guns, on bullets, on service weapons? Like there's all these different questions that I think after this whole, we just went through a month of occupation through this tracker protest in Ottawa and the police across Canada are facing a big, you know, a big pause from the public and saying, okay, we need to have a serious conversation about, you know, for years we've been told you have to approve these expenditures in case, you know,
00:40:46
Speaker
you get occupied and then here we are. Yeah. We've brought this up a few times in the course of our conversation and that is the Edmonton Police Commission. It's worth kind of just laying out what exactly it is and what the division of labor is. So council is not responsible for holding the police accountable. Ostensibly, the body that does that is the Edmonton Police Commission.
00:41:11
Speaker
However, the chair of the Edmonton Police Commission, John McDougall, recently wrote an op-ed in the Edmonton Journal where he uncritically supported the police and their do-nothing approach to the convoy that was rolling through Edmonton regularly. I guess they're still rolling through Edmonton, they're just kind of diminished.
00:41:27
Speaker
Yeah. And I raised concerns about this op-ed at the Edmonton Police Commission meeting. I thought it was a code of conduct violation. I still have not got any response to my questions about this op-ed. Well, and to your point, he published the op-ed the day before the police commission. So it was like the judge issued a verdict before the trial had even taken place, before they'd even heard from the impacted community or anyone else. I woke up to see this op-ed basically saying, nothing to see here, move along.
00:41:55
Speaker
Yeah. And then the next day, like eight or nine people showed up at police commission and be like, are you going to fucking do anything about the convoy? Like this is untenable. Uh, and, and Temetobi Oriola, who is criminology professor at the U of A wrote an op-ed in response. I think it's a final line is worth quoting here. Quote, the Edmonton police commission needs to assert its autonomy, particularly during law enforcement crises, such as the current political turbulence. I am waiting for confirmation that the op-ed was an oversight.
00:42:23
Speaker
Pun intended, I hate puns. But yes, to this, there has been no further statements from the Edmonton Police Commission about the op-ed. Also worth pointing out that John McDougal, who's the newly elected chair of the Edmonton Police Commission, he's locked his Twitter account now, which is very funny.
00:42:43
Speaker
But on his Twitter account, his like banner picture is does have him next to staff Sergeant Michael Elliott of the Amazon Police Association. That's on Mike Elliott's Twitter, not.
00:42:54
Speaker
Or is it on... Oh, it's on Mike Elliott's Twitter, where his profile picture, his banner picture has John McDougall in it, which is very funny. John McDougall, though, does have a history... Again, this is locked. You can't go and check this right now, but I have seen it with my own eyes. John McDougall has liked and interacted with Michael Elliott's tweets on Twitter. It's relatively minor, but it speaks to why McDougall would write that op-ed.
00:43:21
Speaker
It's interesting, is all I'm saying. I think that's all we have time for today, Michael. I want to thank you for coming on the pod and sharing your story with us. Again, I think this is a very important issue. Talk to your friends about the police in general, police accountability, but also this story where this complaint was lodged. It's absolutely wild. How can people follow along with your police accountability work as a city councilor, Michael?
00:43:46
Speaker
Yeah, please visit michaeljans.ca slash safer for all. I will be sharing more information as we go forward talking about the police funding formula, talking about the police budget, talking about police commissioners and opportunities to become a police commissioner. And yeah, I'll be sharing various writing and news as it happens.
00:44:08
Speaker
Yeah, go do that. Also, if you like this podcast and you want to join the 500 or so other folks who help keep this independent media project going, an independent media project that does police accountability work that no one else is doing, you can go to theprogressreport.ca slash patrons, put in your credit card, contribute $5, $10, $15 a month, whatever you can contribute. It's how we survive. We really appreciate it. A link to that will also be attached to this podcast, both on the page and in the little thing that comes on your phone.
00:44:38
Speaker
Also, if you have any notes, thoughts, comments, things you think we need to hear, I am very easy to reach. I am on Twitter at, at Duncan Kinney, and you can reach me by email at Duncan K at progress, alberta.ca. Thank you to Jim Story for editing the podcast. Thank you to Cosmic Family Communist for our theme. Thank you to Michael Jans for being an incredible guest. Thank you for listening and goodbye.
00:45:45
Speaker
police on my back
00:45:48
Speaker
What have I done? What have I done? What have I done?
00:46:01
Speaker
What have I done? Well, I've been running down the railway track. Won't you help me? Police on my back, they will catch me. If I turn off, I won't give deep. Oh, let's meet, I like that.