On March 22, 2012 I made a request under Freedom of Information legislation to obtain two January 10, 2011 letters that had been quietly sent by John Close and Rhonda Cook to TSBP committee and board members.

The release of the letters to me, on April 9, 2012, was completely and duly authorized by council, and was completely legal. The letters came with no restrictions or conditions.

The January 10 letters, exactly as I received them, are at:

http://craiggammie.com/Other Documents/2012 01 10 letter cook close to citizens.pdf

In the Police Services Board meeting of September 19th, 2012, I made a presentation alleging that John Close had interfered with police enforcement activities and had breached the Police Services Boards Code of Conduct.

Early in my September 19 presentation I showed and referred to the two January 10, 2011 letters, indicating that the letters falsely accused people of rudeness, slander, and harassment, and that the letters inappropriately threatened legal action, and that the letters were unacceptable bullying.

John Close rudely interrupted my presentation, accusing me of showing the two letters in contravention of some unnamed privacy rule, saying:

“This is a matter of personal, private, confidential information having to do with harassment policy, and has to be stricken from any presentation, because we have no indication from that person that the information should or could be released.”

In fact there was no personal, private, or confidential information in my presentation. There was only properly and legally obtained documents. And the documents had no restriction on use or distribution. And the information had nothing to do with harassment policy.

What John Close said was an outright lie.

John Close also said about the letters:

“It is under our harassment policy.” “..that was a matter of harassment”… “it was a matter of complaint filed under the workplace safety and healthy .. health ..” “it was a staff member who filed the harassment complaint”.

That was another lie.

Later in the Police Board meeting John accused me and another presenter of slander.

Another lie.

In fact there was nothing slanderous in either of our presentations. (Audio records were made).

I can understand why John didn’t want the January 2011 letters to be out in the public.

Because the letters demonstrate vindictive, threatening, devious bullying.

And because the letters could be harmful to John’s defense on a matter which I understand will come before the courts on December 13th.

John used the same “that’s classified – give it here” bullying tactic in the council meeting of October 2nd, falsely and groundlessly accusing Councillor Jackson of illegally having and disclosing documents containing sensitive personal information.

Once again his purpose was to bury issues and documents which could harm him or his supporters. On that one too he failed.

These situations are just two in a long history of bullying and deception by John Close, including (to name just a few):

1. The January 10, 2011 letters.

2. Threatening, deceiving, and bullying council (January 2011 to May 2012) into believing that the Town had to pay Rhonda Cook’s legal fees for her malicious, groundless, baseless, frivolous, vexatious, costly lawsuit against four citizens (including me) for slander.

3. Falsely claiming that bloggers were harassing people at Town hall or using violent or abusive language at Town hall, and that these actions were criminal offenses (May 24, 2011 press release).

4. From July to December 2011, condoning or participating in a false, malicious, libelous claim that I illegally offered professional engineering services.

5. Falsely claiming that Sauble septic systems were contaminating wells with E. Coli. (in an August 22, 2011 letter to Minister Bartollucci and in an OSST interview).

Some mayor.

It’s time for John to go.

Craig Gammie