Ombudsman finds closed Oshawa meeting illegally involved lobbying, not just ‘education’

TORONTO (April 29, 2009) – Ontario Ombudsman André Marin has found a city of Oshawa committee met inappropriately behind closed doors with a private business in a “lobbying” session that was supposed to be for “education and training” purposes only.  “This is the very type of conduct that municipalities should scrupulously avoid occurring in a closed committee meeting,” he says in his report, The ABCs of Education and Training.

The city co-operated with the investigation but the Mayor responded that he disagreed with Mr. Marin’s findings.  Thereafter, Mr. Marin learned that city officials had failed to comply with his confidential document handling instructions and were refusing to return his preliminary report.  In a subsequent investigation involving Oshawa’s refusal to return the property of his office, the Ombudsman found the city’s actions contrary to law.  The report of that investigation, Pirating Our Property, was released April 27.


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