EDITORIAL – Is the mayor of Kamloops suddenly only allowed to work 9 to 5?

An editorial by Mel Rothenburger.

UPDATE (Sunday afternoon): Mayor Reid Hamer-Jackson phoned back to say he’d found an email notifying him and councillors that access into City Hall would be unavailable after business hours. Which means the mayor shouldn’t have been surprised today that he couldn’t get into the building. It doesn’t solve the issue, though, of his need to get into his office to get work done outside of business hours. Since staff aren’t there after hours, he asks rhetorically, why do they need protection from bullying during those times?

‘HAVE YOU EVER been locked out of your own office?!” the voice on the other end of the phone wanted to know.

It was shortly after lunch when Mayor Reid Hamer-Jackson’s phone number came up on my call display. He was not happy, reason being that he’d gone in to City Hall this Sunday afternoon (April 21, 2024) to do some work and found himself locked out.

This comes not long after he and the rest of council were banned from staff areas of City Hall and other facilities, ostensibly to protect employees against bullying. But this takes the vise being squeezed on the mayor to a new level, assuming the whole thing isn’t just a big mistake.

We won’t know for sure until tomorrow because senior administrators don’t work on weekends and contacting them during their off days is discouraged.

“Do they want me to be a part-time mayor now?” Hamer-Jackson fumed.

A part-time mayor he isn’t. As he points out, “the mayor is the CEO.” Mayors (and councillors, for that matter) aren’t hourly employees. Mayors are used to going into the office after normal hours, in the evenings or weekends. That’s why you might see their vehicle parked in the mayor’s spot at any time day or night.

When the mayor has work to do, the mayor should have free access to his office and, I can tell you, locking the mayor out after 9 to 5 and on weekends is something new. At least, I certainly was never restricted in any way from getting into City Hall to get work done when I was in office.

If administration has taken another unilateral step, or if this is simply an invisible part of the now notorious key-fob change, councillors should put away their rubber stamp for once and get behind Hamer-Jackson to demand the situation be rectified. It’s an impediment to the civic democratic process.

So, let’s wait and see what happens but if locking the mayor out of access to his office today was intentional, there should be hell to pay, and taxpayers should be raising hell right along with the mayor and councillors.

Mel Rothenburger is a regular contributor to CFJC Today, publishes the ArmchairMayor.ca opinion website, and is a recipient of the Jack Webster Foundation Lifetime Achievement Award. He has served as mayor of Kamloops, school board chair and TNRD director, and is a retired daily newspaper editor.  He can be reached at mrothenburger@armchairmayor.ca.