‘HOSTILE CROWD’: Police called to intervene during Springfield council meeting

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For the second time in just more than a year police have been called to council chambers in the RM of Springfield, while the RM’s mayor said he is becoming increasingly concerned about the “belligerent” and “obscene” at public meetings.

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“I’ve been called a liar to my face, sworn at and insulted, and this kind of disrespect towards a municipal council and its rules and decorum are simply unacceptable under any circumstances,” RM of Springfield Mayor Patrick Therrien said on Wednesday.

RCMP were called to the RM of Springfield’s council building in Oakbank on Tuesday evening around 6 p.m., just minutes after a council meeting began.

“The report stated that safety was a concern because of the aggressive crowd of individuals in the council meeting room,” RCMP spokesperson Tara Seel said in a Wednesday email. “Police attended immediately and encountered a hostile crowd.”

According to Seel, the room was well over capacity “making the atmosphere even more chaotic,” and the meeting ended early after she said there was “continuous interruption.”

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On the agenda at Tuesday’s meeting was a controversial vote on proposed amendments that are looking to eliminate invocation and public question period from future Springfield council meetings.

Therrien said on Wednesday that although he believes as mayor that residents should have a voice, he says question periods in Springfield have increasingly devolved into a forum for belligerent and disrespectful behaviour, obscenities, and the sharing of “misinformation and conspiracy theories.”

He added it is often the same core group of people who are speaking on the same topics during every council meeting, and often slowing down the progress of the meetings because they refuse to stop talking or step aside.

“Question period has been absolutely dysfunction for the last two years,” Therrien said. “People are constantly challenging the rules, not following the agenda, and often refusing to stop talking when their time is up, and it’s the same four or five people and the same questions every time.

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“It’s just a new spin on the same issue every time, and you know what they are going to say before they say it.”

Seel said on Wednesday that because of information police received prior to Tuesday’s council meeting, police were already in the area of the council building and ready in case there was a call.

“RCMP were aware that possible contentious interactions could occur at the meeting as it has happened at previous meetings, which we have supplied information to media on,” Seel said.

Springfield had been at the centre of controversy in the last year and a half due to a proposed silica sand mine that Alberta-based Sio Silica previously wanted to build in the community, a plan that has since been killed by the NDP government.

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Police were also called to a Springfield council meeting on June 13 of last year when councillors were supposed to vote on zoning and bylaw changes for the sand mine project, after several citizens confronted Springfield councillors, leaving Therrien to say he was concerned for the safety of some on council.

Therrien is asking for “calm” in the community as council works to schedule a new date for the meeting interrupted on Tuesday and warned some residents that they cannot continue to disrupt council meetings in Springfield.

“This small vocal group has decided they speak for the majority, and they absolutely do not,” Therrien said. “This has to stop because this council and this community can’t go on like this.”

— Dave Baxter is a Local Journalism Initiative reporter who works out of the Winnipeg Sun. The Local Journalism Initiative is funded by the Government of Canada.

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