‘Attacking us for doing our job’: Tiny readies to implement citizen code of conduct
By: Derek Howard, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
Source: MidlandToday.ca, Jun 06, 2025
The final touches for a proposed citizen code of conduct were given consent by the Tiny Township committee of the whole, anticipated for ratification of a bylaw at the next regular meeting of council.
However, turmoil continued within the public discourse surrounding the contentious matter.
Over this term of council, residents upset with policy decisions took to social media to state their views against council and municipal staff, and appeared frequently in council chambers to fill the venue to capacity – often jeering any comments spoken during council at any moment. In 2024, Coun. Steffen Walma described the online actions as ‘cyberbullying’.
The draft citizens code of conduct was a council direction to municipal staff shortly after, which had nearly been introduced but was pulled several times for revisions as council and staff tightened the wording through legal assistance.
Outspoken opponents to the proposed item were among the loudest seen during audience vocalization, often requiring Coun. Dave Brunelle to wave to them to settle down as the sole voice on council they would acknowledge.
During the recent committee of the whole meeting, Brunelle asked CAO Robert Lamb: “if you feel that a citizen code of conduct is needed for the staff at this time?”
Lamb promptly replied: “Yes, I do believe it’s needed, and I think it’s going to be seen in even more and more municipalities.” He commended council for the direction, stating staff had put great effort over the past year on the document.
“Is it a perfect document; no,” said Lamb. “But at least it provides us with the ability when things get to the point where they shouldn’t to us, to be able to protect our staff at the different levels from different forms of unreasonable behaviour.
“It’s sadder that our society has got to the point where we need to do this; that civil discord has got to the point where keyboard warriors can do or say whatever they want, and take shots at people – take shots at people’s professional accreditations, and all the rest of it – without any facts, without any truth behind it,” Lamb added.
Brunelle commented: “I believe it’s mainly from the advent of social media where you can have a lot of anonymous contributors saying a lot of misinformation, like you mentioned. Unfortunately, we’ve come to a point where, yes, we have to probably implement this code at this time.”
The committee of the whole passed the motion unanimously, with Walma thanking Brunelle for scrutinizing the draft on behalf of the residents.
Following the council meeting, MidlandToday spoke to Lamb, Mayor Dave Evans and Deputy Mayor Sean Miskimins about the matter. They emphasized that the primary antagonists amounted to roughly a dozen residents within the township’s estimated 13,000 population.
“I’m a perfect example,” Lamb expressed. “I’ve been attacked on social media. My wife has been attacked on social media. My staff have been attacked on social media. Our professional credentials are being attacked by people who have no clue who or what our backgrounds are… and with all due respect, they were attacking us for doing our job because they didn’t like a decision that council made.”
Evans said that having attended the recent Federation of Canadian Municipalities conference, “dealing with online hostility” was the largest topic among nearly 500 municipal representatives from across the nation.
Regarding Tiny residents, Evans added: “They drive by, they comment, they honk, they knock on my door at 8:00 in the morning; but that comes with a territory. They don’t know where an MPP or an MP lives, but they’ll certainly – they can find us, they can get us so quickly and easily. We’re in the community that we live.”
Lamb stressed how “fundamentally wrong” personal attacks were at a municipal, provincial and federal level, noting: “That’s not what Canada was built on.
“We’re hoping at some point in time other levels of government will take the handcuffs off of us, because we’re not allowed to fight back,” said Lamb, “because we’re supposed to just sit there and take it as a civil servant.
r is slander, libel is libel is libel; and I, and my staff or other people, should not have to sit back and go: ‘Well, we really can’t do anything because it’s seen as anti-SLAPP (Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation) legislation trying to silence somebody’. Well there’s a difference between somebody trying to ruin somebody’s reputation, versus disagreeing about whether we should do X, Y or Z,” said Lamb.
Miskimins pointed to “a southern style of politics” and culture pervading Canada, sharing how his memories were of the pride Canadians once held that “we’re better than that.
“We seem to be losing all of that over a sense of: ‘I’m not getting my way therefore I’m just going to yell louder and louder and louder until I get what I want’ – and that’s the epitome of capital-E entitlement,” said Miskimins.
Lamb continued: “And it’s every day. It’s not like it’s just one issue. Every day.
“When you have to get to the point where you have to moderate everything you put out on social media because you’ve got people making fun of your announcement on X, Y or Z. – ‘We’re having a seniors thing’ or ‘we’ve done this or that’ – it’s like… really?
“Your hatred is so bad that you can’t even celebrate a good news event without making a mockery of it on social media – and every post, non-stop, every post. The same people are commenting or making – I’m just blown away by it,” said Lamb.
The trio agreed that protecting municipal staff was the primary intent.
“And I know even these comments are likely going to receive all kinds of comments and social media about how self-serving and entitled and a bunch of whiners (we are),” said Lamb. “But this isn’t about Robert Lamb. This is about the township of Tiny’s most valuable resources which is our staff.”
The draft citizen code of conduct report can be viewed on the agenda page on the Township of Tiny website.
Archives of council meetings are available to view on the township’s YouTube channel.
Tiny’s next big infrastructure project should be anything but dry
By: Derek Howard, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Source: MidlandToday.ca, Jun 09, 2025
An otherwise dry report on Tiny Township’s water financial plan was made more palatable once it revealed how the next 10 years of infrastructure would look for the municipality.
The presentation by Nancy Neale of Watson & Associates Economists Ltd. at the recent committee of the whole meeting explained that for municipalities to provide water under the Safe Drinking Water Act, a six-year financial plan would need to be submitted to the province; municipalities were encouraged to submit 10-year plans, however.
“This document actually tries to predict and forecast future financial statements over a longer period of time,” said Neale, as one of five licence requirements along with a drinking water works permit, an accepted operational plan, operating authority accreditation, and a permit to take water.
Neale also stated that the financial plan carried many similarities with a municipal budget or rate study, but pointed out the subtle differences which included naming of financial areas (such as a ‘capital forecast’ for a budget but ‘tangible capital assets’ for the plan) or inapplicable areas as with amortization for the budget.
“The increase in your tangible capital assets over the next 10 years is significant,” said Neale. “It’s just over $10 million that you’re going to increase in new assets coming on board, and that is partially from new infrastructure being put in place as well as replacement of old infrastructure that is due to come up.”
The forecast predicted an accumulated surplus increase of roughly $7.5 million by 2034, with Neale noting that it corresponded to an expense-to-revenue ratio for water services decreasing from 91 per cent in 2025 to 70 per cent in 2034. Additionally, Neale praised the Tiny Township spending on tangible capital assets in excess of the annual surplus before amortization.
“What that’s saying is you are doing a good job at staying (at) pace, and putting new infrastructure and renewing your older infrastructure in place over your 10-year forecast,” Neale said.
Mayor Dave Evans asked how a potential and unplanned government investment toward water infrastructure could impact the financial plan, with Neale responding that the province considered it to be a living document to be updated every five years, and moreso with municipalities across the province going through significant changes due to inflation and other infrastructure factors.
Public works director Tim Leitch emphasized the reliance of water testing by Tiny Township, noting that “at our lab, we’re the number one customer for testing just because we have so many different pump houses.
“Other than large metropolitan areas, there’s not too many municipalities in the province of Ontario that have as extensive a system as we have over such a large geographic area. It is extremely unique, and the solutions that we have to come up with to maintain a good financial plan have to be unique also to support that,” Leitch said.
Following the meeting, Evans told MidlandToday that the water financial plan was important due to its incoming relevance over the next few years as just 25 per cent of the township utilized a municipal water supply.
“It’s still preliminary, but in terms of next steps and infrastructure, development and investment in Township of Tiny, water will be it,” said Evans. “That’s the next hill to climb when we’ve done the building, and we’re done taking care of some issues with the environment.
“People are living here full-time and the wells are getting dry, and people have five bedroom or five bathroom homes. Now they’re going to need a secure, safe source of drinking water.
“That’s something that we’ve already planned,” Evans added. “Our water management plan outlines areas such as Balm Beach and areas like that – urban-type content – where it’s going to not just be a question of if-or-when we want to do it. It’s going to be: you’re going to do it now, and you’re going to have to make sure the water is safe to drink.”
As part of the provincial requirements, the water financial plan is to become publicly available once formally ratified by council at an upcoming regular meeting.
The water financial plan slideshow presentation by Watson and Associates can be viewed on the agenda page on the Township of Tiny website.
Archives of council meetings are available to view on the township’s YouTube channel.