TCDSB trustees voted to dismiss the many complaints against Mike Del Grande “MD” that resulted from his vile and offensive argument during a November 2019 Board Meeting. He had ultimately conveyed that LGBTQ+ youth and families at the board are equally as deserving of protections as a pre-written 12-page list of outrageous and criminal acts, such as pedophilia and cannibalism. This happened in a public forum, in a last ditch effort to protest the board adhering to human rights laws verbiage in their policies.
After this petition with over 2K signatures for MD to be censured and multiple official complaints filed, the community was left to wait in limbo for nearly ten months. During this time MD received an award for his actions from the CLC and published an op-ed on their website lifesitenews that doubled down on his statements, now referring to the LGBTQ+ community as evil. Various board members assured the concerned public that the ‘Integrity Commissioner’ or ‘External Investigator’ they hired would help with the dysfunction everyone was witnessing in real time.
However, on August 20th, 2020, during another late night board meeting vote, the decision on whether MD breached his code of conduct as a Trustee (and would be sanctioned in any way) was quickly on and off the table without discussion or explanation; effectively silencing complaints.
Of the 12 (11 excluding the offender), 7 trustees agreed that MD was in breach of the Code of Conduct, and 4 trustees did not. In order to pass agreement on a COC violation, ⅔ of the trustees need to vote in favour. Since ⅔ of 11 is 7 ⅓, they were short ⅓ or 0.3 of a trustee vote. Not surprisingly, 3 of the 4 trustees were his human rights opposing posse: Trustees Tanuan, Lubinski and Crawford. The 4th being a former Ontario Nurse, Trustee Kennedy, who previously claimed (contrary to the Education Act) trustee “reputation” was grounds enough to keep public complaints private in response to this matter.
Ultimately, the External Investigator's report was swept under the rug along with this incident, since the same bad faith actors were left to make the decision on whether or not Mike Del Grande breached his Code of Conduct. This decision made it abundantly clear that the systemic dysfunction and homophobia within the TCDSB runs deep, and urgently requires Ministry intervention to help resolve these issues.
TCDSB Teacher Mr. Paolo De Buono, has officially submitted a request to the Ministry of Eduction requesting oversight. We will be watching closely and will send out an update once a response has been issued.
In the meantime, supporters can continue to share this petition and write letters to their local Trustees and MPPs, encouraging them to speak up on behalf of all students, families, and ally's that have been harmed by Human Rights opposing trustees, most notably Mike Del Grande.