A city councillor took to twitter on Tuesday to voice his opinion on a proposed cycle track and is now under fire from citizens for his comments.
Ward 4 Councillor, Sean Chu, used profanity to attack a proposed bike lane plan developed by city engineer Blanka Bracic, and then tweeted "what was she on? “
When another Calgarian defended the engineer online, Chu tweeted back saying, "that's not an attack...it's telling the truth. You ain’t seen nothing yet".
"No, I’m not going to comment on that and I’ll let my statement speak for itself,” said Chu on Wednesday. “That’s a personality issue.”
Chu issued a public apology a few hours later and says he has nothing more to say on the matter.
Councillor Andre Chabot says the comments were a little too harsh and inappropriate.
“I think members of council shouldn’t make ad hoc comments about something that they can’t verify, one way or another, so if there’s questionable numbers there’s only one way to regulate that and that’s by having a third party review those numbers and then determine whether they’re valid, inflated or conservative.”
Chabot says at the end of the day it is the electorate that makes the decision on who is on council and who is not.
“We’re all elected and we’re elected and we can pretty much say what we want and it’s the electorate that’ll determine whether or not we should remain here for the next term,” said Chabot.
He says nobody’s perfect but people should be more cautious about what they say and who it is going to affect.
Chu’s comments actually violate the city’s ethical conduct policy which was adopted by council last fall.
The policy calls for city staffers to treat each other with respect and professionalism.
The mayor expects at least one councillor to bring up the possibility of sanctions against Chu at Monday’s council meeting.
(With files from Elissa Carpenter)
