The City of Kamloops' deputy CAO says staff pulled the plug on a slideshow Mayor Reid Hamer-Jackson was preparing for a business event last week after the mayor forwarded a number of images — including a photo of a sex act — to the local chamber of commerce.
The mayor said he didn’t take the photos, but requested images from others because he was hoping to show attendees at a March 14 Kamloops and District Chamber of Commerce dinner event what is happening on city streets.
“I forwarded them to the chamber — I didn't even look at the photos at that time,” Hamer-Jackson told Castanet Kamloops, adding he was then told by a city councillor about a privacy breach.
After forwarding the images, the mayor said he found out one of them showed a man and a woman engaging in a sex act in a public place.
“Coun. [Mike] O’Reilly said that I was breaching privacy stuff, and that sort of thing," the mayor said.
"So I don't know what that's all about. They said that there's a policy — and I've asked for the policies a few times.”
City staff stepped in
Deputy CAO Byron McCorkell said in an email to Castanet Kamloops that city staff reached out to Hamer-Jackson weeks before the event offering to help him with his presentation, but the offer was refused.
“We then at the last minute were made aware of a potential for a slideshow to be presented by the mayor as part of his planned presentation. It appears this may include pictures of vulnerable persons in various situations, potentially nude or in other compromising settings, and this would be without their consent or knowledge,” McCorkell said.
“This presents a challenge to the corporation, as this could be a violation of criminal law, FIPPA [Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act] regulations, and intimate images legislation. It would also put our partner agencies, who facilitated the evening, into a potential legal challenge, as well.”
McCorkell said staff acted quickly, advising the chamber the PowerPoint presentation was being scrapped in favour of a gigantic City of Kamloops logo.
“The mayor was advised before the event of this action," he said.
"It is unfortunate that our communications team was not used to help create the visual presentation to support the mayor and there would have been no issue, but that was not our call."
Unaware photos were for event
Hamer-Jackson told Castanet Kamloops a number of photos — including the photo of the sexual incident — were sent to him by Howie Reimer, executive director of the Kamloops Central Business Improvement Association.
Reimer said the photo in question was taken for a police file. He said police were called because “an exchange of a sexual favour for drugs” was happening outside his office window. He noted kids tend to walk by the area and there is a daycare nearby.
“We called it in to the RCMP, and that was a photo that I took to give to the RCMP,” Reimer said.
He said Hamer-Jackson contacted him a few weeks ago and asked if he had any photos of criminality, street disorder and broken windows.
"I sent him 50 photos, including that one,” Reimer said, adding there were also pictures showing piles of human feces and people passed out.
“There's all sorts of photos — never did he say they were for public presentation. I had understood they were for police, community services, public safety initiatives, documentation of what was going on.”
Mayor not sure what he said
Reimer said he sent the photos to the mayor — “him only” — and wasn’t aware until the day of the chamber event that they had been collected for use in a presentation.
“I did not in any way assist, abet or approve of the presentation of the images," he told Castanet. "The picture was sent to him. But I had no, no idea that he was going to do that."
Hamer-Jackson said “there’s a possibility” he didn’t tell Reimer he was asking for photos to use in his chamber presentation.
“I don't know if I actually said that I was using them for directly for that, I'm not 100 per cent sure that I said that,” he said.
The mayor said he didn't have time to vet the images, and any inappropriate photos wouldn’t have been included as part of his final presentation.
“I know the street population, I'm never going to ever send a picture that's going to identify people that are struggling with addictions and mental health — that’s not me,” he said.
Speech focused on street disorder
Hamer-Jackson’s chamber speech largely focused on his concerns around street disorder, and he called for more accountability from local social agencies.
McCorkell said he felt the mayor’s comments were more of a personal nature than reflective of city council as a whole, adding the city has been working to try and improve the situation although the problem continues to grow in communities nationwide.
He said the city has “created strong communication” with the B.C. government, which is responsible for housing and healthcare, asking them to provide more supports.
“We have a large number of residents on our streets that have no place to call home, many dealing with complex drug and mental health concerns,” he said.
“We need to continue to focus on helping them, and that can only be done working with our social agency partners and the province to find solutions.”
