ATHABASCA — An Athabasca County councillor has successfully completed council-mandated courses following an internal investigation into his behaviour.
In follow-up to a motion made Aug. 9, 2022, compelling Coun. Gary Cromwell to apologize and take workplace violence, and discrimination and harassment training with proof of completion by Dec. 31, he presented his certificates of completion at the Jan. 9 meeting, but they raised some questions about when they were done.
“I want to say that I’ve taken my actions seriously and I wanted this to be in the past long ago,” Cromwell said. “I deeply apologize that it seemed like it was not done. I, more than anyone, wants to be able to move forward and not have this held any longer. I'm asking you please accept, again, my apologies for making sure this was not shown as completed. I'm an adult and should have taken more effort in closing this off. Regardless, the training is now shown as complete, which I have attached for all of your record."
The apology and mandated courses arose from a scathing report released Aug. 8, 2022, by Sage Analytics citing Cromwell, among other things, “inflamed the WRFD (Wandering River Fire Department) member concerns, rather than respect and champion the county direction of maintaining complementary emergency services for Highway 63” and he acted “in a somewhat stealthy, self-directed manner … to show that the H63R service was redundant and unnecessary.”
And in the summary of findings, the report said, “The findings show a pattern of unacceptable work behaviour displayed by the respondent, Gary Cromwell. There are several examples of compromised safety for himself and others, particularly while serving in the senior emergency services role as WRFD Fire Chief. This placed individuals, the public, and the county at large at risk.”
To be clear, the allegations were mostly made against Cromwell as part of his role as WRFD chief, which he resigned from March 2022.
Coun. Camille Wallach though, questioned if Cromwell had completed the courses by the Dec. 31 deadline.
“The motion clearly states Dec. 31, 2022,” she said. “With many other courses I’ve taken online you get an automatic e-mail with a course certificate so if Coun. Cromwell does not have the e-mail, the fact he couldn’t log into his account shows that he didn’t complete it on time and was past the due date so, I don’t think we should accept this as completed.”
Coun. Natasha Kapitaniuk agreed.
“My question as a ratepayer would have been, when you did the course why didn’t you bring it up in council so the public would know it was completed; it was done in August,” she said. “I would be thinking that I would want every one of my peers to know that I took that decision of council seriously, that I completed it and then have it on the record at that time with or without a certificate. I think that would have made me feel more comfortable with accepting the technological reasons for the different date on the certificate.”
Coun. Tracy Holland made the motion to accept as information that Cromwell completed the courses.
In a recorded vote, reeve Brian Hall, Coun. Ashtin Anderson, Wallach, and Kapitaniuk voted against it, but the motion was carried with the affirmative votes from the five other councillors.
The completion of the courses marks the end of Cromwell’s tasks following the report and motions from the council.
