We are covering tonight’s special meeting of the @HCDSB #hcdsb #lgbtq #onted https://twitter.com/hcdsb/status/1386708883704623109
There appears to be some audio issues on the feed, with the Trustees microphones. Hopefully this doesn’t impact the meeting too much
Okay seems that the microphone issues have been sorted out #hcdsb #onted
Chair is proposing to move the response to last weeks delegates to after the actual motion vote.

Trustee Iantomassi and Trustee De Rosa opposes it

#hcdsb #lgbtq #onted
Trustee Iantomassi says the agenda is biased and the bylaws have not been approved. Says there has not been full disclosure of the last meeting. Says this meeting is illegal in his opinion. Puts a motion that the approval of the agenda will require 2/3 majority #hcdsb #onted
Chair Murphy says that the parliamentarian said that the meeting is in keeping with bylaws.

Iantomassi says that full disclosure of all letters and materials were not presented at the last meeting.

Murphy rules that all the correspondence has been added. He has ruled.
Iantomassi wants to know how many pieces of correspondence was included. Said that 200 were submitted, but that they received 700.

Murphy says he’s ruled and that Iantomassi wants to appeal

They are now voting on that.

#hcdsb #onted #lgbt #pride
Murphy says the agenda is lawful, Iantomassi says it is not

Trustees are now voting on this.

Trustees vote in favour of the agenda, Iantomassi’s appeal fails
Trustees vote in favour of approving the agenda.

#hcdsb #onted #pride #lgbtq
Trustees are responding the delegations that were presented at last weeks meeting.

Trustee O’Brien puts forward a motion that only the Canadian flag will fly at schools and board office.

Trustee Iantomassi seconds
Chair Murphy says that there is another items that takes precedent over that motion.

OBrien wants the Parliamentarian ruling on that.

The Parliamentarian agrees with Chair Murphy

#hcdsb #onted #lgbtq
Trustee O’Brien is appealing the ruling and we go to another recorded vote.

Trustee Iantomassi wants clarification on the Parliamentarians ruling.

Trustees vote to oppose the appeal. The appeal fails
Trustee Duarte puts a motion to accept the first delegations as information.

Trustee O’Hearn seconds

Trustees vote in favour.

#hcdsb #lgbtq #pride #onted
Trustees O’Brien now makes a point of order that the Order wasn’t read to the assembly

Parliamentarian says that the motion was on the table at the last meeting, it wasn’t gotten to as the last meeting ended

There is precedent that the motion remains on the agenda.
#hcdsb
Trustee Iantomassi appeals this ruling as well.

Trustee Iantomassi is now relying on the fact that they never got to the agenda point of the flag in the last meeting due to the ending, so it cannot be considered read into the record at this meeting.

Trustees vote appeal down
Trustee O’Brien is now saying that Roberts Rules of Orders means that the motion needs to be actually read.

Chair Murphy is relying again on Parliamentarian Kapoors decision.

#hcdsb #lgbtq #pride #onted
Chair Murphy upholds the ruling.

Trustee Duarte moves to accept the next delegation as information.

Trustee O’Hearn seconds

Trustees vote to accept it as information
Trustee Duarte vote to accept delegation 3 as information.

Trustee O’Hearn seconds

Trustees vote to carry the motion
Trustee Duarte moves to accept delegation 4 as information

Trustee OHearn seconds the motion

Trustees vote in favour
Trustee Duarte moves to accept Delegation 5 as information

O’Hearn seconds

Trustees vote in favour of accepting.
Moving on to the actual Pride Flag motion now

Trustee O’Brien objects to the consideration of the question. Karabela wants a parliamentary clarification.

Parliamentarian says it requires a two thirds vote against.
No seconded needed and requires a 2/3 vote. So 6 votes would need to be against consideration.

Karabela wants clarification of the implications of the objection.
Parliamentarian Kapoor says if it carries then the motion is dismissed for this session.

O’Brien wants to know if the vote goes through will this appear on the minutes?

Parliamentarian advises that the vote would be recorded.

#hcdsb #onted #lgbtq #pride
Trustee Guzzo wants to be clear on what she’s voting on.

Parliamentarian Kapoor explains that the objection to consideration purpose is to avoid the motion as its too controversial for this session.

This would be dropped, and so it would need to be brought forward again.
Trustee O’Hearn wants clarification on the reasoning for bring this objection forward.

Parliamentarian says this is to avoid a main motion altogether as the person believes strongly it is wrong for it to come before teh assembly

#hcdsb #pride #onted
Trustees are now going to vote on whether or not the PRIDE flag motion will be considered.

#hcdsb #onted #PRIDE
Trustees vote to consider the PRIDE Flag motion

#hcdsb #lgbtq #PRIDE #onted
Chair Murphy is seeking consensus to lift time limits on debate for this item.

Chair Murphy says there is no consensus so debates will be limited to 3 minutes

#hcdsb #onted #PRIDE #lgbtq
Trustee Agnew is reading the motion.

Trustee Guzzo seconds the motion

#hcdsb #PRIDE #onted
Trustee Agnew speaks in favour of the motion.

Says this isn’t about political posturing, but about saving student lives. Cites facts of suicide rates of #LGBTQ students.

After reading the correspondence submitted she is committed to passing this resolution.

#hcdsb #PRIDE
Points out the other days of highlighting indigenous students, land acknowledgment and disabilities that didn’t bring up the same contention that this motion did.

Makes the argument that the #PRIDE Flags colours are about equality and support #hcdsb #onted
Agnew says not raising the flag sends the message to #lgbtq students that we do not care nor accept them and want them to stay in the closet

#hcdsb #PRIDE #onted
Trustee O’Hearn is up next:

She puts forward a motion to amend on the main motion
We are waiting to make sure that it was actually received
Okay here we go again:

Trustee OHearn motions to strike the Raising the Pride Flag part of the motion.

And the BITR as written to replace it with a new BITR
This BITR and BITFR goes to include training for leadership staff in accordance with the Ontario Human Rights Code, that the schools go to create safe spaces, and taht the staff raise awareness for PRIDE month.

This is a lot of changes to the motion. I can’t keep up with it all
Chair Murphy is asking to run through it again to clarify it all.

Trustee O’Brien has asked for it to be sent to them for review

Trustee Duarte seconds the motion.
Trustee Iantomassi moves to break the propositions into parts so that they can be dealt with separately. Says they are confusing.

Chair asks if this is possible of the Parliamentarian Kapoor.

Kapoor is reviewing it now to see if this is teh case.

#hcdsb #PRIDE #lgbtq
Kapoor says that separation would be difficult. The motion could be analysed clause by clause but you couldn’t vote on each clause. The vote on a whole would have to be on the amendment as a whole.

Kapoor is laying out the process of how this will proceed.
This could go line by line on the proposed amendments.

Trustee Iantomassi’s point of order is accepted by the CHair and so they will review each amendment point by point
Trustee Iantomassi says there are three distinct proposition in the amendment.

Parliamentarian suggested to review clause by clause for this purpose.

Iantomassi says that they do not clarify, but add to the original motion.

#hcdsb #onted #PRIDE
Trustee O’Hearn speaks to her amendment

The motion has created sides in the school community. But its time to make a change. In this amendment she feels its taking a step forward in action.

If one student feels safe in their schools its one too many in her mind.
Trustee Guzzo wants to amend back in the the proposed BITR to fly the PRIDE flag during the month of June 2021

Trustee Agnew seconds it

Trustee O’Brien says that you can’t substitute as the amendment was to strike out.
Chair Murphy asks for clarification from Parliamentarian and says its okay to proceed as is

O’Brien appeals the decision so we go to another vote
Trustees vote on the appeal now

Karabela was disconnected and we are waiting on her decision for the vote.

Trustee Guzzo makes a point of order to call the vote as there appears to be a strategy of delaying on some Trustees

Chair Murphy says its in appropriate to say that
Trustee Karabela appears to no longer be online.

Trustee O’Brien requests to take a five minute recess

Chair Murphy says we need to vote on it

Trustee Karabela is trying to chime in but is definitely having some connection issues.
Trustee Karabela votes in favour

The appeal fails

#hcdsb #lgbtq #pride #onted
Back to Trustee Guzzo’s Amendment

Guzzo speaks that kids are entrusted to the board to make a safe space for them. How can teh board ignore them when they say that they do not feel safe?

Says the Bible was not written to cause harm, but thats what it is happening

#hcdsb
This meeting is getting mired in amendments and procedural over the simple motion to raise the #PRIDE flag

#hcdsb #lgbtq #onted
Trustee Kelly thanks Guzzo for re adding it to the amendment.

The motion is epitome of the #hcdsb maxim of Achieving believing and belonging.

Says the Diocese has show support for the motion

#lgbtq #PRIDE #onted
Trustee Kelly makes the point that here petition has reached over 15,000 signatures.

She says she speaks as a member of the 2SLGBTQ+ community. Does it make her any less of a catholic?

#hcdsb #lgbtq #PRIDE #onted
Trustee O’Brien wants to make an amendment to this amendment.

Parliamentarian Kapoor says its already a secondary amendment and tertiary amendments not allowed

O’Brien says to Guzzo why did she include the CEC in her amendment?
Trustee DeRosa asks to submit an amendment to clear up all the amendments. When can he do that?

Chair Murphy says when we get back to the main motion (When that will be who knows?)

Parliamentarian Kapoor says it has to be to O’Hearns Amendment.

#hcdsb #PRIDE #onted
Trustee Agnew speaks:

She is fully in support of flying the flag and is in support of the amendment. It’s not perfect but it’s a great starting spot.

Says Thunder Bay Catholic and Waterloo Catholic Boards will fly the #PRIDE flag at their schools

#hcdsb #onted
Trustee Iantomassi wants to commend Trustee Kelly.

But wants to emphasise the Halton Catholic ratepayers

He is basically refuting all the points Trustee Kelly has made. Quite emphatically and emotionally.

It should be pointed out Trustee Kelly is a high school student.

#hcdsb
Trustee Iantomassi is taking about two or three minutes to take apart Trustee Kelly’s emotional appeal.

He’s going back to the original motion to flag only the Canadian flag that failed at the start of the meeting.

#hcdsb #lgbtq #PRIDE #onted
Trustee Iantomassi is now going into logistical issues and financial problems of paying for the flags.

Says the board is in no position to deal with this at this time

Moves a motion to postpone the motion til when staff can provide sufficient information.

#hcdsb #onted #PRIDE
Trustee Iantomassi is asking to postpone now until a policy can be determined that includes costing, of the flag and a secondary pole, a policy that deals with competing groups for the same month, who has priority.
We are now talking about the timeline for the board staff to get this information back to them.

Parliamentarian says that postponing the motion past the month of June is out of order. He made the mistake earlier.

Chair Murphy rules that Iantomassi’s request is out of order.
Right now there is about 20 min left in the meeting to figure out O’Hearn’s amendment and then then incorporate it into the original motion and then vote on the #PRIDE flag motion.

#hcdsb #onted
Trustee Guzzo is saying that the purpose of the motion is to send a message that every one of every background is welcome at the #hcdsb

#lgbtq #onted
Moving to a recorded vote on Trustee Guzzo’s amendment to O’Hearn’s Amendment to the #PRIDE flag motion

Trustee Karabela appears to be on the phone as the vote is called

Going back to her for a vote and no answer.

#hcdsb #onted #lgbtq
Trustee DeRosa suggests calling a recess

Guzzo asks, can you call a vote in the middle of a vote

Iantomassi chimes that you cannot

Kapoor says that you cannot.

Murphy votes against.
Back to O’Hearn’s amendment with 10 minutes to go

Trustee Duarte is speaking now in regards to the diversity of the board.

He says he’s heard from many parents and stakeholders in Milton, majority were in favour.

Says he wants to see all students welcomed at the #HCDSB
Duarte supports the amendment
Trustee Iantomassi speaks to thank all stakeholders who’ve spoken to this matter.

He’s going back to the Canadian flag motion that has failed twice already tonight.

Now says its illegal to fly two or more flags on the same pole.

Citing section 29 of the Charter now
Trustee DeRosa up now:

Proposes an amendment to O’Hearns amendment

This amendment is looking to replace the whole motion with a motion to review all equity and inclusion programs in the #hcdsb

#onted #lgbtq #PRIDE
De Rosas motion suggest flying a different flag from the #PRIDE flag and proposes creating a separate flag unique to the #hcdsb

#onted
We need to vote to extend the meeting now

Looks like we are continuing the meeting to 10:30 now

#hcdsb #onted #pride #lgbtq
DeRosas amendment would replace O’Hearn’s amendment and this would go to the original motion proposed by Agnew

DeRosa speaks in favour of the motion. Says the debate is untimely due to COVID-19

This debate has created divisions in the Catholic board

#hcdsb #PRIDE #Onted
He says he has tried to find the middle ground on this. Says hes heard from the silent majority as well as those in the #lgbtq community.

Says the silent majority has not had a voice in this matter and that the board needs to poll that community

Wants to find a compromise
Says he’s heard bullying in the form of phrases like “you’re with us or against us”

Troubled by this terminology

Says the flag is only a symbolic gesture. It offers no long term plan to support #lgbtq kids.

#hcdsb #onted
DeRosa brings up the risk of questioning the value of Catholic education in the public.

Admits that this motion will fall short but says it’ll be a first step to their inclusion into the #hcdsb community
Trustee Agnew speaks:

Says a lot of students were excited and hopeful that #hcdsb will fly the #PRIDE flag.

Says this may not go the way they wanted.

Cautions to the Trustees to fly any flag to recognized #PRIDE month it has to be the PRIDE flag.
Trustee O’Brien wants to make an amendment now

Parliamentary Kapoor says this is a secondary amendment and cannot be amended

Chair Murphy says there needs to be consensus to accept it

O’Brien suggests striking the resolution to fly anything at all

#hcdsb #PRIDE
De Rosa is opposed so O’Briens suggestion is struck down.

O’Brien proposes to suspend the rule to this action

Iantomassi is asking for clarification on which bylaw

Chair Murphy calls for a seconder. No one steps up

This fails.
Trustee Guzzo is now discussing the definition of privilege of benefits of being a white CIS Gendered woman

#hcdsb #lgbtq #onted #PRIDE
Trustee Kelly is speaking about standing up to bullies now.

#hcdsb #lgbtq #PRIDE #onted
Trustee Kelly is going through the colours of the #PRIDE Flag and each colours definition.

Now is comparing the rainbow to a symbol of God. Says replacing the flag is synonymous to saying ‘we accept you,…but…”

#lgbtq #hcdsb #onted
Trustee De Rosa closes that he feels for the plight of the #lgbtq kids and all who are made to feel different and bullied.

Says he is struggling with the reluctance of students to accept this compromise flag. He is trying to find a middle ground. Admits its not an ideal point
Says its a step forward to do more. He’d be happy to not fly any flag.

Says this is his middle ground. He is concerned of the political optics of flying a flag that represents only one minority group in #hcdsb schools

#lgbtq #pride #onted
DeRosa says this is his best foot forward at the moment.
Chair Murphy is moving to the vote on DeRosas amendment
Amendment fails
Need to vote now to vote to continue the meeting

Needs to be unanimous
Trustee O’Brien opposes and so the motion fails

Now some confusion on how they have to finish the action item on teh PRIDE flag.
Parliamentarian Kapoor says that the board needs to continue the meeting to finish the debate on the #PRIDE flag.

And we are going back to O’Hearns original amendment

#PRIDE #HCDSB #onted
Trustee O’Brien is now proposing an amendment to insert a point to include that it would fall under section 93 of the British North America Act.

De Rosa seconds it

#HCDSB #onted #PRIDE #LGBTQ
O’Brien says the reason to include the section on the British North America act. Now is confused about which document deals with the denominational rights.

Has said he’s confused
O’Brien wants to insert it to protect denominational rights into the motion

No questions on it

Director Daly says Section 93 deals with the provincial powers. Thinks Trustee O’Brien is referring to section 19 specifically.
Just to be clear, we are now arguing over points of the British North America Act to be included in this motion.

O’Brien says Daly is right. But now wants to include section 19 of the Ontario Human Rights Code

Says it gives more weight to O’Hearns amendment

#hcdsb #onted
Now the vote
Trustees vote the amendment down
Trustee O’Brien has another amendment to propose.

Wants to remove the phrasing regarding safe space signage from O’Hearns amendment

Chair Murphy asks for a seconder

Trustee Iantomassi Seconds.
Says its a matter of consistency, that if we don’t fly the flag at the schools then we shouldn’t include signage in favour of the flag as well.

#hcdsb #PRIDE #onted #lgbtq
And we go to a vote
Trustees vote the amendment down
Trustee O’Brien goes to the amendment by O’Hearn and proposes to postpone indefinitely

Ruled out of order
Trustee O’Hearn admits her amendment is disappointing to many and she wants to make change at the #hcdsb

We now go to a vote
Trustees vote to pass the amendment
Trustee O’Brien has another amendment to the new motion

He wants to strike out the entire BITR of the new amendment. Essentially nothing in the new motion would survive.

Wants to replace it again with the sole Canadian flag motion that he proposed at the beginning
NO seconder so it fails
Trustee O’Brien is trying to move a motion to postpone the vote indefinitely

Chair Murphy says he called the vote.

Parliamentary Kapoor says it would be in order to accept this motion by O’Brien
This vote to postpone indefinitely is in order

No seconder of the motion so O’Briens motion fails
Motion goes to a vote now
The motion passes but with out the policy to raise the #PRIDE flag. Trustee O’Hearns amendment removed that from the original motion.

The meeting now comes to and end.

#hcdsb #onted #lgbtq
To summarise the #PRIDE flag will NOT be flown over #hcdsb schools. Trustee O’Hearn’s amendment scrapped that policy in favour of educational training for board staff and leadership and to raise some signage in schools.

This meeting took 4 hours to achieve this

#lgbtq #onted
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