Susan Myers accuses fire chief of hijacking City Council

The following email was sent last week by Ward 2 Councillor Susan Myers to Fire Chief Marcel Provenzano, accusing him of hijacking City Council by recently announcing a temporary fire ban.

To view the fire chief's response to Councillor Myers' message, please click here.

Additional coverage of the fire ban issue will appear later this morning or this afternoon on SooToday.com, including findings of an internal review of SooToday.com's coverage of this issue after the accuracy of our reporting was questioned by Councillor Myers.

************************* Thursday March 24, 2011

I am most curious to know what changed in 72 hours that was so sudden, that council and the public, could not have been put on notice at Monday's meeting of this as to a pending ban within the week?

It certainly was not due to a sudden heat wave that catapulted us into a higher risk today from Monday night.

Council approved recommendations in a report - and specifically not a ban.

It feels to me like Fire Services is taking advantage of a situation right now and council has been hijacked.

Why were we not told Monday that today's ban was going to be issued?

City Council, nor the public, was given any indication on Monday that you were going to institute a ban while "reviewing departmental policy changes."

************************* Full SooToday.com coverage of this story

City cracks down on urban bonfires March 24 announcement of fire ban Susan Myers accuses fire chief of hijacking City Council Fire chief responds to Councillor Myers