A trustee is on the hook for $140,000 in court costs incurred by Toronto’s Catholic school board after a judicial review found the board acted legally when it censured him for trying to include fetishistic behaviours, along with gender identity, in its code of conduct.
But the case isn’t over — and no money will be paid anytime soon — because Trustee Michael Del Grande has filed to appeal the court decision on the censure.
The question of costs surfaced when the Superior Court of Justice Divisional Court initially ruled that the pc28Catholic District School Board had acted legally for censuring and sanctioning Del Grande over controversial comments made during a November 2019 public meeting.
In their Jan. 13 decision, the panel of three judges noted that as the successful party, the TCDSB would normally have been entitled to costs, but that they hadn’t received the necessary information on legal expenses so nothing was ordered.
Then on Jan. 27, the judges released an addition to their ruling saying the board is entitled to $140,000 in costs. They noted lawyers for both sides had come to an agreement about costs and had notified the court by email, but that the panel hadn’t received the details.
When contacted by the Star on Monday, Del Grande, who represents Ward 7 (Scarborough-Agincourt), said he wasn’t able to comment on the matter. But his lawyer Charles Lugosi said the necessary documents seeking permission to appeal the Divisional Court ruling had already been filed in the Court of Appeal for Ontario.
“There are very serious legal issues of national importance that arise out of this decision,” said Lugosi, referring to them as precedent-setting.
Trustee Markus de Domenico of Ward 2 (Etobicoke), welcomed the Divisional Court ruling.
“The board was vindicated completely,” he told the Star, adding, “We followed the exact rules, and we followed them properly, but Mr. Del Grande didn’t like them and went to Divisional Court to try and overturn it.”
Trustee Maria Rizzo of Ward 5 (North York) told the Star that community members have “long awaited this judgment” and the prospect of an appeal means “it’s going to be even longer for justice to be met.”
“It’s been since 2019 that we’ve been dealing with this and it’s been a cross to bear, probably for Del Grande as well as the school board, but most importantly for our kids and our families who really felt hurt by this and haven’t been able to move on from it.”
The controversy stems from a November 2019 board meeting when trustees debated a motion updating the board’s code of conduct to include the terms gender identity and expression as prohibited grounds of discrimination, as required by the province and human rights law. Del Grande called it a “slippery slope” and proposed an amendment seeking to add fetishistic behaviours, such as pedophilia, bestiality and vampirism.
After that meeting, the TCDSB received more than a dozen formal complaints and launched an independent review. An investigator found Del Grande had violated the Trustees’ Code of Conduct by creating an “unwelcoming and harmful environment for certain members of the Catholic school board community” and had “crossed the line” using “inflammatory language.”
In August 2020, trustees voted on whether Del Grande had breached the code of conduct, but fell one vote short of the two-thirds majority required, sparking public outcry. In November 2020, trustees held another meeting and reconsidered their first decision. That time, they voted in favour of finding Del Grande had breached the code and voted to impose sanctions, such as asking him to publicly apologize and undergo equity training.
Del Grande sought to appeal the merits of those decisions, along with the sanctions, to the TCDSB, but he was unsuccessful. That prompted Del Grande to apply to the Divisional Court for a judicial review of four decisions made by the board.
With files from Star archives
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