The mayor vows to seek a way to prevent Chu from serving as her deputy in February
The only two members to vote in opposition were Mayor Jyoti Gondek and Ward 9 Coun. Gian-Carlo Carra, who said Wednesday that he wasn’t surprised by the verdict.
“As with past years, there was very little appetite to stand by the original principles we defined at the beginning of the term and deal with the ensuing unpleasantness,” Carra said in a message to Postmedia.
Chu has not served as deputy mayor — a rotating position that sees councillors fill in for Gondek during her absences — since the veteran councillor was re-elected in 2021.
His exclusion came after news that surfaced days before the 2021 election that he’d been reprimanded in the 1990s, when working as a Calgary police officer, for having inappropriate physical contact with a 16-year-old girl. While not criminally charged, Chu was found guilty of discreditable conduct following an internal investigation by CPS.
Gondek said she remains concerned with Chu being on council, and hinted Wednesday that she would seek ways to remove him from the deputy mayor rotation.
“A member of council was sanctioned by the police service for ‘discreditable conduct’ with regard to sexual assault on a minor,” she wrote on X, the site formerly known as Twitter. “He does not deserve to be deputy mayor. I haven’t given up on removing him from that role in February.”
Ward 8 Coun. Courtney Walcott said the deputy mayor vote was a missed opportunity for consistency among council, but he acknowledged he didn’t think much about it ahead of Tuesday’s organizational meeting.
“I won’t speak for anyone else, but sometimes I forget Chu exists on council,” Walcott said.
“I haven’t spoken to Sean Chu in three years. I don’t spend a lot of time thinking about him and yesterday was the same. And that’s my mistake.”
In contrast, Ward 7 Coun. Terry Wong said Tuesday that all councillors have a duty to take turns serving the role of deputy mayor, and that Chu was duly elected to fulfill those kinds of obligations.
Re-including Chu on the deputy mayor roster is an example of council adhering to proper procedure and policy, argued Ward 12 Coun. Evan Spencer.
While “it did make sense” for council to exclude him from the deputy mayor rotation when the allegations first emerged, Spencer said now that Chu has faced legal and public scrutiny over his misconduct, it’s time for council to remove itself from interference.
“Regardless of whether or not you think the legal system got that decision right, for us to continue to extend that (exclusion) more and more every year, the optics grow that it’s council trying to be judge and jury versus the legal system,” he said.
“This year felt like the right year for us to remove ourselves from doing that.”
Chu did not respond to a request for comment.