Municipal Affair

The summer before the 2014 municipal election, Free-FM was one of the hosts of Rock the Park, the big multi-day music festival at London’s Harris Park. It’s an all-hands-on-deck event, from early morning until late at night. It was dark and it was raining as I returned to the VIP gazebo after visiting a porta-potty and noticed councillor Matt Brown and his wife Andrea, trying – and failing – to stay dry, so I invited them to our covered spot. 

Brown was the first candidate to declare he wanted the Mayor’s chair. He had done so in January after serving one term on council. His platform was based on change, as the city shook off its embarrassment and anger from the previous Mayor’s fraud and breach of trust scandal. As rain pelted the wooden roof of the structure, Brown told me it was time to bring trust back to city council. He said he had “family values” and would restore integrity. He didn’t have as much experience as some, but he spun that as a positive. Andrea spoke with excitement about what her husband would do for this city. She was his biggest supporter. They both talked about fresh ideas and a collaborative, not combative, approach

Little did we know how collaborative.

Since he has been Mayor, I’ve run into Matt Brown while out and about in the city and we always have a friendly chat. He messaged me personally one time when I said something on the air that made him laugh. Now, he has shattered his public persona by having an affair with his Deputy Mayor, Maureen Cassidy, who has also ruined the public’s image of her. They have both stepped aside for now, and Cassidy has resigned as Deputy Mayor. She cited their “close working relationship” as a major factor in their “inappropriate personal relationship” that lasted for months, but is now over.

Some are calling for them both to resign completely. Some are wondering how they will ever work together again, and how their spouses will allow it. Both are asking for privacy as they work to repair their damaged families. Matt described Andrea as “angry” at his admission to the affair. Everyone can understand that reaction. Brown is a human being and a pretty good guy, really. But as a human he will make mistakes and by any measure, this one is a doozy.

Yesterday, our show got the first live interview with Mayor Brown since the revelations. He was contrite and he was sticking to a script. We tried to push him into ad-lib territory, but he said what he wanted to say. He’s sorry. He loves his wife and his job and he will work to make it all right.

Earlier in the morning we spoke live to acting mayor Paul Hubert who claimed that he and the rest of council were concerned, not angry, about what has happened. I doubt that very much. Our last Mayor, Joe Fontana, cast a pall on the city with criminal charges and an eventual conviction. The Mayor before that, Anne Marie DeCicco Best is married to a guy who tried, and failed, to wriggle out of causing a drunk driving collision by pulling the power card. Brown hasn’t done anything criminal. In fact, if he had launched into an affair with someone outside of City Hall, it would, truly, be a personal matter. But he didn’t. He affected the process and his job. Cassidy shouldn’t get off the hook either. She did the same. Now there’s word Brown’s Chief of Staff is quitting over the scandal, and suspicion that his recently-departed Communications Advisor may have done the same. I’m just profoundly disappointed that the man who said all of the optimistic things so many of us wanted to hear after such a dark time in the Fontana shadow, has proven incapable of living up to them.