Photo: Contributed

The city of Kamloops has emptied the contents of the mayor’s main floor office, moving all remaining documents to the basement of City Hall after he himself refused to move there.

Deputy Mayor of the November Council. Dale Bass told Castanet Kamloops that last weekend about two dozen boxes of Mayor Reid Hamer-Jackson’s belongings were packed up and moved to the mayor’s new office: an unused meeting room in the basement at that he was ordered to move out due to staff bullying complaints against him. .

Bass said an independent third party packaged all of the mayor’s documents and labeled the boxes based on where they were taken from in the office. She said two community service officers moved the items to the basement office while the third watched.

Bass said she also attended as a council supervisor but was not involved in the measure.

“Staff are now confident that the main floor office is secured and that everything is secure in the mayor’s new office,” Bass said.

She said the third party took out everything that appeared to be work related to the new office, and everything that was of an obvious personal nature was left in the room.

Bass noticed there were only a few of those items, such as a scarf and a badge, and emailed the mayor to let him know he could still arrange to pick them up with a chaperone.

Hamer-Jackson was locked out of the area leading to his official office on the main floor after he refused to move out by the Oct. 22 deadline.

The mayor continues to refuse to go to his new office in the basement of City Hall.

Bass said staff told him that mail and documents the mayor must sign have been piling up in his new basement office, and he confirmed he had to sign some documents.

Under new rules the council implemented in May when Hamer-Jackson was removed as the city’s official spokesperson, Vice Mayor has the authority to sign the documents instead of the mayor if he does not sign them within 48 hours.

“I signed some earlier this week,” Bass said. “Whether or not you meet the obligation to sign within 48 hours on business days (requirement) or there is simply not much to sign, I don’t know.”

Maria Mazzotta, corporate director for the city of Kamloops, said the mayor’s mail and documents requiring his signature were left in a mailbox outside his new basement office until Thursday, when he requested his files be dropped off. at the reception.

“And we are fulfilling that request,” Mazzotta said, noting that there are some items waiting for him, but not a large quantity.

Mazzotta told Castanet that she is not sure if the mayor receives personal mail at City Hall, but anything that is a corporate record should not be removed from City Hall.

“It shouldn’t be. “We don’t know the nature of the materials you receive,” Mazzotta said. “I don’t open your envelopes and if you receive things that are confidential in nature then it is not appropriate for them to be stored off-site.”

When contacted for comment, Mayor Hamer-Jackson said he would remove his personal mail from the facility, but that any documents he needed to sign would provide his John Hancock on site and hand it to staff through the plexiglass at the front desk.

“I’ll take my mail, but I’ll sign all the documents there,” Hamer-Jackson said.

“If it’s my personal email, why wouldn’t I accept it?”

Hamer-Jackson previously told Castanet that she would not store city documents at her TRU Market Auto business at 260 West Victoria St., where she intends to meet with people instead of using her new office in the basement of City Hall.

When asked why she wouldn’t use her new office to sign documents, Hamer-Jackson said her new office “is a waste of taxpayer money.”

“And I’m not a puppet.”

The mayor’s office was relocated in October, and the city council decided by resolution to remove Hamer-Jackson from staff after what the council says has been corroborated by staff. harassment complaints against him – including four complaints from WorkSafe BC.