One of Chatham-Kent's top-ranking officials is no longer a municipal employee.
A release from the Municipality of Chatham-Kent Thursday evening announced that Thomas Kelly, who had been previously been announced as Chatham-Kent's next Chief Administrative Officer (CAO), is no longer a municipal employee.
The release said Don Shropshire, who is currently the CAO, will stay in his role as Chatham-Kent council takes steps to recruit a new CAO and that officials will "not be making any further comments at this time" on Kelly's departure, citing "a responsibility to respect the privacy of our employees."
The release about Kelly comes after CK News Today learned that the Ministry of Labour concluded its investigation into alleged workplace harassment at the municipality of Chatham-Kent and ordered the municipality to investigate the matter.
CK News Today also previously learned that the Ministry of Labour got involved in the case after a harassment complaint was filed against incoming Thomas Kelly in November of 2021, just a week after he was named as the municipality's next CAO on November 15, 2021.
Chatham-Kent council had its second closed-door meeting in a week Wednesday night to discuss "personal matters about identifiable individuals and advice that is subject to solicitor-client privilege, including communications necessary for that purpose with regard to a Ministry of Labour Order".
It's not clear if the meeting on Wednesday or the week before was related to the Kelly investigation. The harassment allegations have also not been proven.
Under section 32.0.7 of Ontario's Occupational Health and Safety Act (OHSA), an employer must ensure that an investigation is conducted into incidents or complaints of workplace harassment and should be done promptly within 90 days or less unless there are compelling reasons why a longer investigation is needed, such as multiple witnesses or a key witness is unavailable due to illness.
The employee and the alleged harasser must also be informed in writing of the results of the investigation and any corrective action. Corrective action could be an apology, education, counselling, shift changes, reprimands, suspension, job transfer, or termination, depending on the employer's policy, and the nature or severity of the behaviour. Corrective actions could also be broader, especially where the investigation of an incident or complaint shows that workplace harassment is prevalent or commonplace. An example of the broader corrective action would be training for everyone in the workplace or in a unit on workplace harassment, causes and solutions.
If the investigation of an incident or complaint finds that there were shortcomings in the workplace harassment policy or program, corrective action could include revising the policy or program.
The person conducting the investigation must be impartial but can be an internal employee such as a supervisor, senior manager, or human resources staff, work at another employer, or may be someone external to the organization such as a licensed private investigator, human resource professional, lawyer, or someone who holds some other professional designation.