School board asks judge to remove trustee who attended meetings online while on work secondment

The Simcoe County District School Board has asked a Barrie judge to remove school trustee Lisa-Marie Wilson because she failed to attend board meetings in person.

The board has taken trustee Wilson to civil court, arguing before a judge that Wilson should lose her seat as school trustee for leaving the province on a temporary work secondment last year and failing to attend board meetings in person. Wilson, instead, attended the meetings electronically.

“Fighting this is more than, is bigger than, just me,” said Wilson to CTV News following court proceedings earlier this month. “So that’s really, that’s the only reason that has kept me going.”

The school board is arguing Wilson violated legislation under section 219 of the Education Act by living out of the province and attending meetings virtually and she therefore vacated her seat while working temporarily as a probation and parole officer in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

The defence called the civil action against her a “Witch hunt” arguing Wilson, who had informed the then-chair Jodi Lloyd of her secondment last August, did nothing wrong and Wilson attended school board meetings online. Her lawyer Jeff Beleskey told the court Wilson always intended to return to Barrie.

“There’s been lots of other trustees around the table who have participated electronically through this whole process yet, you know, them knowing that I was on this work secondment, I’m the one who became the target,” said Wilson.

In court, Beleskey alluded to a vendetta and some sort of animosity against Wilson by other board members with a tipping point being when Lloyd lost her seat as chair with Wilson casting the only vote that was not blind. All other votes were recorded in confidence. Wilson says the legal fight appears to be personal and began when Lloyd sought to have Wilson’s vote nullified because it was cast electronically and not in person.

“I know that the board’s lawyers, who are a firm out of Toronto are not cheap, and a lot of taxpayer dollars has gone into this,” she said. “We’re struggling with our nutrition programs, Chromebooks for students, we have lots of concerns with transportation and bussing. There’s so many families and students in need, yet this is how they are deciding to spend a whole bunch of money.”

The board’s lawyer, Lesley Campbell, argued Wilson failed to meet the minimum threshold under the regulation requiring mandatory in-person attendance for at least one meeting every four months each year, telling Justice Joseph Di Luca that Wilson did not attend a single meeting in person between November 2024 and March 2025, and the board failed to properly follow and enforce the protocols in place.

Wilson’s annual salary, as an elected Simcoe County District School Board trustee for wards seven to ten, is about $14,000.

Campbell told the court the board was not seeking costs for the proceedings. Wilson’s legal costs are about double her annual trustee salary. A GoFundMe has been created to help Wilson pay her legal bills that she has had to put on her credit card. With several thousands of dollars outstanding.

Her lawyer told the court Wilson should receive costs after having her name “dragged through the mud.”

“I can’t be blind to the fact too, that I am their only and first Black elected trustee,” Wilson noted.

The Simcoe County District School Board declined to respond to that comment or discuss the civil case until a ruling has been made.

Justice Di Luca said he will deliver a decision in the coming months.