Heaps no longer wants money for lawsuit expenses

Heaps no longer wants to be reimbursed for lawsuit expenses. Ward 35 councillor Adrian Heaps, seen here with his wife Karen Albertson celebrating his election victory on Nov 13, 2006, recently turned down more than $65,000 of city money to cover costs he incurred in a libel suit he settled with another candidate during that campaign. File photo/WILLIAM MEIJER

Heaps distributed a letter in which he told his colleagues he wouldn't accept the money just a day before the council meeting where city officials were to debate re-opening the controversial decision to cover his costs in the legal battle between himself and candidate Michelle Berardinetti.

"Please accept this letter as my official refusal to accept any reimbursement for legal expenses," he wrote. "For the record, I have long ago paid all legal expenses related to this matter."

He continued: "As councillors, we must conduct ourselves in an honourable way if we are to set an honourable example. I trust my actions will allow Council to focus on what is in the best interests of the city."

Councillors voted to help out Heaps with about $65,000 in expenses he had defending a libel action from Michelle Berardinetti - another candidate in the 2006 election, who he beat by just 89 votes.

Late in the campaign, Heaps distributed a newspaper column endorsing him and disparaging Berardinetti, who is married to Scarborough Southwest Liberal MPP Lorenzo Berardinetti.

Berardinetti sued Heaps for libel, and Heaps eventually settled - paying out $20,000 and issuing a formal letter of apology in which he admitted the flyer may have tipped the scales in his favour in the close-fought election.

As those details emerged, councillors who supported the motion had second thoughts. And at this week's council meeting, two of them - Cliff Jenkins and Michael Thompson - had crafted a motion to re-open and rescind the payment.

Heaps maintained in an interview he was inclined not to accept the money from the beginning - but he did want to see a policy debate take place on how councillors deal with covering legal expenses related to issues arising during elections.

He said the city's integrity commissioner advised him to keep mum on the issue - because doing anything might be seen as attempting to influence councillors' decision on the re-opening motion.

"I was told you cannot influence this issue until the end of the council meeting," he said. "I was severely restricted in what I could say. I issued a statement which was the only one she would agree to, saying I wanted council to do this as a citywide policy."

He said that late last year, he asked that payment of the reimbursement be delayed until after he was sure no councillors would come forward with such a policy.

"I decided to wait over the holidays - nothing happened. I waited until the last possible moment, Monday morning, and that never happened. So I decided the only way to force the issue was to withdraw myself categorically from the decision; the best way to do it was not to accept the money under any circumstance."

The motion will likely still stand, according to staff from Michael Thompson's office because until the offer is rescinded, the money would remain theoretically available to Heaps.

Less clear is what will happen legally. Over the past month, the issue has brought on two lawsuits: one from the Toronto Party, a grassroots organization, and councillor Doug Holyday. City legal staff had advised that paying a councillor's legal expenses out of tax dollars is unlawful and subject to a court challenge.

Holyday said he intended to congratulate Heaps on his decision, but thought the councillor needed to go further and return an earlier payment council approved to him, of more than $82,000, to cover the costs he incurred successfully defending against a compliance audit.

"I'm glad to see him do that," said Holyday. "I think it was naive of him to get in the middle of accepting the money in the first place - but that's a step in the right direction. What I want to know is whether he's giving up the compliance audit."

Both Holyday's and the Toronto Party's lawsuit speak to payouts for compliance audits and other legal expenses covered by the city for Giorgio Mammoliti and Sandra Bussin.