It took over 80 days, hordes of angry parents, a petition with more than 3,000 signatures, several newspaper editorials, two cabinet ministers and the province’s premier to make her see the light. Still, she had the final say.
Nancy Elgie is no longer a York Region school board trustee. That’s certainly a good thing. In the end, however, her resignation is a hollow victory for the Black community.
The 82-year-old widow, who was overheard referring to parent Charline Grant as a “nigger” following a school board meeting late last year, finally threw in the towel on Friday, February 17. She made her departure official – in an at times tearful 10-minute YouTube video – in which we find out she has been out of town recovering from a head injury with her family.
In the video, Elgie explains that she hasn’t been able to talk about the incident publicly because of a concussion she suffered some weeks ago after a bad fall and for which she has been under doctor’s orders “to rest and heal.”
Despite this supposed fragile state of mind, Elgie made a vigorous effort to hold onto her job – first telling the Toronto Star when the story broke that “there is no merit to the accusation,” and then refusing to comment, including after an internal investigation that found she had violated the board’s Respectful Workplace policy.
Elgie would make a written apology to everyone involved. But the matter refused to die. When her mea culpa failed to stem the public outrage, her adult children were brought in to do damage control. Their tone-deaf attempts to explain their mother’s behaviour only swelled calls for her removal.
Cabinet ministers Michael Coteau and Mitzie Hunter encouraged her to leave but were duly ignored. Finally, Premier Kathleen Wynne suggested she had become a distraction for the beleaguered school board. That seemed to do it, but Elgie remained defiant. From her point of view, her apology should have been enough for the board to let her stay.
“Some have questioned why I had not resigned immediately. It was never about protecting my position,” she maintains in her video. “My main concern was the lesson that would be passed on to our students if the consequences for my infraction were totally punitive, with no attempt to be restorative.”
She calls it “a problem” that the board’s workplace policy “does not provide a remedy for trustees as it does for students who breach the rules.” It apparently never occurred to Elgie that she is not a student, and that an elected official is held to higher standard.
The case reminds us that racism comes in myriad forms. It can come in the form of a hate-filled slur. Or it can come in the self-serving machinations of those who offend but wish to escape public censure.
It can also come in the silence of elected politicians who fail to speak out when communities need them most.
Elgie says she hopes her “terrible mistake” will serve as a teachable moment. That it is – every Black student in our public education system has been given a real life lesson in racial bigotry that they would be wise to heed.
Neil Price is author of the Community Assessment Of Police Practices report on carding.
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