Councillor Matt Whitman (centre). Credit: via MattWhitman.ca

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Matt Whitman found himself in a far more serious form of Twitter jail this week, and will now have to apologize for the way he’s been tweeting.

The Hammonds Plains–St. Margarets councillor met behind closed doors with his fellow councillors for over three hours to discuss two letters of complaint submitted to the city about Whitman’s social media use.

One of those came from neighbour and RCMP officer Scott Warnica, who sent an official complaint about the deputy mayor’s social media use to city hall and also took his crusade to the media in order to hold the councillor “accountable” for inappropriate comments.

Richard Dooley explains:

“The matter came to a head for Warnica on Tuesday when Whitman tweeted with the hashtags ‘#powertrip’ and ‘#getalife’ in reference to a man ticketed by the RCMP for operating an ATV on a roadway.

The all-terrain vehicle was equipped with a plow and the man was cleaning up snow on the public roadway in his cul-de-sac. It’s illegal to operate an ATV on a roadway in Nova Scotia and the man was issued a $406 fine.”

The municipality’s code of conduct hold that elected councillors treat everyone with “dignity, understanding and respect.” Warnica asked for Whitman to be removed as deputy mayor over the damning hashtags (amongst other allegedly inappropriate posts) and also tweet a public apology.

Today’s in camera meeting was to determine, in part, if Whitman had acted inappropriately. At the end of the night council found Whitman’s tweeting “did not show the respect expected of a public official” and a motion was passed unanimously for him to issue a public apology.

Whitman had previously told Metro’s Yvette d’Entremont he planned to address the matter publicly.

I’ve been told letters of support have also been sent to the city in favour of Whitman’s prodigious, if sometimes bewildering social media use. The District 13 councillor is one of HRM’s most engaged public officials on social media. This is the man who (jokingly) called himself a “new barometer” for social media savviness in city hall, after all.

But for all his positivity and innumerable retweets, Whitman’s unfiltered content clearly rubs some citizens the wrong way. The councillor is also quick on the draw to block other users—everyone from media outlets to angry HRM residents and anyone he perceives as “being negative.” In an age where Twitter is the most direct way to reach public officials (especially Whitman), that can be an infuriating (though not always inappropriate) strategy.

As an aside, a few months ago I asked for a list of any muted or blocked accounts by @hfxgov, @HfxRegPolice or any other municipally-owned Twitter profile. There were none, according to the city. The police had “mistakenly” muted one account, which they quickly un-muted.

Anyway, with respect to today’s weirdness, here are our favourite Matt Whitman tweets from the past six weeks.

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1. When he IMDB’d The Departed


2. When he threw shade at The Darkside Gallery

3. When he reminded us cat food cans are recyclable

4. When he was happy Keith Richards was still alive?

5. When he got in a spat with Halifax Magazine editor Trevor Adams

6. When he memorialized David Bowie

7. When he realized where HRM is

8. When he reminded us he speaks street

9. Umm…

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This article appears in Feb 11-17, 2016.

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7 Comments

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  4. I think many of his tweets were foolish, but I also think it was foolish to give the guy a ticket, and for a Mountie to be that thin-skinned. There have been many many problems with the RCMP in Canada in recent years. Can the force never be scrutinized or criticized?

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  6. The community is obviously backing the RCMP Officer, a Facebook page was started to support Matt and it only had 23 people after a full day, the organizer blamed Cindy Day…!! Someone else booked the Hammonds Plains Hall to have a Matt Whitman rally, it only got 50 likes over the long weekend, the event was cancelled. Locals are saying Matt the the ATV driver are not neighbours and they live 4km apart. Only the RCMP, Matt, and the ATV driver know the exact story. If you look at the crap Matt tweets, its clear he only does it to market his name. The fact a politician making $80,000 per year wastes his day tweeting the crap the Coast Published above shows his true interest.

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  7. The apparent lack of support for Whitman means nothing. I’m constantly aware of anything this guy does because he’s my alderman and we have shared many emails. I knew nothing about either of those attempts to muster support because I certainly would have backed either venture. I’ve even went so far to tell Whitman I would support him in the next election or should he become mayor. The RCMP was wrong and it was an abuse of power. Whitman didn’t want this issue to become some major issue that would harm his bid for re-election. A person has to pick his battles and decide which one he wants to fight.

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