Chianello: Diane Deans was tenacious, passionate, sometimes frustrating — and utterly committed
As an Ottawa city hall reporter and columnist, I sometimes disagreed with the longtime councillor. But she and her staff knew their stuff and zeroed in on what mattered.
Author of the article:Joanne Chianello, Special to the Citizen
Published May 16, 2024 • Last updated May 16, 2024 • 4 minute read
A reporter’s promise of confidentiality extends beyond this life, which is how I found myself on the section couch with Diane Deans in her home this past Monday. I had come to say goodbye, but also to get her blessing to tell how she helped me break what would be one of the biggest stories of my career.
It was winter of 2019, and I had discovered that SNC-Lavalin (now called AtkinsRéalis) was the city’s choice for the $1.6-billion Trillium Line extension, despite failing – twice! – to score the required minimum 70 per cent in the bidding process. My source couldn’t go on the record, and to publish I needed confirmation from at least two more people.
I had worked at it for weeks, but no dice. With council set to approve the contract on March 6, I considered who else at city hall might help.
Why did I go to Deans? I knew she would be outraged, wouldn’t reveal my source, and would try to help, unlike others who suggested I “keep digging” or “follow the money.” As one of Ottawa’s longest-serving councillors, Deans knew a lot of people and I was hoping she could convince someone to speak with me.
That didn’t work out. But Deans didn’t drop it. At the council meeting, she interrogated city staff and lawyers. They wouldn’t say whether SNC-Lavalin had hit that 70 per cent score. What’s more, the hired legal guns told councillors they were not even allowed to ask the question.
Deans was flabbergasted.
“Not our high-priced lawyer, not senior city staff, not our fairness commissioner can sit in front of us and answer a simple question,” she said, adding she “got a song and dance.” (I included that clip in any story I could.)
The evasions outraged the city and her probing helped convince others to confirm to me that SNC-Lavalin had failed to meet that required score, allowing me to report the story. Some would have preferred otherwise. Not Deans.
Watch city hall for any length of time and you’ll soon see who around the council horseshoe has read a report closely and who has skimmed the executive summary. Deans and her staff — largely women — dug into details, knew their stuff and zeroed in on what mattered.
Reporters sitting on media row always leaned in when Deans’s mic was turned on. We were about to hear a question that hit at the heart of an issue — and get a good quote to boot!
She enjoyed the spotlight but was happy to share it, especially with other women. She launched her annual International Women’s Day Breakfast in the mid-1990s, just a couple of years after being elected — and before such events became de rigueur.
None of this is to say Deans was an angel. She relished the political realm, understood the personality dynamics involved and wasn’t above using them to her advantage. She could frustrate city colleagues by acting on her own, like the time she unilaterally, and successfully, applied for federal money for a community kitchen in the Albion-Heatherington Recreation Centre.
She had a knack for messaging. Being named the chair of the Ottawa Police Services Board in 2018 could have been considered a demotion from her longstanding leadership of the community services committee. But Deans took control of the narrative, boasting she was the board’s first woman chair.
I asked her on Monday what kept her in council, and in politics, for 28 long years. She said that she always told herself she’d leave when she stopped having fun.
That moment didn’t come until very late in the game.
During her final term, worsening tensions between Deans and former mayor Jim Watson were no secret.
When she unilaterally hired a new temporary police chief in the middle of the so-called “Freedom Convoy” in February 2022, politics finally tripped her up.
As police board chair, she was legally allowed to make that hire, even without informing council. But her colleagues didn’t agree with her call. They removed her in an uncommonly chaotic and emotional council meeting. Deans never got over what she felt was personal betrayal.
Over the years, we had often disagreed, including over some details around her hiring of a new chief. That was hard: I respected and liked her, and had seen how the former mayor treated her, from cutting off her mic during a debate over an LRT inquiry to refusing to let her ask a question at a committee she didn’t sit on.
But, during our last visit, Deans wasn’t dwelling on rifts and recriminations. In a flattering pixie cut, wearing a soft pink sweater, she looked as beautiful as ever as we laughed and gossiped about — what else? — city politics. She wanted to dive into the taxi class-action lawsuit decision that had just come down that day.
Her willingness to agree to disagree, stay engaged, and keep laughing are all too rare these days, not just in politics, but in society at large. Diane Deans played the angles, but also pressed her case, even if she was tired, even if some might not like it. She drew out the best in people and worked to make things better. Like many in this city, I’m missing her already.
https://ottawacitizen.com/opinion/ch...erly-committed
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