DRAFT

June 17, 2009

Tamil Demonstrations in Ottawa

Communications Review and Recommendations

1.0 Purpose

Following the 15-day protest by Tamil supporters in Ottawa (April 2009), the Chair of the Police Services Board, Councillor Eli El-Chantiry, expressed concern about the ways in which the Ottawa Police Service (OPS) communicated with the Board, City Council, and the public.

Face Value Communications Inc. was mandated by the OPS to conduct a top-line review of those communications practices and prepare a report for the 22 June 2009 Police Services Board meeting.

The following report is based on interviews with more than a dozen individuals, including the Police Services Board Chair, the Chief of Police, and several senior members and managers of OPS who played critical roles in this incident. The report concludes with a list of 11 recommendations to enhance public communication around major incidents in the future, with a focus on the unique role of the police service in providing timely, accurate information to a range of audiences. The Appendices include brief biographical information on the report’s author and a list of interviewees.

2.0 Background / Context

Ottawa is the site for hundreds of demonstrations and protests every year, the vast majority of which are planned, predictable and peaceful. Typically, there are only minimal disruptions to the public.

Such was not the case on 7 April 2009. Around noon, a group of Tamil supporters began demonstrating on Wellington Street in front of Parliament Hill. The protest would last 15 days. At times, particularly over the first 48 hours, the demonstration caused significant traffic disruptions and inconvenience for commuters and nearby businesses.

Through that initial period, some City Councillors and some members of the public complained about road closures and traffic disruptions in the downtown core. The rationale for the police approach to the demonstration was not well understood.

3.0 Guiding Principles

In considering public communication during this incident, it is important to bear in mind several guiding principles that are key to any effective crisis communications strategy:

3.1 The timeliness and accuracy of information are paramount, particularly during the first 24 hours. The Board Chair raised the concern – which was acknowledged by Deputy Chief Gilles Larochelle, who was the Acting Chief of Police at the time – that there was insufficient information provided directly to the Board in the first 24-48 hours of the demonstration.

3.2 The Police Board, City Council, and local residents all have a legitimate need for accurate, timely, accessible information about situations, such as large demonstrations, with a potential impact on the public.

3.3 Wherever possible, it is advantageous to provide the public with advance warning of possible disruptions, detours or delays. It helps to manage expectations and provides residents and business operators with the opportunity to make alternate arrangements (as was the case with the major protest at the end of the incident).

3.4 Members of the Police Board cannot interfere – nor be seen to interfere – with operations of the Police Service. Consequently, direct requests for information from front-line operational personnel (e.g. incident commanders) are inappropriate.

4.0 Observations

Recommendations to improve coordinated OPS-City of Ottawa communication during major incidents (see Section 5.0) are based largely on the following observations:

4.1 It is often said that “hindsight is 20/20.” This report, and the interviews it is built upon, all benefit from that advantageous perspective. To be fair, no one could have predicted a two-week protest involving thousands of demonstrators and costing nearly $1 million.

From a communications perspective, it is reasonable to conclude that there were more things done right than done wrong over the course of the 15-day demonstration.

4.2 The Ottawa Police Service and the City’s Communications and Customer Service department should be commended for the significant effort made to keep both external and internal audiences informed. In many ways, OPS and the City’s communication efforts “went the extra mile” by preparing numerous information updates, utilizing a variety of communications channels including the media and the City’s 3-1-1 Contact Centre, customizing responses to dozens of public complaints and compliments, and providing regular updates through the course of the long Easter weekend. After the first 48 hours, the information flow became far smoother and remained so for the duration of the demonstration.

4.3 It is, therefore, not the intention of this report to second guess the actions or decisions of those who guided the communications response to the Tamil protest. Rather, it is to identify areas where improvements can be made that strengthen the role of communication in supporting the operations of the Ottawa Police Service, as well as City traffic management, public works and communications, and that help to ensure public access to timely, accurate information about major incidents in the city.

4.4 OPS acted quickly to issue its first public advisory approximately 10 minutes after Wellington Street was closed on Day 1 of the protest. Four additional updates were issued that day at 4:15 p.m., 6:15 p.m., 9:30 p.m., and 11:10 p.m.

This review of the Tamil protest did not include a detailed analysis of the public complaints submitted to OPS or the City via email or by telephone. In the case of public complaints to the police service, it is evident that the majority centred on the police response to the demonstration rather than confusion or misunderstanding about the closure of Wellington Street and the subsequent traffic disruptions. Residents questioned why police were not taking more decisive action to shut down what some considered an illegal activity.

4.5 Day-to-day interaction between OPS Corporate Communications and counterparts with the City of Ottawa and OC Transpo is largely ad hoc. In a situation requiring a crisis communications response, such as the Tamil demonstrations, participation in Operation INTERSECT ensures a far more structured approach, with defined roles and protocols. After being initiated on Day 2, Operation INTERSECT was highly effective in ensuring consistent, coordinated communication amongst the various partner agencies for the remainder of the protest.

4.6 Police personnel were the most prominent spokespeople throughout the incident; however, it wasn’t until Day 3 that OPS provided a senior officer to speak to local media en masse to explain in greater detail the rationale for the operational approach. Chief White was quoted in the Ottawa Sun on May 14^th saying, “I probably would have five hours into this been in front of the press ...”

4.7 Several OPS interviewees noted that the volume of email enquiries from the public added substantially to the workload of staff who were already fully engaged.

5.0 Recommendations

5.1 OPS Corporate Communications should meet with the Board’s Executive Director and senior counterparts in Public Affairs at the City of Ottawa to formalize processes and protocols governing both day-to-day operations and crisis situations. The goals should be to regularize information exchange while leveraging and integrating respective communications tools and activities to improve the timeliness and accessibility of information for the public, employees, elected officials, and partner agencies.

5.2 Communication between OPS and the Police Services Board must also be formalized. There needs to be a consistent, sustainable, and mutually-acceptable approach that will be effective in all major event situations, whether the Chief is available or not. It is recommended that the OPS Director, Community Development and Corporate Communications, meet with the Board’s Executive Director to initiate those discussions and identify desired outcomes.

5.3 Recognizing the importance of providing the Board Chair (or his designate) with timely police updates, it is recommended that the Police Chief (or his designate) continue with the practice of providing verbal updates (telephone or face-to-face) where developments could have a public impact. The simplicity, directness and two-way nature of this approach will ensure the information exchange is timely, appropriate and accurate.

For non-urgent matters, communication should be governed by processes and protocols defined by the OPS Director, Community Development and Corporate Communications, and the Board’s Executive Director (see 5.2 above).

5.4 In a major incident, once the Chair has been updated, the next priority should be to advise the remainder of the Police Services Board, the Mayor, and the rest of City Council. They must be properly equipped to respond to enquiries from their constituents and the media.

Given that the Police Service is accountable to the Board, the most appropriate – and the most straightforward – communications channel would be email from a member of Executive Command (or a designate such as the Director, Community Development and Corporate Communications), to the Police Board’s Executive Director.

In the case of a major incident, the message content would originate from the Incident Commander and would be approved, as necessary, through the chain of command.

OPS Corporate Communications would initiate contact with their counterparts in the City’s Public Affairs Department and with other partner agencies to ensure accuracy and consistency.

Once received by the Board’s Executive Director, the email can then be forwarded firstly to members of the Board, followed by the Mayor, the rest of City Council, and all of their respective staff.

In an ideal world, the Board would receive one communication that includes updates from all the various players involved (e.g. police, transit, bylaw, surface operations, etc.). However, the reality is that it would be virtually impossible to craft, coordinate and approve such a product quickly enough to ensure it’s timeliness and relevance.

These updates would also be posted prominently to the OPS website, the City of Ottawa internet and intranet, and provided to the City’s 3-1-1 Contact Centre. Updates from other participating agencies (e.g. RCMP, OPP, STO) and City services (e.g. OC Transpo, traffic, bylaw, parking) would also be posted or linked to www.ottawa.ca to ensure consistent public access to the full range of relevant information.

Ultimately, residents should be able to visit the Ottawa.ca website during a major incident to find the latest information on police activities, road closures, detours, delays, parking restrictions, etc. Once realized, all agencies involved in the incident would simply encourage the public to visit the City’s website as the “one-stop shop” for all relevant information, to subscribe to the City’s RSS feeds, and/or to call the 3-1-1 Contact Centre.

5.5 OPS should distribute updates on police-related matters via email to local media as “Advisories.” Timely updates on other components of the operation would be issued to media from the City’s Public Affairs Department, OC Transpo, etc.

5.6 All public updates should be provided to the OPS Comms Centre and the 3-1-1 Contact Centre to assist operators in responding to public enquiries. (In the first few days of the Tamil protest, OPS alone received about 100 such calls).

5.7 In addition to posting police-related advisories to the Media Centre on the OPS website, they should also be posted to a prominent new “Public Alerts” section on the OPS Home Page, with a link to the relevant page on the Ottawa.ca website.

5.8 Communicating through mainstream media (radio, television, newspapers) does not fully meet the public’s increasing expectations for timely, accurate information, although the new Information Radio stations (99.7 FM in English; 101.9 FM in French) may eventually serve as a reliable source for real-time updates.

OPS and the City of Ottawa should explore the use of popular social media, such as Twitter, to distribute quick updates directly to the public. Ideally, Twitter subscriptions should be customizable by Ward or neighbourhood to ensure that subscribers receive only the most relevant information. Twitter feeds would provide short, timely updates on traffic congestion, detours, major criminal activity, etc. Ultimately, Twitter could be used by the full range of emergency service agencies to advise of major fires, health alerts, flooding, power outages, severe weather, etc.

5.9 OPS should develop protocol to guide decision-making around the use of senior operational officers as spokespeople during major events or incidents. Anecdotally, it would appear that Insp. Bernard’s media availability at 4:00 p.m. on Day 3 was effective in raising the profile of OPS messaging and demonstrating the Service’s commitment to the safety and security of demonstrators and city residents. Given that media enquiries more than doubled from Day 1 to Day 2 (from 15 to 32), there would have been merit in staging the media availability on the second day, rather than the third.

Other players (e.g. City’s Public Works Department, OC Transpo, Fire Department, etc.) should have their own spokespeople ready to address questions and issues that are specific to their organizations, using messages that are consistent with other participating agencies.

5.10 As noted in the OPS report submitted on 19 May 2009 (RESPONSE TO OUTSTANDING INQUIRY #I-09-01: REVIEW OF OPS COMMUNICATIONS PLAN), OPS must develop a standard approach to email enquiries from the public that are related to a specific operation such as the Tamil demonstrations.

5.11 Finally, it is recommended that the “Major Events Public Affairs Team,” to be introduced to the Board in September, be given responsibility for the implementation of the recommendations in this report. The Ottawa Police Service is strongly encouraged to engage communications colleagues from the City of Ottawa in those discussions, along with senior members of the local media corps who are likely to welcome the opportunity to provide advice on the most effective ways to deliver reliable information to the public.

Members of the Communications and Media Group of Operation INTERSECT should also be given the opportunity to contribute to the implementation phase.

6.0 Appendices

6.1 Biographical Notes

Derek Johnston

President

Face Value Communications Inc.

Derek Johnston has enjoyed an exciting array of assignments and opportunities over 25 years in communications. A graduate of Ryerson Polytechnical University (Bachelor of Applied Arts in Radio and Television), he spent the first five years as a broadcast journalist, working for a national radio network in Toronto and Ottawa.

In 1991, Derek made the move to government communications as a national spokesperson on the new Goods and Services Tax, eventually moving into a communications advisor role with Canada Customs, offering strategic analysis and advice on a wide variety of program initiatives and controversial issues.

Derek accepted a position with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police in 1994 as the senior advisor to the Director of Public Affairs. Over the next five years, he would assume roles of increasing responsibility, eventually becoming Manager of the National Communications Services Branch at National Headquarters.

Since 1999, Derek has been working as a consultant, specializing in strategic communications planning and advice, issues management, crisis communication, facilitation, executive learning, and writing services. Some of Face Value’s police and security clients include:

ž Canadian Police College

ž Justice Institute of B.C.

ž Ottawa Police Service

ž Department of Public Safety

ž RCMP

ž National DNA Data Bank

ž Calgary Police Service

ž Canadian Air Transport Security Authority (CATSA)

ž Canadian Police Sector Council

ž Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police

ž Military Police Complaints Commission

Derek is bilingual and lives in the Ottawa area with his wife and three children.

6.2 Interviewees

The following individuals were interviewed for this report.

Name	Organization	Title
Eli El-Chantiry	Ottawa Police Board	Chair & City Councillor
Lisa McGee	Office of Councillor El-Chantiry	Advisor
Vern White	OPS	Chief
Gilles Larochelle	OPS	Deputy Chief Patrol Operations
Sue O’Sullivan	OPS	Deputy Chief Operations Support
Charles Bordeleau	OPS	Superintendent Emergency Operations
David Pepper	OPS	Director Community Development and Corporate Communications
Mark Ford	OPS	Inspector, EOD Incident Commander
John Medeiros	OPS	Staff Sergeant Community Development
Steve Bell	OPS	Sergeant Police Liaison Team
Carole Lavigne	OPS	Manager Media Relations
Margaret MacDonald	OPS	Manager Corporate Communications
Anat Cohn	OPS	Communications Specialist Corporate Communications
Denis Abbott	City of Ottawa	Director Communications and Customer Service