The December 13 Hypothetical That Wasn’t So Hypothetical
During the December 13, 2022 regular Council meeting’s Public Inquiries section, there were a couple inquiries about closed meetings. At one point, an unidentified voice — not clearly captured on microphone — asked for “a couple examples.”
Mayor Reid Hamer-Jackson hesitated. “I don’t know if we do that — do we do that?”
Chief Administrative Officer David Trawin answered directly. The Community Charter sets out the authority for closed meetings. Council does not invent the language; provincial statute provides it.
In other words, the procedural explanation was already complete. Nevertheless, an illustration followed.
Councillor Katie Neustaeter volunteered an example of when Council would need to meet in a closed meeting. She didn’t point to land acquisition. She didn’t reference litigation strategy. Nor did she cite routine labour relations.
Instead, she described a council member bullying staff, threatening their jobs, altering working conditions until they became untenable, and exposing the City to legal liability. In that scenario, she explained, Council would have to meet in a closed session to protect the corporation, the taxpayer, and each other.
You can review the video of the meeting here: https://kamloops.playfullscreen.com/?mediaid=502# – the relevant discussion is at the 1:21:00 mark.
Importantly, Neustaeter added that this was “a hypothetical, not a situation we’re in at the moment.” Entirely hypothetical. Yet remarkably specific.
The Weight of Context
However, context complicates that word — “hypothetical”.
Four days earlier, on December 9, 2022, Council delivered a confidential letter to the Mayor that referenced legal exposure arising from his conduct. Earlier that week, Council had already met in camera on December 6 and 8 to seek legal advice, while the letter to the Mayor advised he was not to share it with his lawyer.
The December 9 letter addressed risk directly. It didn’t speak in abstract terms; it identified legal exposure the City sought to manage. By contrast, the December 13 explanation framed bullying and legal liability as illustrative possibilities.
To be clear, council members must respect confidentiality. They cannot disclose in-camera matters publicly. Nevertheless, confidentiality does not determine which example to select when explaining the law.
The Community Charter offers multiple neutral illustrations: land transactions, solicitor-client privilege, labour negotiations, personal information. Any of those would have answered the request.
Instead, Neustaeter chose workplace intimidation and legal exposure — precisely the structural framework Council had already discussed internally. The example was hypothetical. The alignment was not.
The Letter’s Release
Meanwhile, the December 9 letter didn’t remain confidential.
According to the City’s website, Council authorized its release on July 29, 2025, following repeated requests from Mayor Hamer-Jackson. Soon afterward, on August 22, 2025, counsel introduced the letter during cross-examination in the Mayor’s defamation proceedings against Councillor Neustaeter. The court marked it as an exhibit to establish that concerns about the Mayor’s conduct had surfaced as early as December 2022.
The document moved through stages. Initially, Council treated it as confidential correspondence. Later, Council authorized public release. Ultimately, litigants relied on it as courtroom evidence.
Before the Headlines
Subsequent reporting deepened the picture. Workplace complaints reportedly dated back to November 2022. In June 2023, Radio NL reported that the Mayor faced investigation for alleged workplace bullying and harassment. Investigators first contacted him about that process on February 23, 2023.
Then, on March 17, 2023, Council publicly described the Mayor’s behaviour as chaotic and disruptive while again invoking legal counsel and governance risk.
Consequently, the language introduced in December — bullying, staff impact, legal exposure, institutional protection — became part of Kamloops’ political vocabulary.
No rule prevented Neustaeter from offering her example. Furthermore, nothing in the record shows she disclosed confidential information. Even so, she did not have to choose that illustration.
Provincial statute offered several neutral options. The question itself imposed no requirement. In the end, the Neustaeter decided which example to use.
Framing Before Confirmation
Municipal politics rarely shifts through dramatic declarations. Instead, it advances through framing. Officials introduce language before they confirm allegations. They normalize concepts before events crystallize.
On December 13, 2022, Neustaeter told the public that if a councillor bullied staff and created legal exposure, a closed meeting would protect the City. Shortly afterwards, bullying and legal exposure no longer occupied the realm of illustration.
The Community Charter did not require that example. Neustaeter selected it. Sometimes the example tells the story before the story becomes official.
Editor’s Disclosure: Kamloops Critic has previously reported on litigation and governance disputes involving Councillor Katie Neustaeter and Mayor Reid Hamer-Jackson, including the December 9, 2022 letter and subsequent defamation proceedings. This article relies on publicly available meeting videos, court records, and documents released by the City of Kamloops. It does not allege misconduct or breach of confidentiality by any party, but examines documented timeline and rhetorical framing.
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