After Patrick Brown & Rowena Santos targeted local volunteer group, Brampton moves to evict Friends of Historic Bovaird House 

In an alarming move following the lead of Mayor Patrick Brown and Councillor Rowena Santos, the City of Brampton has ordered the Friends of Historic Bovaird House, which for decades has curated the agricultural museum, to vacate the property by Friday, February 28.

Despite a comprehensive KPMG review into baseless allegations by Brown and Santos of mismanagement by the group which not only cleared FHBH but lauded the organization for its work and the significant amount of money its volunteer efforts save local taxpayers, the two politicians pushed to end City Hall’s relationship with the organization.  

The decision has sparked widespread outrage and has been described as a political vendetta carried out by Brown and his close council ally Santos because of the role of former councillor Jeff Bowman, who had close ties to FHBH and cast votes to hold Brown and Santos accountable for alleged wrongdoing during their previous term of office. 

Earlier this week, for the second time recently, FHBH board member Gloria Berger delegated council to get answers about a new agreement with the City to operate the historic site. Council members received her presentation but did not address any of Berger’s requests for clarity around the tense process to reach a new agreement to operate the historic site.

The historic Bovaird House, a symbol of Brampton’s rich heritage, is now at the center of a contentious eviction battle as the City moves to remove the volunteer group that has preserved it for decades.

(Friends of Historic Bovaird House)

For more than a year the organization has been functioning without a formal contract to operate as a cultural organization that manages the agricultural museum in the city. Failed negotiations unfolded after the City tried to impose restrictive conditions two years ago when Brown and Santos made the unfounded allegations of mismanagement against the group.

Berger and the rest of FHBH were stunned when a letter was received last month.

It was dated January 21, 2025, from Steven D.S. Ross, Deputy City Solicitor, addressed to FHBH representative Adriel N. Clayton: “Pursuant to Council direction staff must now make arrangements for your client to wind down its operations and for the City to assume possession of the premises at 563 Bovaird East in a manner that is mutually convenient for the City and your client,” the letter detailed.

“We are hereby requesting Friends of Historic Bovaird House vacate the premises no later than February 28, 2025, and to contact City staff to make any necessary arrangements for the return of all artifacts and other personal property on loan, inspecting the premises, receiving keys, settling of any accounts, and reimbursements etc. prior to that date.”

"We were actually shocked," Berger told The Pointer, "because we had been led to believe that after a meeting on December 12th, which included our lawyer and a lawyer from the City, there was a possibility of looking at things, and we were very close to a final agreement. That's what really shocked us.” 

Berger said the contract presented by the City included clauses that were unusual which had never been requested before, and that signing the agreement could have put the group in legal and financial risk. It was a departure, she said, from the terms that had tentatively been negotiated.

“All of a sudden, here's the agreement we signed off on, and they come back with something else, and they put more things in it.” She said the City suddenly told the group there would be no further negotiation. “There can be no changes. You either sign it or you're out."

One of the conditions was the placement of a council member on the FHBH board, which Bowman said was unusual. 

"How many other volunteer organizations that get grants from the city are they demanding a board seat on? Carabram? Regeneration? Boys and Girls Club of Peel? Volunteer MBC?" Bowman questioned in an email.

Bowman, members of the group and residents who have long supported FHBH have told The Pointer the efforts Brown and Santos have gove to for years to undermine the organization, are motivated by votes Bowman took last term of council to investigate disturbing allegations of wrongdoing against both of them – in 2022, Brown and Santos took advantage of councillor schedules and when they had just enough votes the mayor called a surprise meeting on a Friday afternoon at the end of August to cancel a half dozen investigations launched by a majority group of councillors led by Bowman.

When he was no longer on council after Bowman decided not to seek re-election in 2022, Brown began making wildly misleading claims.

“[A]n egregious, flagrant conflict of interest for a councillor, who's no longer at this table; they embarrassed the City of Brampton,” the mayor said in 2023, referring to Bowman previously taking votes in support of FHBH. 

Brown blatantly lied about Bowman’s actions. When he made the comment, the City already had the KPMG report which showed there was no conflict of interest and no issues with the way FHBH had managed the operation of the site.

“When the Mayor stated that a councillor had ‘an [egregious] and flagrant conflict of interest’ that was patently untrue in my case,” Bowman told The Pointer previously, following the release of the KPMG report that showed Brown made false accusations against the former councillor. 

Around the time in 2022 when Bowman and a majority of councillors began to demand accountability inside City Hall following dozens of alarming allegations against Brown of shady contracts, wrongful use of resources and staff, improper procurements and many other disturbing accusations (many supported by evidence), Brown and Santos began making unsubstantiated accusations against Bowman related to his support of Historic Bovaird House, a City-owned attraction that allows visitors to see what early farming traditions in the area looked like. 

KPMG eventually concluded that there were no irregularities and no violation of City rules or policies in the funding and management of Bovaird House. And it found no conflict of interest.

Brown started attacking Bowman and FHBH almost immediately after the former councillor helped lead the process to investigate Brown and Santos for procurement and hiring irregularities and their own alleged conflict in the handing of lucrative City contracts to their friends. 

After the KPMG report came out in 2023 Bowman told The Pointer Brown’s accusations against him were “totally inaccurate,” and said he considered them to be inflammatory. “I felt they were meant to cast aspersions as to my credibility.”

The KPMG report was in the City’s possession weeks before Brown made his false remarks on November 15, 2023, and stated the firm had “not found any evidence” that Bowman had benefited in any way from his advocacy of FHBH, and had not been in a conflict.

Brown repeatedly used his position as mayor to make public claims denigrating Bowman and volunteers at Bovaird House and claimed “national media” attention on the issue was an embarrassment to the City. The Pointer could not find any “national media” coverage of the issue, while local coverage was driven by Brown himself. 

Historic Bovaird House was given to the City in 1985 and offers a space for the Brampton community to learn about the area’s post-colonial farming history, showcasing pioneer-era agricultural equipment and the lifestyle of those who settled here in the 1800s through the mid-1900s, hosting public events to bring this bygone culture to life. It is designated as a cultural heritage resource under the Ontario Heritage Act, meaning its conservation is protected legislatively. 

After Bowman began his work to investigate the widespread allegations of wrongdoing inside City Hall under Brown’s leadership, council members aligned with the mayor suddenly began questioning the City’s funding of the site. 

His false remarks about Bowman, weeks after the KPMG report cleared him, followed a history of Brown lying publicly.

He made false remarks in the media about the reason why Guelph-Humber pulled out of a planned post-secondary expansion in the city. 

He lied about COVID-19 testing numbers in the city during the pandemic. 

He falsely claimed former CAO David Barrick was not implicated in the Ontario Ombudsman’s Niagara “Inside Job” investigation.

As PC leader, the province’s integrity commissioner found Brown tried to purposely mislead him about personal financial details.  

Table setup for Mother’s Day function at Historic Bovaird House in 2018.

(Historic Bovaird House)
 

Bowman previously said the KPMG report “really contained no new information that previous councils were not aware of.” He said that as a designated cultural heritage property, the City “has to maintain the property and the buildings, and these costs should in no way be associated [with] the volunteers that run the site.” Bowman was a former council member for Wards 3 and 4 and acted as a liaison for FHBH.   

KPMG found all of FHBH’s finances have been in order and all of its records matched the City’s, regarding budget items and the overall management of funds.

While Brown has made false accusations that appear to be politically motivated, he has defended the complete lack of oversight and total breakdown of accountability under his leadership at City Hall. He repeatedly lied on iHeartRadio’s Jerry Agar Show where he insisted a Deloitte investigation found no wrongdoing involving the City’s failed Brampton University project. The Deloitte report, released in September 2021, did not even look into the matter, which involved more than $630,000 of contracts given to friends of Brown and Santos, including for work that was never done. Councillors did not know about the connections and three times what was approved for one of the contracts was eventually paid out to Brown’s friend (he later cancelled a separate investigation into Brampton University).

What Brown failed to mention on the show was that Deloitte found shocking conduct under Brown’s watch, including the hiring of directors who were supposed to be engineers, to oversee critical infrastructure, that had no such experience (one did not even have a university degree).  

Brown told Agar another lie, that the City’s Integrity Commissioner looked into the allegations and found no wrongdoing. However, as The Pointer reported, when Brown cancelled the university investigation, he also called for the City’s integrity commissioner (IC) to review the allegations but was told that the IC does not have the jurisdiction to carry out such an investigation. Brown made yet another lie on the show, claiming an internal audit probe looked into the university allegations, revealing no wrongdoing, when in fact the City’s internal audit department never did any such investigation of the Brampton University file.

Froese Forensic, the external firm hired by a majority of councillors last term to do the external investigation, did, however, find widespread wrongdoing, before Brown cancelled that investigation. 

Brown lied again, claiming publicly that Ontario’s Ombudsman had cleared him and the City of wrongdoing when the mayor had enough votes to cancel the half-dozen investigations ordered by a majority group of councillors in 2022. In fact, the Ombudsman wrote a letter criticizing Brown’s decision to cancel the investigations and advised council to reopen them. Brown ignored the direction then lied about what the Ombudsman had directed.

A KPMG investigation found no irregularities and no violation of City rules or policies in the funding and management of Bovaird House, contradicting false claims by Mayor Patrick Brown.

(The Pointer Files)
 

Brown publicly maligned Bovaird House volunteers in 2023, falsely accusing them of mismanagement, which the KPMG report proved false.

“We did not find information suggesting City Staff, City Councillors, BHB (Brampton Heritage Board) members or FHBH (Friends of Historic Bovaird House) members failed to comply with the relevant (City) policies,” KPMG concluded.

Now, it appears the Friends of Historic Bovaird House which has been managing the agricultural museum for more than three decades, preserving the site’s heritage from the 19th century and running community-driven educational programs for students and others, will be locked out tomorrow, after Brown’s three-year crusade to hit back at a former councillor who tried to hold the mayor accountable.

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