Mission City councilor Ken Herar, a community-minded principled and humble politician who is well liked for years of community and volunteerism, was finally vindicated by the courts after judge quashed and set aside in its entirety a completely unwarranted censure brought against Herar by Mayor Paul Horn. In a recent judgment, Justice Caldwell said Herar was denied “procedural fairness and natural justice” and is entitled to costs for bringing the petition before court. DESIBUZZCanada did an exclusive story on the case last year to highlight the wrongs done to Herar in a simple matter that could have been done dealt with behind closed doors instead Mayor Horn and some members of the council decided to ruthlessly target Herar in an attempt to ruin his longstanding reputation as a man who has always put community first. Speaking with DESIBUZZCanada, Herar remained humble but was happy that his ordeal was finally behind him as he and his family had suffered greatly by this unnecessary targeting of him for something that was so small but was made into so big with City wasting taxpayer money on an investigator and then ramming through the censure for no reason at all. “There’s no winners or losers here the end result is the public simply lose confidence in local government, unfortunately,” Herar told DESIBUZZCanada. “There also needs to be tighter oversight how Code of Conducts are handled and mandated by municipalities from the province to avoid scenarios like this, which seems like a growing trend within many municipalities. At the end, I will continue fighting the good fight on issues that matter to residents. That will remain my focus for the entirety of this term.”

https://desibuzzcanada.com/post/is-the-campaign-against-mission-councilor-ken-herar-a-political-hit-job-to-smear-his-reputation

By R. Paul Dhillon – Editor DESIBUZZCanada

A judge has ordered the censure of Coun. Ken Herar “quashed and set aside in its entirety” following a petition against the City of Mission. Submitted Photo

MISSION – Mission City councilor Ken Herar, a community-minded principled and humble politician who is well liked for years of community and volunteerism, was finally vindicated by the courts after judge quashed and set aside in its entirety a completely unwarranted censure brought against Herar by Mayor Paul Horn.

In a recent judgment, Justice Caldwell said Herar was denied “procedural fairness and natural justice” and is entitled to costs for bringing the petition before court. 

DESIBUZZCanada did an exclusive story on the case last year to highlight the wrongs done to Herar in a simple matter that could have been done dealt with behind closed doors instead Mayor Horn and some members of the council decided to ruthlessly target Herar in an attempt to ruin his longstanding reputation as a man who has always put community first.

https://desibuzzcanada.com/post/is-the-campaign-against-mission-councilor-ken-herar-a-political-hit-job-to-smear-his-reputation

Speaking with DESIBUZZCanada, Herar remained humble but was happy that his ordeal was finally behind him as he and his family had suffered greatly by this unnecessary targeting of him for something that was so small but was made into so big with City wasting taxpayer money on an investigator and then ramming through the censure for no reason at all.

“There’s no winners or losers here the end result is the public simply lose confidence in local government, unfortunately,” Herar told DESIBUZZCanada. “There also needs to be tighter oversight how Code of Conducts are handled and mandated by municipalities from the province to avoid scenarios like this, which seems like a growing trend within many municipalities. At the end, I will continue fighting the good fight on issues that matter to residents. That will remain my focus for the entirety of this term.”

Herar told the Mission Record newspaper it hasn’t been easy on council over the past several years, and it’s taken a toll on his mental and physical health. 

“It’s been very hurtful to my wife and I because … we were never really given, we feel, a proper and fair opportunity to state our case and what we did. No matter what we said, we were still going to be smeared,” Herar said. 

The judge noted Mayor Horn’s participation in the complaint process among concerns of significance due to serving in his municipal role while also being the complainant. 

According to the judgment, Horn participated in a meeting to approve the appointment of a complaint investigator while “in possession of unique information, presumably unknown to some, if not all, other participants”.  

The judgment also stated that Horn signed a joint resolution on behalf of council to resolve the complaint, which was later unanimously rejected by council “for reasons that are unclear”. 

Other concerns of significance for the judge included the refusal of access to basic information and the “insulation” from scrutiny of the investigator’s notes and file material. 

“As late as the Nov. 1, 2023 meeting, council refused to provide the petitioner with access to the Complaint Investigator, her file, or the original complainants for purposes of cross-examination or challenge,” the judgment reads. 

A quick turnaround between the investigator’s report and a special council meeting in September 2023 that Herar’s lawyer couldn’t attend was also listed as a concern. 

“These factors lead me to the conclusion that the petitioner was clearly denied the procedural fairness and natural justice to which he was entitled given the nature of the investigation, the quasi-judicial nature of the process, and the significant consequences to which he was exposed and which came to be imposed on him,” the judgment reads. 

Caldwell’s decisions came after lawyers for Herar and the city made submissions during a four-day judicial review at Abbotsford Law Courts beginning on Feb. 3, 2025. 

Mission council censured Herar in November 2023 due to a breach of the city’s code of conduct, stemming from a complaint in April of that year. 

The code of conduct complaint that led to the censure was filed by Horn following a pair of incidents in March 2023, both of which amounted to nothing and could have been resolved behind closed doors reported Mission Record, . 

Many people that DESIBUZZCanada spoke to said that Mayor Horn needs to be censured and held accountable for this waste of taxpayer dollars spent on this whole disgraceful affair by the City which should never have happened.

With Files from Mission Record