Mike Babinsky

Mike Babinsky is a school trustee and conservative political activist in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.

Early life and career

Babinsky resides in north-end Winnipeg. He is a real-estate agent in private life, and also started the Winnipeg Sponge Puck Hockey League with his wife in 1982 ("WFP", 16 January 2002). He first came to public attention in 1995, when he helped organize a letter-writing campaign in support of right-wing initiatives on crime issues. The campaign endorsed public caning, boot camps in the Canadian north, and reforms to the Young Offenders Act. A newspaper report described him as a thirty-three years old ("Winnipeg Free Press", 30 September 1995).

chool trustee

First term (1995-1998)

Babinsky was elected to the Winnipeg School Board in the 1995 Winnipeg municipal election, winning one of three seats in the city's third ward.

There was subsequently a legal challenge concerning to the validity of Babinsky's election, after a defeated candidate argued that he should have been disqualified for not officially residing in the city at the time of the vote. Records made public from the 1995 provincial election showed that Babinsky registered at a polling station in Springfield, a constituency located immediately to the east of Winnipeg's city limits. Babinsky acknowledged voting in Springfield, but argued that his real address was in Winnipeg. He claimed he "screwed up" with his voting registration, and added that his provincial vote probably shouldn't have counted ("WFP", 14 June 1996). No effort was made to remove him from office, as more than six months had elapsed since the election.

Babinsky has often argued that the Winnipeg School Board spends too much money, and is responsible for unnecessarily high levels of civic taxation. He has sometimes recommended or encouraged dramatic cutbacks. He presented a report to the board in August 1997 about a recent visit to Ukraine, arguing that teachers in that country "work without pay, make their own books and toys at night, and personally clean their school buildings" if funding runs out. He suggested that Canadian teachers and trustees consider their example in times of financial adversity, although he added that he did not expect the model to be taken up in the near future. Board chair Anita Neville said that there was "absolute silence" on Babinsky's report from other trustees, while Manitoba Teachers Society president Diane Beresford argued that it would return Canadian teachers to 1930s conditions ("WPF", 18 August 1997).

Later in 1997, Babinsky polled his constituents on a series of forty questions, including "Should welfare recipients serve as unpaid school crossing guards?", "Is it fair for some teachers to earn more than $50,000 a year? If not, how much should they get?", "Should The Lord's Prayer be recited in public schools?" and "Should special needs students be in their own special classrooms?" Babinsky claimed that he was surveying his ward's "silent majority" ("WFP", 14 September 1997). Neville described the questions as "leading, offensive and simplistic", and one constituent wrote that it was "designed to solicit pre-determined responses" ("WFP", 6 October 1997). Babinsky sent the survey to 29,000 homes, received 1,175 responses, and presented his findings in July 1998 ("WFP", 27 June 1998).

During the School Board's 1998 budget negotiations, Babinsky brought forward a resolution to remove increased spending for "the school nutrition program, mediation services, special education, and professional development". It was defeated by a vote of 8 to 1 ("WFP", 11 March 1998). Later in the year, he spent four weeks in the Philippines to explore that country's school system ("WFP", 5 May 1998).

econd term (1998-2002)

Babinsky was re-elected to the school board in 1998.

In April 1999, he and Betty Granger were the only two trustees to vote against provisions for anti-homophobia education in the city. He argued that schools should not teach children about "alternative lifestyles", and was quoted as saying, "What's next? A special committee against calling people fat, calling people skinny, calling people geeks?" ("WFP", 7 April 1999). After the vote, he sent another poll to his constituents with the question, "Do you believe anti-homophobia education needs to be established in the Winnipeg School Division?".

Babinsky claimed that he decided to commission his poll after discovering that an official polling company had surveyed 500 people, and found that 75% supported anti-homophobia education. His response to the official poll was, "Wow. I wonder who they polled - the gay community?" ("WFP", 15 May 1999). He later released the results of his own survey, which suggested 85% opposition to the measure ("WFP", 11 September 1999).

1999 provincial election

Babinsky was not a member of any political party before early 1999, when was nominated to run for the Liberals in the 1999 provincial election. He later developed reservations about the Liberal Party, and conducted another poll to ask his constituents for which party he should campaign; the results were 47% Liberals, 35% Progressive Conservatives, 13% New Democratic Party, and 5% any party. Babinsky said that he made his final decision to run as a Liberal after visiting his mother's grave and making the serendipitous observation that she had been born in 1922, which he suggested was the last time the Liberals formed government in Manitoba ("National Post", 10 September 1999).ref|notquite

Babinsky presented himself during the campaign as "someone with a big mouth" who would work for constituency issues ("WFP", 24 August 1999). He also said that he would try to reduce the number of school trustees in Winnipeg by as much as two-thirds, arguing that the city was spending too much on the board ("WFP", 2 September 1999).

Babinsky's decision to campaign for the Liberal Party was somewhat controversial. The party as a whole supported the Winnipeg School Board's plan for anti-homophobia legislation, and did not endorse Babinsky's plan to reduce the number of trustees. Rival trustee Mario Santos expressed surprise that the Liberals would accept him as a candidate ("WFP", 15 May 1999).

During the election, Babinsky's house was vandalized with stickers reading "homophobe". An unknown organization called "SNOUT", which described itself as a "queer militia group", took credit for the incident. Babinsky later said of the matter, "What [the other trustees] wanted to do was teach kindergarten kids that having a dad and a dad is OK. As soon as my hand went up opposing the teaching of anti-homophobia, I was the devil" ("WFP", 11 September 1999).

He received 1,849 votes (23.82%), finishing a distant second against NDP incumbent Doug Martindale.

After the election, Babinsky was censured by the Winnipeg School Board for having issued a press release that "in effect named a child that had been abused sexually" (the release named the child's sibling, and noted that another member of the family had been abused). His intent in issuing the press release was to argue that the school in question was not adequately protecting children, but Anita Neville argued that Babinsky had "compromised the safety of children in the community and abused the power of his office". Mario Santos said, "Babinsky has gone over the line on a few occasions. But this time he really got low." ("WFP", 23 September 1999). Babinsky was not present for the meeting, and unsuccessfully attempted to have the Board revisit the issue two weeks later ("WFP", 7 October 1999).

In 2000, Babinsky was the only member of the Winnipeg School Board to defend fellow trustee Betty Granger after she made controversial comments about an "Asian invasion" of Canada's university. He argued that her remarks were "a slip of the tongue", and that the press should move on to other matters ("WFP", 5 December 2000).

Babinsky argued in early 2001 that the province should declare playground structures as "essential equipment", thereby making them eligible for capital funding. The "Winnipeg Free Press" noted that Babinsky received "rare support from his fellow school board members" on this issue ("WFP", 27 February 2001).

Third term (2002-2006)

Babinsky was re-elected in 2002 with more votes than any other trustee ("WFP", 24 October 2002).

In early 2003, he argued that Winnipeg schools should return to a policy of describing their winter concerts as "Christmas concerts". He was quoted as saying, "I think the majority rules. Changing it for a small minority of people isn't right. There should be no reason why the community can't express their roots." Another trustee noted that there were no formal prohibitions against the word "Christmas", and that schools were allowed to determine their own wording ("WFP", 14 January 2003).

He was the victim of online identity fraud in March 2003, when individual using the e-mail address "[e-mail]" posted a series of crude and disparaging remarks against Jews and gays to an online forum while pretending that he was Babinsky ("WFP", 10 March 2003). The address does not correspond to the Winnipeg School Board's real e-mail format. Babinsky forwarded the matter to the police and the Manitoba Human Rights Commission; newspaper reports do not indicate if charges were ever filed.

Babinsky later called for the city to abolish portable classrooms, and replace them with additions to existing school buildings ("WFP", 23 September 2003). In late 2004, he supported the creation of parking spaces for parents to drop off their children at schools ("WFP", 22 December 2004). He also supported a 2005 motion to completely ban smoking at local public schools, which failed by one vote ("WFP", 30 August 2005).

Notes and sources

# The Liberal Party did not actually form government in 1922; it actually lost power to the Progressives in that year. The Liberals and Progressives merged in 1932, however, and the 1922 victory was retroactively written into the Liberal Party's history. The Liberal-Progressive alliance governed until 1958.