As the councillor responsible for communications, I was  proud to present our new social media policy at the last public  meeting on May 13.

Thanks to our ever so valuable Director of Public Affairs and Communications Darryl Levine, his  team and members of council  who contributed to this final product. The city  launched its Facebook page on April 18, 2009. In the subsequent 10 years, we have added video channels, first at Vimeo then YouTube, Flickr, Twitter and then in November 2017, a Facebook group, which acts like a traditional discussion forum. The goal of the Idées CSL Ideas Facebook group (née Your CSL) was to give residents an exchange forum to provide feedback. We specifically included the word “ ideas”  in the name to help encourage users into the constructive conversations and comments.

Right now we gave just over 2,300 members for our Côte Saint-Luc page and over 2,100 for CSL Ideas.

 There are things we want to carry out in terms of social media such as sharing smart ideas members have come across, learning about ways we can improve our services and ensure people use their  real name in  their Facebook profile.

We also urge members not to use: offensive or violent language; hateful or discriminatory comments regarding race, ethnicity, religion, gender, disability, sexual orientation or political beliefs, attacks on specific groups or any comments meant to harass, threaten or abuse an individual.;  this space to advertise a business.  If someone persists in offensive behaviour or continually violates any of our house rules, we may block that person from further participation. 

As for the rules,   they have been adopted to make this forum better for  members. Administrators have the following options available when dealing with posts or comments that break the rules: delete the post or comment, ask the member to edit the post or comment to make it comply with the rules, closed commenting on the post, mute the member, eject the member, turn on post approval for a period of time to allow people to cool off.

Off-topic posts

Do not post about topics that don’t relate to something that the City of Côte Saint-Luc is responsible for doing or enforcing.

Municipal politics and campaigns

Do not discuss municipal politics, election campaigns or candidates, future or past.

Provincial or federal politics and campaigns

Do not discuss provincial or federal politics, campaigns, or candidates. You may discuss provincial or federal programs as long as they relate to an idea for the city (e.g., “The city should use money from such and such a provincial program to do such and such a project.”)

No insults

Do not direct personal insults at one another (e.g., "You are an idiot."). Do not name call. Do not make discussions unnecessarily personal. If somebody else insults you, report their post, do not mimic their behaviour.

No defamation

Do not post or comment something that defames physical person (eg, City staff, City Council members, other persons) or moral persons (ie, the City). Innuendo will not be tolerated either. The law of defamation protects a person’s reputation from harm that is unjustified. Section 300 of the Canadian Criminal Code states: “Every one who publishes a defamatory libel that he knows is false is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years.” Source: https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-46/page-65.html

Do not be unnecessarily antagonistic

 People are allowed to have different opinions than you.

No harassment

Do not purposely intimidate a member or harass them. This includes personal attacks on administrators or moderators.

No comments about named or identifiable employees of the city

Do not comment on a specific employee or groups of employees. If you have a concern or suggestion for improvement, you can contact the Human Resources Department privately at hr-rh@cotesaintluc.org.

Threats

Do not threaten or intimate a threat.

Obscenities

Do not post any messages that are obscene, vulgar, sexually-oriented, hateful, threatening, or otherwise violative of any laws.

Trolling

Do not post in order to anger other members or intentionally cause negative reactions.

Spam

Do not spam, which is a post or comment that is submitted repetitively, without any bearing on the discussion topic, or otherwise deliberately disrupting the forum.

Advertising/soliciting/self-promotion

Do not promote, advertise, or otherwise call attention to your product or business.

One-word posts and animated GIFs

Do not post one word posts or comments. Examples include posts with only one or two words (e.g., "cool", "LOL", or a smilie), posts saying "I agree", "+1", "this", "me too", or the equivalent, posting overused memes, or making posts with images (e.g., animated GIFs) or videos that contain no relevant, constructive text or commentary.

Real names

You must use your real name or otherwise be identifiable to the group administrator.

Profanity

Do not use bad words even with letters replaced by asterisks or spelled in other ways.

For the complete policy click here.