Coun. Shila Sharps listens during a council meeting on April 8, 2024. (Eli J. Ridder/CHAT News)

By CHAT News Staff

Medicine Hat residents call on Sharps to resign, criticize ‘insensitive’ remarks

Apr 10, 2024 | 3:37 PM

Social media was flooded Wednesday with calls for Medicine Hat Coun. Shila Sharps to resign after remarks she made during an earlier council meeting and a subsequent apology some have labelled insincere.

READ: Sharps apologizes for end-of-council remarks after backlash

“I’m losing the will to live,” Sharps said as she argued against extending the end of a four-and-a-half hour council meeting Monday.

Some residents called her remark “insensitive”.

Sharps apologized Tuesday to those who she may have offended, but asks that everyone looks at the intention behind what someone says.

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“If anyone was offended, truly offended by anything I said, I will apologize to you because it is never my intention to hurt anyone like that,” Sharps told CHAT News.

“But also, I would like everyone to just calm down a little bit and look at people’s intentions,” she added.

“You can call me or text me, you don’t have to go to social media, you don’t have to internalize it, you can say it to me and I will listen to you.”

Hatters took to their keyboards on Wednesday to hail her apology as “disingenuous” and “narcissistic”.

“When has anyone ever calmed down when being told to calm down,” wrote a user in Medicine Hat’s popular “roast and toast” group.

Others argued Sharps didn’t say anything offensive.

READ:

“I can understand the comment being a bit offside considering where the meeting was but seriously folks come on,” another user wrote.

“She didn’t say anything offensive; people are addicted to being offended,” they added.

A petition was posted to Change.org Wednesday demanding Sharps resign due to disrespecting citizens.

The anonymous author wrote Sharps “made light of suicide”.

“Sharps’ comments are just the latest in a pattern of disrespect towards the citizens she is supposed to represent. Her actions are not only insensitive but also unworthy of her position as council member,” reads the petition.

Residents have given mixed reaction to the first-term councillor since she was elected to council, with some supportive of her transparency efforts and others more critical.

Sharps has recently been in the spotlight after it was revealed she was the one who filed a code of conduct complaint against Mayor Linnsie Clark following an exchange between the mayor and city manager during an August 2023 meeting.

That complaint led to an investigation that found evidence of misconduct by Clark. A group of seven councillors — not including Sharps as she had recused herself — voted to sanction Clark, taking away many of her mayoral powers and cutting her salary in half.

CHAT News has reached out to Sharps for comment.