A Grand Bend resident, who served as reeve and village councillor in the 1970s and 80s, believes Lambton Shores residents are losing their freedom of speech.
Last week, the municipal council approved policies on the handling of inquiries and complaints.
"In my opinion, it was a case of censoring anybody that staff doesn't want their message getting through," says Bob Sharen. "The clerk now has the power to say certain letters will not go through to council and that's only supervised by the CAO [Chief Administrative Officer]."
He says neither were elected to office and a protocol for appeals has not been put into place.
"The last time I checked, the Charter of Rights gave me the right to public speech," he says. "This takes that away. It's also contrary to the municipal act, which says there shall be transparency and openness in the operations of council."
A new "Unreasonable Customer Behaviour Policy" was also approved, which has the ability to place numerous restrictions on repeat offenders.
Individuals may be refused access to any municipal buildings -- unless they have an appointment -- or have their use of services in the municipality limited or regulated.
"That means that parents and grandparents might be banned from seeing their children and grandchildren playing hockey, or ringette, or some of those things... because council meetings are held in one of the arenas," says Sharen.
Each case will be considered on an individual basis and the decision to classify a customer's behaviour as unreasonable will be made by a department head in consultation with the CAO.