On Jan. 6, 2015, Taryn Joy Marchi stepped through a snowbank next to a newly plowed parking spot in downtown Nelson and into a classic Canadian conundrum.
The ensuing drop injured Marchi’s leg badly enough to warrant $1 million in alleged damages.
The city claimed it had followed its snow removal policies, but could she sue them for a job poorly done?
Nine years later, the result of that question — a legal battle which made it all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada — continues to reverberate through the courts as well as the public works departments of cities across the country.
Especially on snowy days.
The question of a municipality’s ‘core policies’
In a nutshell, Marchi’s case dug into the question of a municipality’s “core policies” — decisions shielded from private negligence claims so the courts don’t create a “chilling effect” by subjecting all government decisions to legal liability.
On the day of Marchi’s injury, city crews removed snow from roads …