To whom much has been given…
For Martin Franssen, the meaning of service was learned long before it ever became a career. Born in Port Perry and raised in Oshawa, Franssen grew up watching his parents quietly anchor their community. His mother, Ruth Marie Snowden, trained as a nurse at Oshawa General Hospital.
His father, Martin Joseph “Joe” Franssen, arrived in Port Perry from the Netherlands at age 16 and went on to pioneer vital local initiatives, including Oshawa Handi Transit, a Meals on Wheels program for Oshawa, youth correctional facilities in Oshawa, and Cheshire Homes, a residence providing supportive and 24-hour attendant care for physically disabled or brain-injured adults. Martin’s parents engaged him in every activity and initiative early on.
That early example went on to shape Martin’s own life across the Canadian Armed Forces, municipal policing, international NATO missions, higher education, and grassroots community leadership.
Yet the most compelling narrative isn’t simply the roster of what Martin has done. It is what those accumulated experiences have taught him about human responsibility. Sitting down with Martin, Mogaji Tunde explores how decades on the front lines of service translate into a vision for local leadership, duty, and community legacy today.
Q: Growing up with parents so deeply embedded in public welfare sets a high bar. When you look at Oshawa today versus the city your parents served, what’s a specific standard or moral line they held that you feel modern public leaders are dropping the ball on?
Martin: My parents operated on a principle of quiet, unadvertised accountability. When my father started Oshawa Handi Transit or created the Oshawa Meals on Wheels program, he didn’t wait for a committee mandate or a photo opportunity. My father was never one to seek recognition. He was the genesis of many community projects in Oshawa, yet he was rarely identified as such and even less often acknowledged for his work and successes. That never deterred my father nor my mother from continuing to serve and support their community.
Where modern public leadership often drops the ball is in substituting optics and endless procedural consultation for immediate, tangible responsibility. We’ve traded personal accountability for bureaucratized delays. My parents believed that if you identify a gap in your own backyard, you own the responsibility to fix it. The question isn’t ‘What is the problem?’ (that’s the easy part); but “What are ‘you’ going to do to fix it?” Waiting for others is not always the solution if you have the means to assist with the solution.
This principle is something I have practised throughout my life: in the military, policing, civilian employment positions I have held, and charitable positions I have held and continue to hold)
Q: You’ve moved between military hierarchy, frontline policing, higher education, and international diplomacy. Those cultures operate on very different rules. What was the single hardest friction point or cultural adjustment for you when transitioning between those worlds?
Martin: The hardest shift was moving from the absolute clarity of a rigid (military and paramilitary) command structure to the decentralized, nuanced reality of higher education and community advocacy.
In the military or law enforcement, order and intent are clear. But when I stepped into the classroom at Durham College or began chairing community roundtables, pulling rank was useless and counterproductive. I had to unlearn the instinct to give directive orders and master the art of persuasive consensus. In an academic or community setting, people don’t move because you hold authority; they move because you’ve convinced them of the shared value of the outcome. Learning to slow down and lead through influence rather than command was a steep, necessary learning curve.
Q: It’s easy to talk about sharing wisdom, but experience can also make leaders rigid or cynical. Can you pinpoint a moment in your career where your accumulated experience was actually wrong; where you had to unlearn a habit to solve a problem?
Martin: In my training, I had been taught that the exploitation of older adults (commonly referred to as “elder abuse”)—including non-payment of a resident’s bill, long-term care home issues, or matters involving a Power of Attorney or Last Will and Testament—was not criminal and was best addressed through civil law processes.
I quickly discovered that this premise was often wrong. I then embarked upon a journey of learning. I delved deeply into the governing legislation, completed specialized training courses, and sought out insights from experts.
I learned that, yes, when dealing with a matter involving the victimization of an older adult (and, by extension, vulnerable persons of all ages), there may be things best dealt with through civil law. But, more often than not, there were also matters worthy of a Criminal Code investigation.
Had I simply accepted what I had been taught in my training and not explored the matter more deeply, I could never have helped the many people I am proud to say I have helped.
But I didn’t stop there. I then embarked upon a journey of sharing the information I had obtained with the general public and professionals across Ontario through the development and presentation of formal courses, including a postgraduate course for Durham College, as well as courses for police officers and other professionals. I also provided informal presentations to members of the public.
It is something I have continued to do since retiring from law enforcement.
Q: Police culture is historically reactive, as most often law enforcement responds to the crime after it has happened. When you started pushing proactive education and prevention for older adults, did you face pushback from traditionalists who saw that as ‘soft’ work rather than real law enforcement?
Martin: Absolutely. Early on, and still today, some traditionalists viewed my public education sessions and related work as something best left to others. It’s not “real police work”.
The turning point came when I started laying out the cold operational numbers. I showed them that a single complex financial exploitation investigation could consume hundreds of investigative hours and tens of thousands of dollars in judicial resources, often with zero funds recovered for the victim. Meanwhile, a one-to-two-hour public information seminar in a church hall, mosque, community centre, or wherever may prevent victimization.
No victimization, no investigative file. Once we framed prevention as resource optimization and harm reduction, the mindset shifted from skepticism to buy-in by many. For example, when I first started providing public information sessions in 2016, I completed some 30 sessions to a few hundred people. In 2025, I presented just under one-hundred information sessions with a total audience of just under 3,000 citizens. In the same year, I also provided sessions to community organization staff and various professional organization. The majority of these sessions were given during my time, i.e., outside work hours.
I have been asked often why I bother to do and to continue to provide this information and training sessions. My response is easy, as I would love to protect everyone from abuse it is an unreasonable expectation of anyone. However, if I am able to inform someone in a manner that prevents their victimized, then I have helped them far better than the criminal justice or civil legal process will ever be able to do. Information not only provides the power to prevent but can be empowering.
Through these efforts, I have learned the value of keeping people informed. Whether the information is presented to help prevent/protect from victimization to solicit understanding as to a particular decision that was made, keeping people informed is so essential.
Q: Getting 40 police services, provincial ministries, and Canada’s five major banks around one table sounds great on paper, but those institutions usually protect their own turf fiercely. Walk me through a specific moment in Law Enforcement Agencies and Partners Protecting Seniors (LEAPPS) where negotiations stalled, and how you broke the deadlock.
Martin: The biggest roadblock/challenge was mistrust between organizations.
The main purpose of the LEAPPS Committee is the protection of older adults from all forms of abuse. I believe, as it ‘takes a village to protect our children,’ “it takes a community to protect vulnerable adults, including older adults.” Law enforcement works in a silo. It must work with the many community partners. It is often a team effort requiring the input and efforts of the various partners across the province.
The first step was to establish Terms of Reference that addressed issues of information sharing while respecting privacy laws. I then approached academic researchers to encourage their expertise in gathering data that can be used to present the issues to the government and others who rely upon tangible data to support concerns. (There is currently three research projects at various stages of development)
But the best approach was personally involving the various partners in situations I was investigating and then sharing the outcome with the members as evidence that a team effort is not only viable but can provide results no one agency/organization could achieve alone. All while we continue to respect privacy concerns and institutional protocols.
I was able to prove to the 225-plus LEAPPS members that the correct team approach can provide unexpected results that protect the ‘individual’ versus the file.
Q: In Jordan and Afghanistan, you weren’t just managing across cultures; you were operating in high-stakes, low-trust environments. Give me a specific example of how you earned credibility with a team or partner who had every reason to distrust an outsider.
Martin: The mission in Jordan back in 2006/2007 was primarily the training of Iraq National Police (INP) recruits. I entered that mission with very limited awareness of their country, culture, religion, and traditions. My understanding of what was really happening in their country was limited to what was available through Western news outlets. I was a foreigner in Jordan, and I was a foreigner to the recruits. Although I was there with the best intention to provide them with the best training I could, I was limited by the program a Western police training program) that had been in place for the past 3 years.
I quickly came to realise that trying to impose Western police training standards on them was, in fact, a disservice to the trainees and could put them at risk of bodily harm or death. Recognising this, I worked closely with my partner, a police officer of many years from the United Kingdom, to modify the practical training, using scenarios that were more relevant to the current situation in the war zone in Iraq.
Not only did the trainees become more engaged and therefore better prepared to return home, but our training sessions soon became a highlight at the training centre. Many dignitaries from various countries would drop by to observe the training sessions we were providing.
I also made a point that as the recruits learned from me, I learned from them. I began to learn their language, and through individual interactions I began to gain a better understanding of their culture, religion and the impact this war was having on them, their family and their country. That led me to sponsoring a gentleman from Iraq, who is today a proud Canadian citizen.
Q: Oshawa is undergoing rapid growth and shifting demographics. Growth inherently creates winners and losers. What is a hard trade-off the city is currently dodging that leaders need to be honest with residents about?
Martin: We are dodging the honest conversation about density versus infrastructure funding. Everyone wants affordable housing, modern transit, expanded emergency services, and preserved green space, but nobody wants their property taxes to spike or their neighborhood layout to change. Leaders have been trying to promise everything to everyone without being transparent and informative about the trade-offs.
If we are going to expand Oshawa’s footprint and welcome tens of thousands of new residents, we have to admit that legacy infrastructure built for a smaller industrial town cannot support that volume without strategic, prioritized capital investment. That means making hard choices: prioritizing core road networks, water systems, and public safety coverage over pet vanity projects. Honesty in leadership means informing residents about what we cannot afford to do right now so that we can deliver impeccably on what we must do.
The residents of Oshawa and the Region of Durham must be kept informed in a timely, honest manner that encourages their thoughts and input before a decision is made. And after the decision is made, they still deserve to be informed of that decision and the rationale behind it.
Q: Commanding an operational team in the military or police relies on chain-of-command authority. Politics relies on compromise, persuasion, and dealing with conflicting public interests. Why make that leap now, and why should voters believe an institutional leader can adapt to political consensus-building?
Martin: Such a great question, because my career hasn’t been spent in an isolated command bunker, it’s been spent at the intersection of complex systems. When you build cross-provincial coalitions like LEAPPS, negotiate across nationalities in NATO operations, or advocate for vulnerable seniors across municipal, provincial or federal boundaries, you aren’t giving orders. You are building consensus among stakeholders who don’t report to you and don’t have to agree with you.
The shift to municipal politics isn’t a leap into unknown territory; it’s the application of a lifelong skill set. Voters don’t need another career politician who excels at soundbites. They do need someone who knows how complex institutions function, how budgets operate under pressure, and how to bring competing interests together to deliver real-world outcomes. They also don’t need someone who can’t identify areas of concern or problems. They need someone who can provide sound solutions that are well researched and viable. I am that person
Q: If we strip away the awards, titles, and political platforms, what is the single most tangible, unglamorous outcome you want to point to in ten years and say, “That exists because I didn’t walk past it”?
Martin: It isn’t a flashy monument or a building with my name on it. It’s an operational system running quietly in the background that supports the residents. Again, it is living in a city and Region where people are proud to say they are a resident. A city where everyone is safe to work, play, worship and thrive.
If I can look back and say Oshawa and the Region of Durham are better off due to my efforts, that is the only legacy that counts.
