Who’s in charge?

I hate to use somebody else’s tag line, the great guest contributor to the Pass Herald S.C Rutigan writes articles under that tag I hope he/she does not mind me stealing it for one week but it’s very relevant to something that happened in the Municipal Office over the last few days.

On Monday afternoon there suddenly appears on the Municipal web site under the employment section a new listing for a Human Resources Administrator, not a mention of this position was made at any council meeting recently or back in the spring during the budget process. Maybe it was all decided In Camera? Even if it was, there should have been a motion in the books supporting the position.

Hopefully somebody would bring it up at one of the meeting yesterday, nothing during the G+P meeting, then last night at the council meeting Councilor Gallant asked the CAO if it was true that we were looking for a Human Resources Administrator he said “yes”. Then councilor Gallant asked if the position was on their Organizational chart to which he replied “No”, then he asked how and why the decision was made to hire for this position. The CAO replied that in light of an on going review that both administration and CUPE felt it was necessary to fill this position, and there were funds available within the budget to pay for it.

Now this raises a number of concerns, council’s must fully understand that administration should be running the day-to-day operations of the municipality, that council cannot be micro managing.

Council goes through a budget process where manpower increases are brought forth by administration and exactly how they are going to be paid for. Council agrees or not, then its administrations job to go out and fill the approved positions.

Right out of left field we have a Human Resources Administrator (Permanent part time) obviously council was not informed unless Councilor Gallant was left out of the information loop similar to Councilor Saje was months prior regarding the issue of Clay Cup being terminated by Medican.

Some will argue that there is money in the budget, let administration proceed and that would be all right if you were filling an operational position at the lower end of the pay scale for the next three months.

Your not this is a “Permanent part time” position this position will go on beyond the end of the year, is anybody fooled by the terminology of part time. The pretense that this position will be part time is being used as the wedge to get this position in the door. Look at the qualifications they are looking for on this position does anybody believe that a highly experienced professional is going to take on this position for “20” hours a week? I do not think so.

Come budget time the need for this bureaucratic position (just like any other) is going to be strongly justified by administration. This is going to be another $100,000 a year job that will be funded by either increasing revenue’s, or taking money from another area in the budget. Somebody made the comment to me a while back that we have more administrators than public works operators. This might be a slight exaggeration, if we keep going at this pace by the end of the next council’s term we may have more administrators than CUPE members.

The morale of this story? It’s very obvious to me now, “Who’s In Charge”         

Note: Check out the article on the new entrance signs on the Pass Promoter site at the following address: 

http://www.crowsnestpasspromoter.com/2013/08/21/municipal-entrance-signs-underway 

Manager of Corporate services ? and a few other issues

Hopefully everybody had a good Christmas.

This morning I noticed on the Municipal Web site under the employment section the Manager of Corporate Services position is no longer listed.

In my mind this could mean one of two things either the position has been filled, or the ghost of fiscal sanity  visited council and administration Christmas Eve and showed them a glimpse of the future. Which led to a stalling of the drive to fill every vacant office in the municipality with an administrator.

If the position has been filled then contrary to what any politician claims we will have the largest bureaucracy in the thirty three year history of the Crowsnest Pass.
(CAO, Directory of Finance and Corporate Services, Director of Community and Protective Services, Director of Engineering, Planning and Public Works, Manager of Public Works, Manager of Corporate Services, Fire Chief, Deputy Fire Chief). Now repeat all of that without making a mistake.

Budget:

Attended a Budget meeting just prior to Christmas, couple of issues of note interesting to hear that the money for the demolition of the Centre is still there for next year despite everybody brimming with confidence that the developer will be tearing the building down at their cost. Also that $1.5 million dollars has been set aside for recreational purposes (very general statement) no specific place for this cash it will have to wait for the out come of a recreational feasibility study. With less than ten months left in this council's term they better get that consultant in quickly to do this study or is this funding being directed towards this council's second term?  

Putting the positive spin on the Crowsnest Pass

I was told yesterday that we all need to be more positive that even the local politicians are talking about all the negativity not being a good thing for the community.

So I said it’s time to put on my positive thinking cap get excited, look around us and write about all the “positive’s” we have in this wonderful community we call the Crowsnest Pass.

So I get to work, you can not argue the beauty of this community I think we can compete with anywhere in the world. The people, are incredibly good people who welcome you with open arms. The location of our community nestled in the Rocky Mountains, great proximity to the prairies, BC, USA, Lethbridge, Calgary all within a few hours drive. I thought wow there is a lot to be happy about in our community.

Then boom about 1pm yesterday I get a call telling me that the Devon gas plant is closing down, what a loss for this community 30-40 good paying jobs our largest Industrial tax payer, and a company that has been a very good corporate citizen for a long time.

Bad news, that really deflated my positive attitude.

Later I am thinking how do I get back to that positive frame of mind? it’s Tuesday let’s go to the council meeting and find some inspiration.

What an opportunity it fell right in to my lap.

First good news the Crowsnest Historical Society appears as a delegation they are going to keep the museum open through the summer, thanks to the hard work of the previous board they are getting a provincial grant that will keep them afloat. Positive stuff.

Then the CAO gives a verbal report the municipality put out a Request for Proposals on the Crowsnest Centre Site (previous council had set the direction by rezoning this land to commercial). The CAO informed council that there has been so much interest in this site that they have extended the dead line from April 20 to May 18. A new hotel soon great news. Positive stuff

The CAO informed council that the new “Director of Protective and Community Services” will be starting next week. This gave Councilor Mitchell the opportunity to refresh everybody’s memory to the fact that we used to have four departments with four Directors but now we only have three departments headed up by three directors.More positive stuff.

Then one of the councilors mentioned that he can not understand all the rumors going around about tax increases, especially considering that council has not finalized the budget yet.

I can not see a councilor taking that position this far along in the budget process unless they have some sense of where the process will end.Well looks like more positive news.  

On my way out somebody asked me how much longer do you think the consultants will be here? I told them well on Councilor Saindon’s blog he states the following:

“We only have one consultant on the payroll to date and she will have her programs completed very shortly”   

 That burden on our tax dollars will end soon. Even more reason to be positive.

Then today I was reading the Promoter looking at the comments regarding additional community policing and I am thinking lets be positive the Mayor, the consultants told us these positions will pay for themselves. If that isn’t positive what is?

 Man I am getting so full of positive that I could almost explode. I can’t wait for the next council meeting Inspiration with a capital “I”