But a tightening of rules governing the slush fund that Toronto councillors call their office expense budget is a positive development.
It might even work to curtail the more outrageous spending of some councillors, though that is a long shot for at least two reasons.
One, the spending limit at $53,100 is untouched and still way too high, with $40,000 being a more reasonable and restraining limit. Two, final spending approval rests with the city clerk and there is little evidence to suggest this office is sufficiently independent to be a watchdog.
In fact, Tim Ivanyshyn, the last guy in the clerk's office who asked too many questions about city council spending, was secretly dumped with no explanation. The mayor's office has frustrated efforts from Councillor Michael Walker to find out why the civil servant was let go in the wake of embarrassing public revelations about councillors' spending.
The Sun slows councillors' rush to the trough |
It only took six months plus one week and likely a cast of thousands to produce -- but at least the new improved councillor expense policy appears to have substance.
The 62-page policy -- released publicly yesterday as part of next Thursday's executive committee agenda -- is comprehensive, reasonable and clearly stipulates what councillors will be eligible to expense using their $53,100 office budgets and what will be considered ineligible.
And it appears those who put together the new policy took into account the many spending abuses first revealed by my colleague Zen Ruryk and I in a series of investigative reports commencing last July.
No comments:
Post a Comment