City expense rules 'hog wild'
Where's the clarity? Political staff get new credit cards, while office charges stay secret 120 days
On May 4 of last year my colleague Zen Ruryk and I put in a municipal Freedom of Information (FOI) request for the 2006 office expenses of Mayor David Miller and the 12 minions on his handpicked executive committee.
After much to-ing and fro-ing with the city's FOI office, the requested information was finally coughed up on July 23, 2007 -- nearly four months later -- despite what's supposed to be a 30-day turnaround time in the legislation.
Neverthless, when the Sun's dogged persistence on the office expense issue paid off in terms of new guidelines -- which allowed us regular access to councillor expense files -- we were thrilled.
We were also supportive of a new councillor expense policy developed to tighten up the controls on what could be expensed. It's far from perfect but at least it promised routine disclosure online of each councillor's expenses after every quarter. That, according to the policy, would occur with 30 days of the closing of each quarter.
But transparency is a relative word, apparently, at Socialist Silly Hall -- or so I discovered last week.
When my Sun colleague and I endeavoured to access certain councillor expense files for the summer months, as we've done regularly in the past year, we were refused and told to wait until month's end, the first time they'd be posted online.
Coun. Doug Holyday tried to do the same and was also told no.
In fact, in an e-mail exchange with Winnie Li, the city's director of council and support services, he was informed that "the details of the expenses will be routinely disclosed on the Internet" and they are "not available" for his review immediately.
In other words, Holyday, the media and any other councillors who seek expense information will be required to wait the same 120 days the Sun did last year when we requested the details under FOI legislation!
"It seems to me the only thing that's been tightened is the secrecy," Holyday said.
My calls to city clerk Ulli Watkiss and Li did very little to shed light on the policy change.
Watkiss would only say the disclosure policy changed at the July council meeting, but indicated she was too busy to find the section that outlined the change.
After some digging, I did find one tiny sentence on page 11 of the council report stating that under section 15 of the municipal FOI legislation, a "head may refuse disclosure if the information contained in the record will be published by an institution within 90 days after the request is made."
I can only surmise this is what city staff are using to withhold information on a more immediate basis.
Li informed me -- in an e-mail -- that the posting of the councillor expenses at the end of this month will include detailed invoices, including actual taxi chits and receipts.
"It would be far more easy to peruse and review," she wrote me.
IT'S PUBLIC MONEY
For one thing, I'll believe it when I see it. But if this regime truly believes in transparency, the expenses should be available whenever someone requests them. After all, it is public money.
Coun. Rob Ford, who knew nothing about the change in policy, called it "unbelievable and ridiculous."
He also noted he's very upset with the city's decision this past week to issue special MasterCard credit cards -- called P cards -- to council staffers to charge up a wide variety of expenses without having to use their own money.
"This is just encouraging people to go hog wild," Ford said.
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Jet setters: Not even all the talk of a recession or the concerns about one's carbon footprint can stop the mayor and his minions from spreading their wings on taxpayer-funded trips. It seems not only Miller flew the coop to Europe last Wednesday but Coun. Norm Kelly spent last week in Madrid with his lovely wife Charlotte.
I'm told by one of his office staffers he went there to see a "number of officials" about transportation issues but I'd have to wait to hear the full story when he returns to the office Tuesday.
I wonder if Kelly, who in the past has charged to trips to China and his $53.50 Costco membership to taxpayers, asked his staff to use their new P-Card MasterCard to book his trip to avoid shelling out his own money up front.
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