Let’s stop the revolving door that is the CAO’s office

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 28/01/2015 (4122 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

In the private sector, if a multibillion-dollar company tried to function for any extended period of time without a chief executive officer, you can bet investors and analysts would howl in disbelief, concerned the foundation of the organization was at risk of collapsing in a thunderous, dusty heap.

Ah, but that’s the private sector, where leadership is a key element in organizational success.

In municipal government, however, we tend to see a different approach. In fact, a municipality seems to be able to operate almost indefinitely without any real corporate leadership.

Exhibit one: the City of Winnipeg and the soap opera that is the office of the chief administrative officer.

Winnipeg is going into its 16th month without a permanent CAO. There is a search on for a new CAO, but it is unclear when it will be completed.

Former CAO Phil Sheegl resigned in October 2013 and was replaced on an interim basis by deputy CAO Deepak Joshi, who last week was suspended by Mayor Brian Bowman and the executive policy committee for unspecified reasons. All Bowman would say for now is he has “lost faith” in Joshi.

Although the mayor and council provide political leadership, the CAO is the source of leadership for the civic service. He or she is responsible for the engagement of city employees at all levels and the creation and maintenance of a culture that is working to provide value for taxpayer money.

Put the wrong person in the CAO’s job, or suffer too much turnover, and you have the potential for sloppy, ineffective government. At the very least, you have a government in which everyone is working with a different set of goals and mandates. In other words, no common vision or purpose.

Winnipeg has seen all of this and more. For the better part of a decade, there’s been a revolving door in the CAO’s office through which has passed a parade of intriguing characters.

Annitta Stenning was generally well-respected as a professional public administrator when, in 2007, she resigned as CAO without offering an explanation. The speculation was Stenning could not work with former mayor Sam Katz, who was elected in 2004.

After a national search, Stenning was replaced by career public administrator Glen Laubenstein. Although he had a stellar resumé, Laubenstein was seen by media and other observers as an uneven and unpredictable character. Before long, it was clear he and Katz had no functioning working relationship. He left in 2010, again without explanation, along with another wave of senior civic employees.

(It should be noted Laubenstein also left his next job, chief administrator for the RM of Wood Buffalo in Alberta, under similar circumstances. He collected more than $400,000 in severance for three years on the job.)

Which brings us to Phil Sheegl, a real estate developer and lifelong friend of Katz, whose appointment as CAO raised eyebrows and concerns. Many skeptics believed his business sensibilities would compromise public-sector principles. In almost every regard, Sheegl did not disappoint.

Sheegl resigned just days before a damning audit of city real estate transactions was made public. That audit revealed city hall on Sheegl’s watch emphasized expediency over due diligence and personal relationships over fairness.

With an RCMP investigation ongoing into some of the transactions outlined in the audits, we don’t know the full extent of the mayhem created during the Sheegl era.

Council demonstrated its complicity in the tawdry legacy of CAO dysfunction when it decided, against all rational thought, to delay the hiring of a permanent replacement for Sheegl. A new CAO should have been in place by last spring; councillors deferred that decision because it was an election year. Now, heading into the spring of 2015, the city is still without its leader.

Joshi’s mysterious suspension seems destined to end in his termination. That would mean three successive CAOs will have left the city under clouds of controversy. And no matter how you look at that sorry sequence, it’s a bad deal for taxpayers.

The City of Winnipeg has had too much turnover and too many dubious characters in key positions. That has led to much inconsistency and dysfunction.

After years of mysterious disappearances, real estate scandals, operational audits and unexplained suspensions, a few years of stable, competent public administration would be a breath of fresh air.

dan.lett@freepress.mb.ca