Saturday, January 02, 2016

Core Services Review To Become Reality - Finally?

OPINION
Nanaimo Info Blog Poll
Shows overwhelming support of review

The poll run on this blog has seen 3,964 people participate in the poll with 93.16% of participants supporting an independent core review at City Hall.

Core Review Thwarted By Council & Staff

Having watched city council for over seven years now I have witnessed the idea of a Core Services Review kicked around by different councillors both pro and con, but mostly con. Councillors Kipp and Bestwick on many occassions attempted to champion the cause of a core review in an effort to get a handle on how your tax dollars are being spent and whether or not efficiency couldn't be found.

Core Reviews are not surprisingly opposed by labour who will dub them as 'witch hunts' in an effort to gain sympathy and support from the public. Councillor Brennan has been one of the more vocal opponents to core reviews citing them as the cause for her once loosing her job.

Previous Council's seemed to like the idea floated by staff that different internal exercises constituted a partial core review, claiming that the strategic plan was in some way a measure of how tax dollars should be spent.

In my opinion, I suspect that both management and labour live in fear of an independent review of how city hall delivers the services taxpayers pay more and more for with each passing year. The increase in money flowing through city hall over the past decade when compared with population increases, inflation and services being offered is out of balance by any yard stick.

When first appointed to the position of city manager, Mr. Swabey claimed to cut a million dollars a year from the budget by reorganizing upper management. More recently interim city manager Ms Samra cut over $800,000 from the budget by taking similar measures. As much as these actions can be applauded, it calls into question why such waste was allowed by previous city manager Mr. Kenning.

Opposition To Core Review Will Continue

As much as interim manager Ms Samra is to be applauded for getting the core review on the fast track after being in the office for less than a month (something the previous managers couldn't accomplish), it does not mean the process is going to go off without a hitch, and continued opposition.

In my opinion you can expect management and labour will do what they can to limit the impact of such a review and that Councillor Brennan can be expected to be a vocal opponent of the process. She has already expressed her disapproval of the management changes which Ms Samra initiated saving taxpayers $816,000 per year.

It will take much vigilance on the part of this city council and concerned city taxpayers, and council watchdogs to see that the core services review is actually a legitimate process and not just another paper tiger from city hall.

allvoices

1 comment:

  1. Because Brennan obviously has a bias against core reviews, her campaign being heavily funded by unions and since she was apparently let go from a previous job after such a review, shouldn't she excuse herself from this core review since she's got some real biases and conflicts?

    ReplyDelete

Your comment will appear after moderation before publishing,

Thank you for your comments.Any comment that could be considered slanderous or includes unacceptable language will be removed.

Thank you for participating and making your opinions known.

Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.