Burned

County spent $684,300 to terminate employees last year

The trigger was a workplace accident. A worker’s hands were burned by steam as he and fellow workers coaxed a frozen pipe in Ameliasburgh to begin flowing again. But in the aftermath, three people lost their jobs with the County—including its top manager.

Neither Mayor Robert Quaiff nor County officials would divulge the cost of parting with Chief Administrative Officer Merlin Dewing at the time—despite a Freedom of Information request filed and pursued by The Times columnist and reporter Mihal Zada.

Also in 2015, two senior administrators at McFarland Home lost their jobs.

The cost to the municipality to sever employment with these and other County staff has now been tabulated.

In 2015, termination costs of $684,300 were paid and accrued by the County for nine former employees, according to Susan Turnbull, Commissioner of Corporate Services and Finance. This includes $196,000 spent on professional services related to these terminations.

“The costs reflect the payout of settlements for terminations that occurred, in some cases, a number of years prior to 2015,” wrote Turnbull in an email.

In 2014, the County spent $85,700 in termination costs. It has spent $1,700 so far in 2016.

Sadly, this may be the closest ratepayers get to learning the cost of firing the County’s manager last March.

The total settlement cost equals about 2.2 per cent of the 2015 tax levy.

The information is contained in a year-end report to be tabled at a committee of council on Thursday.

There had been simmering discontent among council and others long before March 2015.

Dewing was hired in 2011 with a mandate to examine, assess and evaluate the County’s business from top to bottom, something that hadn’t happened since the 10 townships, villages and towns had been amalgamated into one municipality in 1998.When he was done, 44 jobs had been eliminated and 29 new jobs created. Together, the moves erased about $1.5 million from the County’s annual overhead costs.

But this restructuring came at a cost. Many departing and demoted staff complained loudly to council members about the diminished capacity of the municipality and declining morale among remaining staff.

While some council members were sympathetic, most had been elected in 2010, campaigning to rein in the cost of local government and improve efficiency. But even as Dewing introduced new training and career development programs across the workforce—winning national recognition for these efforts in May 2014—a newly elected council was becoming increasingly testy with the County’s manager.

By then, Dewing had shifted his focus from the business of the municipality to council. He saw too much interference by elected officials in the day-to-day operations of the County. It was confusing to staff and clearly inefficient to have 16 extra managers directing their activities.

But the more Dewing guided council members toward governing and away from managing, the more some council members bristled. That wasn’t what they were elected to do, they complained.

The frustration came to a head when a worker’s hands were burned last winter. It was alleged that safety precautions hadn’t been followed. Two roads supervisors lost their jobs as a result.

Several council members reacted harshly to the sackings.

Councillor Kevin Gale responded angrily to the terminations, prompting him to send out an email to County employees asking, “Who’s next?”

At the following council meeting, Gale and others urged Dewing to rehire the senior roads supervisor. Dewing refused.

Gale emailed the CAO the following morning insisting it was in the best interests of the County that Dewing rehire the roads supervisor. Once again Dewing refused.

Later that morning, Mayor Quaiff announced that a special closed-door meeting would be held on Friday to consider Dewing’s fate.

Rather than fight, Dewing sat down with Quaiff to negotiate the terms of his exit. The deal was already done by the time council met on Friday to ratify it.

“We have reached a decision that Dewing’s leadership style no longer aligns with Council’s preferred corporate administration approach,” said Mayor Quaiff in a statement afterward.

He refused to say how much the departure of Dewing would cost County taxpayers. Today, 15 months later, we have a slightly clearer picture.