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Waiting for CAO
Let us do something, while we have the chance! It is not every day that we are needed…Yes, in the immense confusion one thing alone is clear. We are waiting for Godot to come – Samuel Beckett
Even a slug exhibits motion on occasion. While it chugs forward at a pace that exposes it to all manner of predators, the slimy crawler manages to keep moving until it finds a leaf under which to hide. Leadership at Shire Hall, on the other hand, seems to have lost any momentum that might have once propelled local government—calcifying in plain view. Moving so slowly as to be at risk of turning to stone.
Perhaps it is a constituent-management trick, meant to drain expectation that something might actually get done. Some ready examples. Nearly a decade has drifted past since the Dukes left the old rink in Wellington. In a community crying out for affordable housing—nay, housing of any kind—a goodly sized chunk of land sits next to it, fallow and unused. Year after year. Plans come and go. Yet nothing of consequence changes. Literally next door there is a workable model that could be copied to provide desperately needed rental housing. Yet there seems no visible signal of movement, no indication that we are further ahead than 10 years ago.
One more. It was eight years ago the municipality discovered it had a problem with the creek that runs underneath the former convenience store at the main intersection in Wellington. Specifically, the near-constant humidity was found to be eating the building and threatening to pull it into Lane Creek. Plans were devised. The County eventually purchased, and then abandoned, the building in fear of liability exposure. More plans were prepared. Public meetings entertained hundreds of folks with renderings and feedback forms. Then nothing. The file has gone cold. The creek still flows under the empty building.
There are dozens of such stories from every corner of the County.
Andrew Hancharyk, the County’s Director of Corporate Services, announced this week he will leave the municipality by the end of the month. He is the third senior manager to make his exit in the past six months. Three senior people out, none in. Last month, another senior manager pleaded with council, in uncharacteristically plain terms, that planning and development needed at least three more folks in order to meet the volume of work in front of them. Now. He’s still waiting.
Council parted ways with its Chief Administrative Officer (CAO), James Hepburn, in February. The CAO is essentially the top manager for the County administration. It’s an important job. In other organizations, it is a role that would be filled quickly. County council, meanwhile, only got around to choosing a recruiting firm last month. It will now set to work scouring the earth to find suitable candidates. Two seasons have slipped by. Leaves will yellow and snow will fall before, if ever, we see Godot.
Rob McAuley is a highly skilled and experienced bureaucrat. There can be no rational debate on these facts. As acting CAO, however, he is constrained by his caretaker role and his personal inclination to risk aversion.
So, we wait. Until waiting defines the culture. Nothing happens. Eventually, we stop believing anything will.
Eighteen months ago, this newspaper laid out five reforms to the County’s business. These reforms—a return to standing committees, the creation of a waterworks commission, filling vacancies in planning and development, paying council members fairly and reasonably and initiate an honest talk about our roads and bridges— were tangible proposals founded on 15 years of close observation. We repeated them in January. Not a grail by any means, merely the bits one picks up when you write and reflect on one subject for a decade and a half.
Nothing happened.
Shire Hall has not considered fundamental reform, let alone embarked with a slug’s ambition toward change. Change will be now be thrust upon them.
Premier Doug Ford said earlier this week his government is moving forward to transfer more of the costs of public health, childcare and land ambulance onto municipalities. This should spur a deep dive into the County’s business—to determine what is essential and what isn’t. Or council may hastily lop off a limb or organ. The unlucky thing a majority of them agree is dispensable.
Bottom line: Next year your local government will do less and it will cost a lot more. You will have fewer services, but pay higher tax bills. Waiting is no longer a satisfactory response. Especially when it isn’t at all clear what we are waiting for.
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