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Expenses for top city of Nanaimo staff released

Sep 14, 2016 | 5:47 PM

NANAIMO – Transparency seems to be the word of the moment at Nanaimo City Hall.
 
On the heels of an unprecedented release of councillor expense claims, the city has now published 2016 expenses for top earning staff.

The report shows that CAO Tracy Samra leads the pack, claiming $10,763 in expenses in the first six months of this year.

The bulk of those expenses, around $8,700, are related to travel and conferences, including $5,117 to attend the Federation of Canadian Municipalities convention in Winnipeg in June.

Samra says being new to the municipal scene, it was prudent for her to attend all of the standard conferences and events to understand the landscape.

“Now that I know how they run and what happens at them, I’ll be a little more selective next year on which ones I spend my time and energy with. It’s been a good learning year for me, got a lot of networks out of it and obviously any type of education you can get within the municipal sector is a good thing,” says Samra.

After the city announced it would be publishing detailed quarterly expense reports for mayor and council moving forward, Mayor Bill McKay made a public call for that level of disclosure to spread to top staff at city hall.

In a news release, the city states it will now publish detailed staff expenses for employees who earn more than $75,000 per year twice a year, in August and November. That’s as well as the annual ‘SOFI’ report, which lists total expenses but with no detailed accounting.

While the city states this “exceeds the legislative requirement of reporting”, their website does list staff expenses as being routinely accessible, meaning the information is, and always was, available by request and without a Freedom of Information request being filed.

Mayor McKay says he welcomes this move, adding that communities around the world are looking for more disclosure, transparency and value for their money.

“I had no objection to most everything I saw in there. Personal development is part of it, we’ve got, naturally, travel. I’m a firm believer in education so I can’t see anything that’s objectionable in any of the reports that I’ve seen so far,” says McKay.

Samra’s expenses are almost double the five-year average for the city manager position, with Al Kenning and Ted Swabey spending an average of $5,570 between 2011 and 2016. The 10-year average, including Jerry Berry, is $8,506.

Councillor Bill Bestwick says he’s confident a “culture change” is happening at city hall and nothing stands out from the report to him, because he’s never seen this type of information, or this level of detail, in the last 10 years.

“We start trying to make comparisons about what this person spent as opposed to this person. There’s going to be a spike here and there depending on certain circumstances, but when I look at what has been presented, there’s nothing that is excessive,” he says.

A notable spike in expenses among the city’s top staff comes from the chief financial officer role, formerly the director of finance.

The report shows Victor Mema claimed $7,148 through the first six months of 2016.

The five-year average for expenses claimed by the director of finance position is $2,089.

Mema says the increase in the total can be attributed to the fact his role has changed, being named CFO, and the fact that Brian Clemens, who held the position for all of those years, was at the end of his career.

High expense claims are nothing new for Mema, according to financial reports posted online. Statement of Financial Information documents published by the district of Sechelt, his previous employer, show Mema expensed more than $63,000 to taxpayers in 2013 and 2014 combined.

Both McKay and Bestwick referenced a need to continue to focus on the bottom line and how money is being spent at city hall.

“For sustainability, there’s only so much money. And the taxpayers are only willing to contribute so much money. We have to be responsible with the money that the taxpayers provide to us,” says Bestwick.

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You can view the full report here.