On Tuesday evening, Calgary City Council’s executive committee went behind doors to discuss the review process behind evaluating the performance of city CAO, David Duckworth.
Speculation, and demands across the city, were Duckworth would be blamed for the Bearpaw South Feeder Main rupture in December and be fired. However, under the Municipal Government Act, the executive committee does not have the authority to fire Duckworth. That authority resides solely with the regular city council.
On Wednesday, Calgary Mayor Jeromy Farkas spoke, as much as he could, about discussions in the meeting.
“I just want to preface this by saying employment standards and law relating to HR means that we can disclose the city manager’s compensation. But other elements in terms of performance review, marital history, health, all of those other things, they're subject to confidentiality. So there's a reason why this review process is done in camera,” said Farkas.
“That said, we came out of the meeting with a number of recommendations, significantly tightening up the overall performance review process for the city manager.”
Farkas pointed to previous councils, saying it was clear they played too loose in terms of providing firm direction to city managers and holding them accountable for results.
“So, it's clear our council is going to be doing things very differently when it comes to our expectations,” he said. “We're going to be very clear in terms of what our expectations are, not just as a council but also as an employer to our one employee, David Duckworth."
"And we're going to hold (Duckworth) accountable for results and it's going to be a very thorough and objective process, not one based on personality or feelings.”
One change is a quarterly, instead of an annual, performance review with Duckworth and being clear about meeting expectations, adding all options are “on the table in terms of performance.”
“We have the mandate to make recommendations, one of which is the continuation of employment but also perhaps corrective action. It's really critical that we hold our city manager accountable and give very clear direction,” said Farkas.
When it comes to accountability at city hall, he said, “The buck stops with me, the buck stops with us as a city council. Ultimately as mayor, I'm responsible for public safety in the city. And I take that responsibility very seriously.”
He added the Bearspaw South Feeder Main Independent Review Panel report “was very clear that this was not a single point of failure, but the result of more than two decades of a lack of governance and oversight into city administration, with some responsibility to both be borne by successive city councils as well.”
“But what matters now is those mistakes are not repeated and there's going to be healthy debates over the course of the next coming months from council in terms of exactly how we action some of the recommendations in the report, whether it's a wholly owned subsidiary of a municipally controlled corporation. There's some nuance in terms of the exact governance model.”
Also on Wednesday, Farkas received a letter from Alberta Municipal Affairs Minister, Dan Williams, regarding the water main break, including a formal request for information, a letter Farkas said he was expecting.
“We appreciate the minister is performing due diligence on this matter and I’ve responded confirming that Calgary will cooperate fully, provide the requested documentation, and keep Calgarians informed,” said Farkas.
“I appreciate the minister’s support for our crews and the collaborative relationship. Our focus is public safety today and the necessary long-term fixes to stop this happening again. We expressed on a voluntary basis our willingness to work with the provincial government to provide any and all documentations and support of the independent panel report review.”
