Ford motion forces TCHC board members out
CBC News
Posted: Mar 10, 2011 12:01 AM ET
Last Updated: Mar 10, 2011 1:09 AM ET
Toronto city council has voted to dump the remaining members of the Toronto Community Housing Corp.
The decision came at a special council meeting that stretched late into Wednesday night.
After six hours of debate council voted 25-18 to support Mayor Rob Ford's motion to dismiss the four members of the board who refused to follow the mayor's recommendation and resign in the wake of a damning report from the auditor general.
Nine other board members resigned last week.
Jeffrey Griffiths, the city's auditor general, released a report on Feb. 28, that revealed TCHC awarded a three-year, $25-million refurbishment contract after receiving an unsolicited proposal and another $5-million contract that did not have appropriate documentation and appeared to be sole-sourced.
The report also detailed staff at the city-run housing agency expensed cruises, massages and Christmas parties exceeding $40,000.
Griffiths said later that he was outraged after examining the agency's books.
"In my eight years as auditor general at the City of Toronto, I've never seen such a blatant disregard of policies and procedures as they relate to employee expenses," he said
Ford, who was elected on a platform of cleaning up waste at city hall, was also outraged by the report and said he intended to clean house at TCHC.
With the final four board members — councillors Maria Augimeri and Raymond Cho, as well as two tenant representatives — removed from the board, the way is now clear for the city to appoint new board members.
The councillors who voted against the dismissals said they were angry over the lack of due process.
"This is Toronto, it is not Libya," said Coun. Glen De Baeremaeker.
The mayor's office has said it wants former long-time councillor Case Ootes to take over the running of the housing agency in the interim.
Ford said during the debate that he only expects Ootes to run the TCHC until May, but he hopes to be able to appoint "a new board as quickly as possible."
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