Improper awarding of city contracts, a missing paper trail, deals swelling $747 million over budget, fraud allegations and an auditor turfed by council for bringing all this to light.
Those events culminated into one of the biggest fiascos to hit city hall this year.
Yet mayoral hopeful Barb Higgins maintains the city can look after its own books. The province, she says, can stay away.
“We should be able to look after our own books,” Higgins said at a campaign rally this week. “I don’t think we need the province for that. We can do that on our own.”
Fellow candidate Craig Burrows, a former alderman and former chair of the audit committee, says the province needs to investigate. “What she’s saying is that those who are accused and those who are asleep at the wheel should be given the ability to hire an independent auditor to investigate the allegations,” he says.
In August, Burrows put the provincial auditor general on notice, stating his first order of business, if elected, would be to request a complete, one-time provincial audit of the city’s tendering practices.
Last November, a provincial all-party committee shot down a private members’ bill establishing an auditor to check municipal spending.
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