Philip Slayton's book, Mayors Gone Bad, should be required reading not just for every mayor and city councillor in Canada but also for anyone thinking of running for a seat at the table of municipal office.
Slayton's 2015 book showcases a rogue's gallery of Canadian mayors who abused their office to benefit themselves and their friends. Everybody knows about Rob Ford but there have been many other recent naughty mayors:
Larry O'Brien of Ottawa (bribery and influence peddling charges)
Gerald Tremblay of Montreal (corruption allegations)
Michael Applebaum of Montreal (fraud charges)
Gilles Vaillancourt of Laval (gangsterism, money laundering, fraud and corruption charges)
Alexandre Duplesis of Lavel (prostitution scandal)
Joe Fontana of London (fraud conviction)
Susan Fennel of Brampton (personal expenses scandal)
And those are just the big city mayors.
The irony of the entire book is that Slayton is quite sympathetic to Canadian mayors, the men and women elected with reins not connected to anything. They are subservient to their city managers and the bureaucracy on one side and their city councils on the other. Unlike prime ministers and premiers, they do not control blocs of votes, a party apparatus (except in Vancouver), the political agenda and senior staff.
Their only real power lies in the authority of their office, in being able to call themselves "the mayor."
In other words, the mayor is the cheerleader-in-chief. The mayor can only wield political clout by forming a loose and fragile coalition with a majority of councillors. For many who complete their due diligence on the actual job of mayor, it looks like a lot of responsibility and grief but little actual control.
Meanwhile, newly-elected mayors quickly learn that the most powerful person in city hall is actually the city manager. The bureaucracy of municipal government is run out of the city manager's office and the mayor and city council make policy decisions based on the information and options provided by the city manager.
In Prince George's case, Lyn Hall is merely the chairman of the board of the City of Prince George. The chief executive officer in charge of the city's daily affairs is Kathleen Soltis.
Canadian mayors are little more than city councillors with a different title. In Prince George, the mayor is paid more money and is expected to work full-time. Those are really the only differences. Hall's vote is worth no more or less than any of his council colleagues.
More than one commentator accurately pointed out that Ford would never have been allowed to become such an international disgrace had he been a premier or a prime minister. His party and his caucus would have been able to throw him out of office following established procedure and tradition. All Toronto councillors could do was demand Ford resign and plead with the Ontario government and the premier to do something.
Therein lies the problem.
Municipalities are completely subservient to provincial governments and it's no different in B.C. The Union of B.C. Municipalities and the Federation of Canadian Municipalities are great venues for municipal governments to exchange ideas and best practices but they are little more than lobby groups when dealing with the provincial and federal governments, respectively.
Strangely, Slayton follows up his list of mayors gone bad with solutions that amount to a mayor's fantasy - city charters that would make provincial and municipal governments political and administrative equals, unrestricted taxing rights and the unrestricted ability to borrow funds and run deficits.
Slayton also likes rigourous conflict-of-interest standards, including sanctions and suspensions for violating mayors and city councillors, and political parties at the local level, weeding out the lesser candidates before they come before the electorate.
While the idea of Prince George and its mayor having much more influence over the B.C. government and the premier, it just seems like a recipe for even more back-stabbing and backroom deals.
Mayors and city councils are hemmed in by provincial and federal protocols.
While that's not an ideal scenario, perhaps that weakness is what gives municipal government the strength it does have.
-- Managing editor Neil Godbout
