Greater Sudbury has paid more than $1.3 million in settlement payments and severance to non-union employees between Jan. 1, 2014, and May 16 of this year, Sudbury.com has learned.
According to documents released through a freedom of information request, the amounts range from a low of $1,747.45 paid to one former staffer, to a high of $286,378.81 paid to another, an amount that includes disability payments, severance pay and a $90,120.26 settlement.
Sudbury.com asked for the amounts paid to former employees who were not members of a union, a group that includes city managers and contract employees. Names have been redacted because of privacy rules.
The specific FOI request reads: “I am looking for the total amount paid out to former non-union employees in severance packages and other compensation between Jan. 1, 2014, and May 16, 2016.”
While the amounts were paid out between those dates, some of the payments are for money owed as far back as 2010. The most recent is dated 2014 and includes a $68,628.48 settlement payment plus $116,558.48 in severance.
The issue of severance pay has become an issue at Greater Sudbury because of a surge in the number of managers who have left since the October 2014 municipal election. They include:
Former CAO Doug Nadorozny, who was reportedly dismissed in April 2015 and is now the top bureaucrat in Aurora, Ont.;
Tim Beadman, the former emergency services head, who left unexpectedly in January of this year;
Transit Director Roger Sauvé, another surprise departure last month;
Robert Gauthier, transit operations manager, who left at the same time as Sauvé.
That list doesn't include city managers who have left for other positions, including city budget chief Lorella Hayes, who left late in 2015 to take a similar position with the GSU; Catherine Matheson, the city's manager of community development, who left in 2014 on a secondment to become a senior director with the Northeast LHIN; and city planning director Mark Simeoni, who accepted a similar job last year in Oakville.
Airport CEO Bob Johnston held the interim CAO's title after Nadorozny left, but he was dismissed in September 2015 following a dispute with Mayor Brian Bigger. He has since resumed his duties at the airport.
Because the names were blacked out on the FOI request, it's not known whether the $1.3 million paid to former employees includes money paid to managers who recently left.
