What Happened To Openness, Transparency and Accountability at city hall, that's what mayoral candidate Patricia Mills wants to know in a recent news release.
On Friday, Mills issued a release questioning why two recent Freedom of Information (FOI) act requests aren't being honoured, and she lays the blame for the city's refusal at the feet of Mayor Brian Bigger.
“In our last mayoralty race, citizens of Greater Sudbury voted for a platform that included openness, transparency and accountability," Mills said. "Those are the promises Brian Bigger made to the citizens of Greater Sudbury. But the reality is that the mayor has been anything but transparent.”
One FOI request pertained to a lawsuit settlement with a former Mayor’s office staffer and the city's refusal to say how the suit was settled. The second involves the terms for development of new infrastructure required to prepare the site and land transfer agreements surrounding the Kingsway Entertainment District (KED).
Mills said Bigger has refused to make the information available and has refused to make information available to the Information and Privacy Commissioner of Ontario.
“If the Privacy Commissioner’s role is to uphold and promote open government, why would the mayor refuse to cooperate with them?" Mills said. "At the very least, he should be releasing the documents they need for their investigation.”
As for the KED project, Mills again expressed her concern that hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars are being committed to various projects while she says the public doesn't know "important details" like final costs to the city, or cost sharing arrangements between the city and the developer.
“It’s concerning to me that we are committing taxpayers’ money to a $100-million plus project and the mayor doesn’t feel we should be informed of the very basics of who is paying for what,” Mills said.
Saying she understands why closed-door (in-camera) meetings are held on sensitive matters like legal or personnel disputes, but any decisions made in secret should then be made public.
Mills believes all in-camera motions involving the KED project and all financial costs, including legal and any contracts that have been let for this project, should be made available to the public.
“I can assure you that if I’m elected, I will treat citizens with the honesty and respect they deserve. Decisions made in an in-camera meeting will be immediately made public and that includes decisions on how we are spending taxpayer money.”
