Would Jim Pattison Want To See Spending Details?
Wednesday, June 26, 2013 @ 3:45 AM
One would think that the more eyes you have looking at your expenses and just what those costs are, would be welcomed by the City.
As in anyone’s life, we all don’t have the ability to cover all the bases when it comes to value for our dollar and in many cases it is our friends neighbors and co-workers who give us some tips and from that we are able to get better value for our dollar.
With that in mind, you would think Prince George City Council would be more than in favour of having 80,000 eyes looking at the expenditures in the City with a view to saving money. It is after all their money and so they have more than a passing interest.
The City Council and its members are an extension of the public that they represent and they should be more than eager to have their constituents looking over their shoulders in an effort to make the City more financially prudent . Somehow that idea gets lost in a maze of excuses which are no more than just that.
The cost of putting some, if not all of the invoices before the public is not astronomical and to suggest otherwise is simply not true. Ask any major company, any large corporation of just how many eyes get to look at the expenses and when a member of the Board asks for a break down on a certain item it isn’t long before that information is made available. In many cases it results in a savings to the company which in this case is the City Of Prince George and the citizens of it.
The mindset that the directors of a company do not have the right to fine tune the expenses are long since past. Ask Jim Pattison if he likes to look at what his companies expenses are down to a very minor detail, and is there anyone out there that doubts his success? Then perhaps City Council can get its mind around the fact that sitting at the Council table does not simply entail discussing the big ticket items, looking after the small stuff is where it all starts.
I’m Meisner and that’s one man’s opinion.
Comments
Unfortunately Prince George is a long way from ever having someone with the ability to operate the city with the financial skills of a Jim Pattison.
With the city council’s attitude is if you need more coin in the piggy bank just raise taxes it does not lead to successful financial management.
You’re asking politicians to use common sense and look out for the voters and general population over themselves? They won’t do it until they absolutely have too.
When is the Municipal Auditor General going to audit the City of PG? After the report is released, is when City of PG will do what you ask.
Until you start looking at the details, there is seldom any thought as to how things can be done better.
For example, until you look at your phone bill, you’ve got no way of knowing if you need to be thinking about a long distance package.
Until you look at your heating bill, you’ve got no way of knowing is the expense is out of line–maybe your hot water tank is gummed up, etc.
If we really want to save City money, then open up the books. The more ideas the public can come up with, the better.
Does anyone know what technology the city uses? That is, is there a database from which this information can easily be obtained? The way the Council talks (other than Brian Skakun) you’d think it was all done with bound ledgers and quill pens.
Looking a little closer at the list I do have a question or two.
Side Show Production Services – $157,611.22- mayor and council meetings?
Veekens Poultry Farm – $53,908.79 Chicken cordon bleu for all?
“Does anyone know what technology the city uses”
So, if a Councillor was going to ask that question, would he be given the answer? Or does the City not know that either?
Whatever packaged system(s) they use, it is obviously the wrong package(s) or they have not been instructed how to use it.
Given the belligerence by senior management towards a Councillor wanting to probe some data when the global results are being reported, I do not know whether I am seeing incompetence or a system incapable of doing what a municipal financial accounting package needs to provide.
We may need to look a little more closely at the capacity of the IT department to see whether they can set the system up to meet the needs of managers for capturing data and reporting out.
Quite frankly, I do not understand why Soltis did not know what services a particular company provided for the City. After all, it was not a $75.49 invoice. It was for a company that seems to annually bill around $80,000. And it was on the radar screen a year ago for the very same reasons.
I tend to believe she did not want to give out the information based on some strange principles she, Green and the lap dog … turned monkey … believe in.
As some said, use google.
http://cncentre.ca/Pages/StageHands.aspx
The CN Centre is proud to have Chris Radmacher and Side Show Productions as our exclusive supplier for labour, rigging, wardrobe, and runners.
Sorry … that was a cut and paste, but allowed me to bring the info within 3 minutes …. ;-)
Veekens may be fertilizer for city parks ….
I could make a joke here, but think I had better not; would likely be booted … ;-)
If anyone wants to make a comment about the fact that the stage hand guy and the mosquito guy are both from Kamloops, feel free to do so …..
So much for leakage …. :-(
Okay, I’ll start ….. how much money is leaving this City to pay for services and goods which appear, at first glance, to be attainable here?
Is this just a coincidence, or is this indicative of tendencies for our purchasing?
Can we get a report from Kamloops showing how many such services they use from PG headquartered companies?
Micromanage from the top if you can’t trust anyone with whom you can delegate?
Unfortunately council will never be able to cut spending at city hall until they fully understand the details of their operations, including major contracted services. Skakun’s request may not be reasonable as it stands, but the intent is valid. The derision he faces from the mayor turns my stomach. It clear we do not have a functioning team dynamic on council.
They complain the city spends too much money…so the City cuts programs and staffing to lower cost….then they complain that the City is laying people off and cutting programs????
They complain that ther roads are full of potholes….so the City says, wll the reason we cut what we thought we were able to get long without, so we wod have more money to fix our road….then they complain that you still shouldnt have layed peole off….and they complain that the raid fixing is done during the day..why can’t it be done at night…oh, I guess because it would disturb their sleep….and ah no the City shouldnt do that.
Y’know in our town I think there has never been a City administration that people didn’t complain about…
So my advice to the Mayor and Council is to just do the very best job you can, and thats all we should ever expect from you…
If at the end of the day, the voters like what you did…ou will get re elected..If they didn’t like it…well I guess you won’t.
Personally i still think that Prince George is a great City to live in and we have precous little to complain about except the weather…sometimes…
Have a great day in Prince George all…..
Everyone hacks on Sheri Green, but there wasn’t too much choice last election between her and dithering Dan Rogers.
Bottom line is that we need some effective leadership and strong decision making from Mayor and Council. Get on with the business of running the City efficiently and effectively. Cut the fat. Stop pandering to special interest groups and make some tough decisions. We haven’t had that for a long time.
I don’t know when the City tossed all its expensive hardware and software and paid big bucks for the latest and the greatest. Perhaps it wasn’t all that great? If it can’t provide instant access to information (the kind Councillor Skakun is asking for) it is basically garbage or the knowledge to use all its built-in features is lacking or if none of the above applies we are owed an explanation as to what the real problem is!
I thought that the city had just completed a major upgrade to their financial reporting system.
Looked in the 2010-2014 provisional plans and found the following under “computer betterment” for the years 2010,2011 and 2012.
“further configuration of Tempest to include better management of the Garbage container inventory” I can see where this would be a three year project as the are small, medium AND large containers;) $650k over 3 years.
Having dusted their hands of that one have jumped headlong into a multi year mega bucks CMMS program.
CMMS programs are designed to allow quick reporting. The CMMS could provide a rapid and easy means for opening, reporting on, and closing work orders to neame a few.
Labour, materials, failure codes, completion date, and downtime could all be reported
The new Auditor General for Local Government would be very interested in these comments. Here’s the link to the website:
http://www.aglg.ca/information-for-the-public/index.html?WT.svl=TopNav
“Would Jim Pattison Want To See Spending Details”
If there is evidence to suggest that the spending is not in accordance with policy or there are indicators of impropriety, then yes, he likely would want those details and he would most certainly get them.
If there are no such indicators, however, then like every other large organization he likely just lets the internal control environment function like it was designed to do.
So my question is why does Skakun want to see this stuff? Is he just doing it for kicks, or does he have reason to believe that city polices are not being followed?
Hmm …. my experience is that a board member (similar to a Councillor) not only has a right, but a duty to probe. The probing is different for an internal individual than it is for an outside auditing company. In fact, many cities have auditors as a position, and in some US cities, it is an elected position.
We have no auditor. There is no one who has an independent position at our city. It is not required. Thus that probing is dependent on Councillors.
Letting the internal control environment function is the position of taken by Stolz.
So, what do we know about the internal control environment. What does it control? How does it control? Who controls it?
Nobody supposedly knew what a company that get paid around $80,000 annually does for the city. 100 of such companies makes $8million. What other 100 companies that get about that amount of money on average every year do we not know anything about?
This company should be on the tip of everyone’s tongue. It was one of the same companies that was probed last year.
To me, the fact that THAT has resulted in this tells me that it was right to probe.
Comments for this article are closed.