Tenants of the Toronto Community Housing Corporation get bedbugs, while TCHC staff get chocolates from Holt Renfrew.
That, according to a Star source, is just one of the outrageous expenses highlighted in the auditor-general’s report into the workings of the biggest social housing provider in the country.
The bonbons are not the only bombshell. Here, according to our source, is a partial list of what seem to be highly inappropriate expenses: $1,850 for a boat cruise for the purposes of staff development; $1,925 for manicures and pedicures; $6,000 for a planning session in Muskoka; $40,000 for a staff Christmas party in 2009; $53,500 for a similar bash in 2008; $800 for four massage practitioners at a staff picnic. Oh, and those lovely chocolates? They were handed out as gifts for staff, at a cost of $1,000.
What makes things worse, if anything can, is that the money for all these little luxuries is derived from the rent paid by tenants.
200 Wellesley is burning? My nails are drying; I’ll call you back. Al Gosling and Dirty George are dead? I need a massage. And what shall we do about the bedbugs, the drug dealers and the leaky toilets? Let’s meet for a chat in Muskoka.
According to our source, copies of the AG’s report will be delivered to TCHC board members over the weekend and released to the public as early as Monday. The report was originally to have been released at the end of March.
Other details were not available at this time but, the peanut-filled chocolates are peanuts; according to our source, the serious problems have to with repairs, the letting of contracts, the big-ticket stuff.
We’ll know soon enough.
However, the Star has seen an internal briefing document suggesting that the impact of the report will not affect TCHC’s credit rating with Standard and Poor’s, and that “the financial amounts raised in the Auditor-General’s report are well below the materiality thresholds for TCHC.”
Smells like chocolate to me.
But here is where we have to tread carefully: If I read things right — and if my source’s instincts are on point — then the brothers Ford will try to use this report as a wrecking ball.
The fear is that the Fords intend to dismantle TCHC, taking millions of dollars off the city’s budget books, while at the same time freeing tenants to make their own way in the housing marketplace.
That’s just wrong.
The mani-pedis, the massages and the maraschino centres may be an outrage, but killing TCHC would be a disaster. Yes, things are bad in community housing, but the private marketplace is an utter disaster for anyone on welfare or collecting a disability pension.
The solution? Fix what’s broken.
A head or two should roll.
TCHC should stop rewarding people in the hope that they might be persuaded to do a good job.
Back when I was in management school, I learned that you reward good performance; you praise initiative; you let people know when they don’t perform; you offer them the chance to improve; and if they resist, you let them go.
In the case of TCHC, it should also be made clear that the least important staff person in any building is the most important person.
Why?
Because someone pushed a broom past Al Gosling as Al slept in the stairwell after he was evicted; if the person with the broom had taken the initiative, Al would still be alive. Of course, if the person who signed off on the eviction had also taken some initiative . . .
Finally, TCHC has to return to basics. It is a landlord to some 160,000 residents who comprise the most complex group of people in the city. We have a particular obligation to deliver the services they need in the most responsive way possible. If that means a return to in-house social work, in-house cleaning and building management, so be it.
Of course, it would help if the province resumed its responsibilities. If they did that, I’d buy the damned chocolates.
That, according to a Star source, is just one of the outrageous expenses highlighted in the auditor-general’s report into the workings of the biggest social housing provider in the country.
The bonbons are not the only bombshell. Here, according to our source, is a partial list of what seem to be highly inappropriate expenses: $1,850 for a boat cruise for the purposes of staff development; $1,925 for manicures and pedicures; $6,000 for a planning session in Muskoka; $40,000 for a staff Christmas party in 2009; $53,500 for a similar bash in 2008; $800 for four massage practitioners at a staff picnic. Oh, and those lovely chocolates? They were handed out as gifts for staff, at a cost of $1,000.
What makes things worse, if anything can, is that the money for all these little luxuries is derived from the rent paid by tenants.
200 Wellesley is burning? My nails are drying; I’ll call you back. Al Gosling and Dirty George are dead? I need a massage. And what shall we do about the bedbugs, the drug dealers and the leaky toilets? Let’s meet for a chat in Muskoka.
According to our source, copies of the AG’s report will be delivered to TCHC board members over the weekend and released to the public as early as Monday. The report was originally to have been released at the end of March.
Other details were not available at this time but, the peanut-filled chocolates are peanuts; according to our source, the serious problems have to with repairs, the letting of contracts, the big-ticket stuff.
We’ll know soon enough.
However, the Star has seen an internal briefing document suggesting that the impact of the report will not affect TCHC’s credit rating with Standard and Poor’s, and that “the financial amounts raised in the Auditor-General’s report are well below the materiality thresholds for TCHC.”
Smells like chocolate to me.
But here is where we have to tread carefully: If I read things right — and if my source’s instincts are on point — then the brothers Ford will try to use this report as a wrecking ball.
The fear is that the Fords intend to dismantle TCHC, taking millions of dollars off the city’s budget books, while at the same time freeing tenants to make their own way in the housing marketplace.
That’s just wrong.
The mani-pedis, the massages and the maraschino centres may be an outrage, but killing TCHC would be a disaster. Yes, things are bad in community housing, but the private marketplace is an utter disaster for anyone on welfare or collecting a disability pension.
The solution? Fix what’s broken.
A head or two should roll.
TCHC should stop rewarding people in the hope that they might be persuaded to do a good job.
Back when I was in management school, I learned that you reward good performance; you praise initiative; you let people know when they don’t perform; you offer them the chance to improve; and if they resist, you let them go.
In the case of TCHC, it should also be made clear that the least important staff person in any building is the most important person.
Why?
Because someone pushed a broom past Al Gosling as Al slept in the stairwell after he was evicted; if the person with the broom had taken the initiative, Al would still be alive. Of course, if the person who signed off on the eviction had also taken some initiative . . .
Finally, TCHC has to return to basics. It is a landlord to some 160,000 residents who comprise the most complex group of people in the city. We have a particular obligation to deliver the services they need in the most responsive way possible. If that means a return to in-house social work, in-house cleaning and building management, so be it.
Of course, it would help if the province resumed its responsibilities. If they did that, I’d buy the damned chocolates.
