Three Mayor Rob Ford allies who helped choose citizen appointees for city agencies stood at council in October to say they knew nothing of a mayor’s list of preferred candidates.“Making up lists!” Councillor Giorgio Mammoliti thundered, scolding city ombudsman Fiona Crean for including evidence of one in her report that concluded other political interference “compromised” the appointment process.
However, emails obtained by the Star under freedom-of-information reveal that assistants of councillors Mammoliti, Michael Thompson and Jaye Robinson were all sent “the mayor’s choices for shortlisting tomorrow” — 30 names for boards of six major agencies — by Pina Martino, then Ford’s special adviser on issues management, on July 17, 2011.
Copied on the email, sent on a Sunday at 4:02 p.m., was Olivia Gondek, then a senior Ford aide responsible for liaison between Ford and councillors.
Mammoliti, Thompson and Robinson — then the only members of Ford’s executive committee also on the civic appointments committee — all say now they never saw the list, that their assistants never forwarded it to them. The assistants all say they have no recollection of the email, although one retrieved it from his account at the Star’s request.
Whether or not they saw the list, says Councillor Janet Davis, a civic appointments chair under former mayor David Miller, the fact the mayor’s office sent the names shows it was trying to influence a process designed to be free of cronyism.
The list emailed by Martino is similar, but with four additional names, to the 26-name list she later filed with the city manager’s office. The latter list’s existence was publicly revealed shortly after the raucous Oct. 4 council meeting at which Mammoliti and Councillor Doug Ford, also on civic appointments, suggested there never was a mayor’s list.
Martino emailing the list to councillors appears contrary to the findings of Crean’s report. It anonymously quotes mayor’s staff — interviewed under oath, as were all witnesses — as saying they had at the meeting, “for their own purposes,” a list compiled from councillor recommendations but didn’t share it with anyone except, later, the city manager’s office.
The mayor told reporters during the uproar he knew of no list. He suggested Crean’s report was politically motivated and that the ombudsman and two other “accountability officer” posts should be replaced with one part-time lawyer.
Martino in September won the provincial Progressive Conservative nomination for Etobicoke Centre and, according to the mayor’s receptionist, no longer works for Ford. Gondek recently moved to Toronto Hydro. Neither responded to the Star’s calls and emails seeking comment. Nor did Ford’s press secretary George Christopolous.
The email trail also shows Councillor Cesar Palacio’s office privately asked Gondek and Councillor Frances Nunziata, chair of the civic appointments committee, to give “a great deal of consideration” to a list of candidates.
It appears that, shortly after the Monday morning shortlisting meeting got started, Gondek forwarded that list to Martino in the committee room. Martino responded two minutes later asking Gondek to “print a few copies and bring them to me in room 4.”
The email from Palacio’s office appears to breach a city directive that stipulates non-appointments committee councillors can recommend board candidates only in public by writing to the city clerk or appearing in front of the committee.
Palacio “doesn’t believe that any council regulations were contravened in this case but that he will make inquiries with the appropriate officials for clarification and will follow up with you at that time,” wrote the councillor’s executive assistant, Mike Makrigiorgos, to the Star last week.
Davis, who was on civic appointments from 2006 to 2010 and chaired it the first two years, went to the July 18, 2011 shortlisting meeting as an observer. Members voted to kick her out after she complained of seeing Martino’s lists on the desks of “several” of them and protested against a mayor’s staffer being allowed to stay when they went in camera.
“This demonstrates that the mayor was attempting to influence through the members of the committee, the appointments and the outcome of those appointments prove that he was successful in doing so,” Davis said.
“This is completely unacceptable. Not once when I was chair did I verbally or in writing get a list of the mayor’s preferred candidates for appointment.
“Over 500 people applied for 18 positions (considered) that day. They have to be assured that their applications were considered in a way that was fair and transparent, and according to a policy that the city has approved.”
City council eventually confirmed committee recommendations for 13 of the people on Martino’s list of 26 names for a board of a city agency, board or commission.
Original Article
Source: the star
Author: David Rider
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