Municipal Governance Expert Doesn’t Expect Return of City Manager
Municipal governance expert George Cuff addressing council in May 2024. (Photo courtesy of the City of Medicine Hat)
A noted consultant on Alberta municipal governance issues isn’t mincing words in his description of the latest actions of Medicine Hat council as the drama at city hall moves into its penultimate phase prior to the election.
“At the end of the day, I would be quite surprised if Ann Mitchell is back to work,” said George Cuff, founder of George B. Cuff & Associates.
City council passed two motions regarding the city manager during a July 28 special council meeting which relieved Mitchell of her duties and appointed a trio of councillors to hire and direct an investigator. That meeting was held without public notice, did not produce an agenda and was held in an unknown forum.
Despite city hall stating on July 29 that the previous day’s meeting saw the motions passed during an open session, city staff didn’t respond to an inquiry by the Owl simply asking the location of the meeting.
Asked whether such procedures are normal, Cuff responded, “I would say it’s not normal so you’re right to raise an eyebrow and issue a question and presumably you’d be able to ask a question of mayor and council.”
The Owl has posed that question to the Mayor Linnsie Clark and council but they’ve choosen not to respond to it.
Cuff went on to state, “No, it’s not normal but I would argue that’s because right now business is not normal for the City of Medicine Hat. They are obviously in a space and time that they think it’s justifiable in terms of them taking action and doing so quickly. . . .This is not normal times.”
In May 2024, Cuff was invited by city hall to present during a committee of a whole meeting followed by a closed session featuring an attempt to help bridge the fractured relationships between the mayor, council and Mitchell.
By that time, there had been a breach of the city’s code of conduct by Clark regarding her interactions with Mitchell during a council meeting the previous August, an investigation launched into that issue and a threat of a defamation lawsuit by the city manager against the mayor. There were also council’s disproportionate sanctions issued against Clark for the code of conduct violation and the filing of a judicial review of restrictions place on her.
Post May 2024, things didn’t get any better.
The judicial review decision was scathing regarding council’s actions, the mayor’s apology to Mitchell was received with some hostility as the city manager responded by stating Clark should also apologize to the entire community and a request for a municipal inspection by the province was sought and received by council. And all that occurred during a three-week period late last summer.
Since that time, there appeared to be little improvement with Cuff suggesting while the inspector’s report brought the issues into focus and likely played a part in council’s decision to relieve Mitchell of her duties.
“I presume that the two events are connected, i.e., the suspension of the CAO (chief administrative officer) and the production of the inspection report,” he said, adding it was not kind to Mitchell, Clark or council.
And the issue is boiled down to one of confidence.
“Does council have the necessary confidence in its CAO as its chief advisor and chief administrator,” said Cuff. “If the issue is no, we just had this major inspection that was critical of us but also critical of our CAO and pointed out our organization is not as unified and supported as we think it should be, therefore we feel we need to act.”
Cuff warned if the next council isn’t prepared to stick to fundamental principles such as knowing the difference between being elected to govern and being hired to manage, a disaster won’t be too far away.