By Pepper Parr
July 10th, 2024
BURLINGTON, ON
The makeup of Burlington’s organization chart is going to become known in bits and pieces.
Jacqueline Johnson is second from the right; Blake Hurley is to her left.
Jacqueline Johnson, seen at a Committee of the Whole this week, is the Commissioner of Community Services responsible for overseeing:
Transit
Recreation, Community and Culture
Fire
Customer Experience
Blake Hurley is the Commissioner for Legal and Legislative Services. He is also the City Solicitor. He is serving as Interim CAO while Hassaan Basit is away. Communications did not confirm that he is on vacation.
The current organizational chart for the City of Burlington
A better sense as to the size of the staffing compliment can be seen from the organizational chart for the Digital Services Division. The chart was a “for discussion” document. Roll your cursor over the image to enlarge the type.
The chart was published as a “for discussion” document.
85 people in just the Digital Services Division? Am I reading that correctly? Should be more like 5 to 10 people, max! No way there’s a need for that many people. Here’s the crux of the problem: City of Burlington is a business… run by non-business people. Put this in the hands of the private sector and we’d cut staff by 50% or more and increase productivity by 300%. I have no doubt that our elected officials and municipal workers honestly feel like they’re doing their best, and doing what’s best for the taxpayers of Burlington, but that’s because most have never worked in the private sector where efficiencies and productivity matter, or they have worked in private sector but couldn’t hack it, and found comfort in the thick concrete confines of City Hall. They don’t know what they don’t know, and we as taxpayers are paying the price for it. A serious overhaul of the way City of Burlington does business is long overdue.
With all due respect, this very popular view of the natural advantages of the private sector to conducting public business is both simplistic and inaccurate. First, the public sector can never be identical in its operation to the private sector because its main “business” is stewardship and several of its ‘business lines’ defy placement on a P&L sheet. That said, the public sector should always have the same regard for fiscal prudence, efficiency/effectiveness of operation and customer satisfaction. I am most familiar with the Provincial Government and over the last 25 years it has “privatized” road maintenance, driver examination, driver and vehicle transactions, Hwy #407, the enterprise data network and integrated fare card (Presto) to name a few of the more prominent divestitures. Are these run more efficiently – not really; are they more economical – absolutely not; do they provide better customer fulfilment – perhaps. The point is the public sector has a responsibility to the public good that is not totally or equally shared by the private sector so when comparing the two one must be careful to recognize the differences. I am not an apologist for the public sector and believe that it has many valuable lessons to learn from private business. However, I believe that the City of Burlington is not a well run public sector organization and is years behind in its implementation of a whole series of governance and operational best practices. The new organization that is being presented in progressive levels of detail is a case in point.
There are many who feel as frustrated as James who would agree with you Blair.
I refer to it as the ‘colour-coated paper clip’ where needed capital is diverted away from the production of saleable products into the abyss of administrative wants; I’m given to understand that Adam Smith is no longer covered in business school, pity.
I’ve seen org charts for multi-national corporations that look flatter than Burlington’s.
Nine heads and Commissioners? Seriously? For a City with 200,000 residents. Can someone please explain to me how Markham, Richmond Hill and Oakville manage with far fewer.
BTW…I suggest a change in the title of this article. Burlington: A City that Keeps Growing its Bureaucracy!
Agree
Talk about shuffling the deck chairs.This org chart looks like a sign that trouble lies ahead, designed so no one will be responsible for anything.
When I look at the sheer size and descriptions of the Digital Services Division personnel and its planned growth it is little wonder that citizens are feeling overtaxed. I suggest we outsource IT completely for starters. This is government out of control. I will help prepare the RFP free of charge.
Any chance any of these departments will face cuts before the Mayor asks residents for 8%+ tax increase in 2025 after 14%+ over the last 2 years? There is just 1 taxpayer and we are getting creamed from all levels of Government, inflation and high interest rates. We need to install a City Council that will make deep cuts and soon. Speak up Taxpayers of Burlington – send a strong message to your councillor to reduce spending now!
Get your megaphone out Phil for this message it needs to get out there to get the truth out about our council who see, hear or speak no evil about their 6 years of financially devestating decisions.
Well, if we need to look at the most obvious division in which staff cuts could most readily be accomplished, it may well be that of the Chief Information Officer (CIO). Yes, I know that this is the “information age” and that the key to business and organizational transformation is through the media of information and digital services. But, having actually been a CIO with a client/service base much larger than the City of Burlington, I can confidently say that this is not a skeleton organization by any means. It is function and resource rich. My fundamental problem with it is that it has not really proven itself or delivered anything even approaching competence let alone transformation. It is an organization designed and built on the sifting sands of future promises. I much prefer incremental approaches where achievements are the foundation and justification for subsequent resource deployment – and, in all cases, the justification includes realized cost savings, honest efficiency/effectiveness improvements and observable increases in customer service and satisfaction. We shall see where this all leads but my immediate suspicion is not much of anywhere. I also suspect that we shall probably see Mr. MacDonald in another jurisdiction within two years – with a CV that touts all the story-line benefits that he laid at the door of Tim Commisso.
As far as the strangely patchwork assembly of services called Community Services and under the direction of Commissioner Jacqueline Johnson, I would like to reflect on her previous program and policy observations. I would like to but I honestly can’t find any. Has she, to anyone’s knowledge ever opened her mouth at Council or at Committee? As such, she is a reasonably good choice – she may not have contributed anything yet (after 2 years?) but she also hasn’t alienated anyone either. If she can continue to keep her head down and her silence golden, she may survive the Meed Ward/Basrit experiment.
It’s more like 18 months. She was hired January 2023.
She has answered questions from time to time at committee/council, but there is no way to find when due to the poor standard of minute taking.
I do remember she gave a presentation with two other Executive Directors when I was present at a committee meeting. It was at the CPRM June 27, 2023 Item 5.2.
True in all respects Jim. I should have been more precise both as to the timing of Ms. Johnson’s arrival and the nature of her “substantive contributions”. Just my opinion after all and as the poet said “ad infernum et coquam awhile”.
You get a new job as CEO ….then take a vacation.??
If true then the corporate world is changing.