By Pepper Parr
July 28th, 2025
BURLINGTON, ON
We published a piece early this morning about the two very demanding jobs Curt Benson will take on starting August 2nd.
Readership was brisk.
Curt Benson: Takes the helm as CAO on August 2nd.
Shortly after the noon hour, we received the following from the City Communications people:
We’re just writing to seek a correction in the article “Curt Benson takes on a back breaking job on August 2nd – will be both the CAO and Development Commissioner until November of 2026”
We wanted to confirm/clarify for you that the City is actually in the process of actively recruiting for Curt’s backfill for the Commissioner role, and we expect to be able to share more about the outcome of that process in the coming weeks.
What did they want corrected?
The city never said anything about “actively recruiting for Curt’s backfill for the Commissioner role” in the original media release – there was no correction to be made.
A little more in the way of “clarity” on the process the city is using.
Is the active recruiting for someone who will replace Curt Benson as Commissioner: Development and Growth? Or will the person fill in for some of the work Benson did as Commissioner?
We could find nothing in the way of a job posting on the city website – but that is not unusual – the city website has always been difficult to navigate. Putting a date on everything and then listing items in chronological order would be a very useful first step.
This suggestion will never make its way to the people who upgrade and maintain the website – in Burlington, the departments don’t talk to each other. That is partially due to the number of people who work virtually.
Final question is: Given that the Mayor has the power to appoint whoever she wants as the city Chief Administrative Officer, why bring Benson in until a new Council islsworn in November of 2026?
“Final question is: Given that the Mayor has the power to appoint whoever she wants as the city Chief Administrative Officer, why bring Benson in until a new Council is sworn in November of 2026?’
My answer to this question would be should the mayor decide to run for re-election and win she might decide that she can’t work with Curt Benson. Instead of having to fire him and having to pay him out of his contract he will be done and she can look for a new CAO.
I hope that Mr. Benson is using this as stepping stone to a better position in another municipality.
This is a typical and ongoing issue with our current mayor and council. They operate behind closed doors all of the time, until if and when they decide to release certain information only to their residents who pay their salaries!!
And not acceptable!