With a large section of city workers allowed to retire in the coming years, the mayor wants to take a serious look at attrition.
The city has 142 of its 1,855 employees, not counting the Thunder Bay Police Service or TbayTel, eligible for retirement this year alone. Mayor Keith Hobbs said he believes it’s time for every department in the city to see if those jobs need to be replaced.
"I watch people snow shovel out front (of city hall) and five people are shoveling. You know, maybe we can get away with three," Hobbs said. "Maybe there are part-time jobs that we can cut. I’d just like to see us look at it. We always have to be doing that. We always have to be vigilant when we’re looking at the taxpayer’s dollars."
But CUPE Local 87 president Marie Dean, who represents over 500 city workers, said the shoveling Hobbs sees is done by contract, not city employees. When her members did the work, only one person was necessary. Dean said hiring city workers to do that job might save the city money.
"When he’s talking about contracting work out maybe he wants to contract it back in and higher CUPE members to do that work at a much lesser amount of money," Dean said.
City manager Tim Commisso has been tasked with bringing a report to city council on the issue, although no timeline has been set.
"I think this should be an ongoing process. We should be looking at our organization all the time. So there’s no real timeline on it, just on a go forward basis," Hobbs said.
He cautioned that he wouldn’t want to see layoffs or a reduction in city services, but cited golf and homes for the aged as departments that could maybe use attrition to save money.
"I’d hate to see people lose their jobs. That’s not the exercise here."
As a retired police officer, Hobbs saw the department go from two to seven inspectors during his time on the force. He said every position in the city should be looked at once someone retires.
"Each department has to look and say ‘can we do better or the same with less?’" It’s not just going to be that we’re looking at the unionized workers. We have to look at management as well. Are we too top heavy?"
Although some cities, including Toronto, have started looking at privatization of services to save money, Hobbs said he doesn’t know if such a pro-union city like Thunder Bay would want to move in that direction.
"I don’t know whether we’d have the stomach to do that, privatization, but I think you have to look at it. You have to look at all angles. You have to run the city as efficient as you can."
Local union leaders say they’re disappointed to hear Hobbs’ comments after he was endorsed by the Lakehead District Labour Council in the past election. Dean said the council takes they’re endorsement seriously and what Hobbs said before being elected and what he’s saying now doesn’t add up.
"The premise perhaps under which he was elected is not maybe exactly what people thought it was so I’m surprised," Dean said.
