It’s been a strange couple of weeks south of the Fraser River in Delta, where new Mayor (and old city manager) George Harvie got right down to business on his motordom agenda, insisting with the new Metro Mayors’ Council that he still wants the Massey Bridge. The new chair of the Mayors’ Council Jonathan Cote told Mayor Harvie that deciding whether there was going to be a multi-billion dollar ten lane bridge replacing the Massey Tunnel was not in Metro Vancouver’s jurisdiction.
But Mayor Harvie is gathering like-minded pro-bridge people around him, and took the eyebrow raising step of appointing one of the unsuccessful candidates running for council under Harvie’s slate to a position in the mayor’s office. It’s the “director of public engagement and intergovernmental affairs” given to Param Grewal, a $125,000 position. Mr. Grewal is an older vintage as is the mayor, and of course is advocating for the Massey Bridge.
While the Delta Optimist reported on the social media storm about this appointment, Mayor Harvie stated “The mayor needs that and it’s not just the mayor of Delta, they generally hire their own staff. .. I had that position and wanted to get more utility from that position and wanted to hire somebody with the experience Param has. I was very fortunate he decided to take that job. That job is autonomous and is a four-year contract. I had the HR (human resources) staff draw up the contract to make sure it was done properly and within the city’s guidelines, but he does not direct staff and he reports directly to me.”
Previous Mayor Lois Jackson has come back as a Delta city councillor and as a support to Mayor Harvie, who was her hire as Delta city manager. Ms. Jackson spilled the beans when she alluded “In North Delta the demographics are very different than South Delta. We do need to have a conduit between ourselves and the Indo-Canadian community. There’s a lot that goes on that, I think, we can miss. There’s a lot of barriers, in particular, with the senior people.”
What Councillor Jackson is saying is that the support for Mayor Harvie’s election came from North Delta where residents are bullish on big infrastructure projects like the Massey Bridge, and good accessible highways, so it made sense to appoint someone to excluded staff that represented that area. The other two Delta areas, Tsawwassen and Ladner have already experienced a lack of civic public consultation and follow-up with major issues like the continual stench of the Enviro-Smart Organics operation somehow approved on supposedly protected Agricultural Land Reserve. Documentation from Metro Vancouver appears to show that Mayor Harvie “strenuously objected” to a public process and air quality permits for this use as previously documented in Price Tags.
And surprise! According to the Delta Optimist, when returning Councillor Bruce McDonald (who was NOT on Mr. Harvie’s council election slate) was asked about Mayor Harvie’s political hire, he knew nothing about it. That information had not been given to Councillors outside Mr. Harvie’s circle.
“I haven’t got a clue. I haven’t had any communication from the (municipal) hall what it’s all about and we were not told he was being hired. I have no idea what his job description is and I have no idea what he’s being paid.”
