Peterborough city hall shuffles its upper management unexpectedly

Consider it like a game of municipal musical chairs, as the City of Peterborough looks to shake up its upper management depth chart.

“In the last month, month-and-a-half or two months, the directors and CAO have sat down and discussed in some detail and quite candidly what we need to do to move the city forward,” said Wayne Jackson, the director of community services and deputy CAO.

That includes Allan Seabrooke stepping down as chief administrative officer to replace Ken Doherty, who is retiring in June as the director of community services.

But that’s just the tip of the organizational shuffle as a report going to council Monday night recommends the city reduce its current five director positions down to three commissioner roles.

Replacing Seabrooke as CAO will be Sandra Clancy, the current treasurer and director of corporate services, who brings 33 years of experience working at city hall.

Meanwhile, Jackson will remain on as deputy CAO and take over the commissioner of infrastructure and planning position, while city solicitor Patricia Lester will take over as commissioner of corporate and legislative services.

“The departure of Ken Doherty was going to leave a big hole in the organization with some major files outstanding,” said Mayor Daryl Bennett.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "The departure of Ken Doherty was going to leave a big hole in the organization with some major files outstanding," said Mayor Daryl Bennett.

“The arena in the north end and the new study for the OHL (Ontario Hockey League) facility and a number of others of similar projects of that ilk were going to take a new person some time to get up to speed on.”

Seabrooke wrote the report and was unavailable for comment as he is currently out of the country on holidays, but he brings previous experience as a community services director with the city of Waterloo and was the one who made the recommendations to change roles.

“What we have here is a person who looked at the wellness and well-being of the community ahead of himself,” said Jackson.

In the report, Seabrooke suggests retirements will lead to staffing shortages and so now is the time for restructuring.

The report doesn’t present Seabrooke’s role change as a demotion but its timing comes just weeks after some recent municipal deals fell through including the proposed sale of Peterborough Distribution Inc. to Hydro One and land annexation negotiations with Cavan-Monaghan Township that fell apart.

“I had a meeting with Allan and I posed that question, ‘Do you see this as a demotion?'” said Ashburnham ward Coun. Keith Riel. “And whether he was following the party line, if you want to call it that.

There are no budget implications for 2018 with the management shuffle, but the report doesn’t provide any clues of potential cost increases in 2019 when the city will have to hire a new solicitor — and according to the report, each commissioner and CAO will receive pay upgrades.

The report will be at city hall next Monday night and it will be up to the councillors to approve the new leadership model.