1.             VACANT POSITIONS

 

                POSTES VACANTS

 

 

 

COMMITTEE RECOMMENDATIONS AS AMENDED

 

That Council approve:

 

1.                  That if a position in the City remains open (vacant) for a period of two years from the date that it last had an Owner that the position be declared as surplus to the Corporation’s needs and that the budget allocation and FTE(s) associated with the position be removed from the corresponding departmental budget; and

 

2.                  That should there be a substantive reason that the position remain open that a staff report be brought before the appropriate Standing Committee for their consideration with a reason why the position is still needed and with a plan that will ensure that the position is filled.

 

 

RecommandationS MODIFIÉES DU Comité

 

Que le Conseil approuve :

 

1.         Qu’un poste qui demeure ouvert (vacant) pour une période de deux ans soit déclaré inutile pour les besoins de la Ville, et que les allocations budgétaires et les ÉTP associés à ce poste soient retirés du budget du service correspondant;

 

2.         Qu’un poste que l’on estime devoir garder ouvert pour une raison importante fasse l’objet d’un rapport du personnel, présenté au comité permanent approprié, faisant état des raisons pour lesquelles ce poste est nécessaire et accompagné d’un plan visant à le pourvoir.

 

 

 

 

 

Documentation

 

1.                  Corporate Services and Economic Development Committee’s report dated 9 February 2010 (ACS2010-CMR-CSE-0011).

 

2.         Extract of Draft Minute, 2 March 2010.

 


Report to / Rapport au :

 

Corporate Services and Economic Development Committee

Comité des services organistionnels et du dévelopment économique

 

and Council / et Conseil

 

9 February 2010 / le 9 février 2010

 

Submitted by / Soumis par : City Council / Conseil municipal

 

Contact / Personne-ressource : Carole Langford, Committee Coordinator /
Coordonnateur du comité,
City Clerk’s Branch/Direction du greffe
580-2424, Ext. / poste : 28934, Carole.Langford@ottawa.ca

 

City Wide / À l'échelle de la Ville

Ref N°:  ACS2010-CMR-CSE-0011

 

 

SUBJECT:    VACANT POSITIONS

 

OBJET :         POSTES VACANTS

 

 

REPORT RECOMMENDATION

 

That Corporate Services and Economic Development Committee consider the following motion, for recommendation to Council:

 

1.                  That if a position in the City remains open (vacant) for a period of two years from the date that it last had an Owner that the position be declared as surplus to the Corporation’s needs and that the budget allocation and FTE(s) associated with the position be removed from the corresponding departmental budget; and

 

2.                  That should there be a substantive reason that the position remain open that a staff report be brought before the appropriate Standing Committee for their consideration with a reason why the position is still needed and with a plan that will ensure that the position is filled.

 

 

RECOMMANDATION DU RAPPORT

 

Que le Comité des services organisationnels et du développement économique recommande au Conseil d’examiner la motion suivante aux fins de recommandation au Conseil :

 

1.         Qu’un poste qui demeure ouvert (vacant) pour une période de deux ans soit déclaré inutile pour les besoins de la Ville, et que les allocations budgétaires et les ÉTP associés à ce poste soient retirés du budget du service correspondant;

 

2.         Qu’un poste que l’on estime devoir garder ouvert pour une raison importante fasse l’objet d’un rapport du personnel, présenté au comité permanent approprié, faisant état des raisons pour lesquelles ce poste est nécessaire et accompagné d’un plan visant à le pourvoir.

 

 

BACKGROUND

 

City Council, at its meetings held between 25 and 28 January 2010, referred the following motion to the Corporate Services and Economic Development Committee for consideration:

 

That Motion No. 82/27 be referred to Corporate Services and Economic Development Committee

 

 

MOTION NO. 82/27

 

WHEREAS the City of Ottawa Organizational Chart is produced from the HR databases (SAP-HR) and is refreshed on a daily basis, meaning the chart is always up-to-date as a result of the Request for Personnel Action (RPA) and Organizational and Positional Change Approval (OPCA) process; and

 

WHEREAS the City Managers have a wide array of SAP-HR reporting available to them, specifically, the Position Incumbent Report, which provides information on the status of positions (whether they are permanent, temporary, casual, vacant, filled on a temporary or acting basis), as well as identifies the owners and holders, their union affiliation and pay grade; and

 

WHEREAS Full Time Equivalents (FTE) are used for budgetary purposes to quantify the number of FTE positions approved by Council and one FTE may equal the following hours per year: 1,820 (35 hours/week), 1,950 (37.5 hours/week), 2,080 (40 hours/week) or 2184 (42 hours/week), depending on the collective agreement associated with the work. The FTE count is used to quantify annualized hours for positions to provide for a standard, universally accepted means of comparability and is the accepted basis for comparison with other organizations and municipalities; and

 

WHEREAS positions are created from FTEs based on operational requirements to deliver services. Positions are categorized as full-time, part-time, salary, wage, casual and student and are based on the type of staff required to the work; and

 

WHEREAS temporary positions are established to meet short-term operational needs, and they are funded from multiple sources, including one-time funding, capital projects, federal or provincial funding, or gapping from vacant positions; and

 

WHEREAS a true vacancy is defined as a position not having an owner and not filled by anyone placed temporarily or acting in the position and no staffing action against them.  This excludes seasonal and summer student positions, and a position shown as open until a permanent staffing action is completed within SAP and varies from one position to another. Information on how long a position is vacant can be generated from SAP and is reviewed quarterly by management. Options and strategies for positions that lay vacant for extended periods of time are reviewed by the departments on a regular basis in order to meet service delivery requirements; and

 

WHEREAS acting or temporary assignments are governed by the various Collective Agreements and the lengths of term vary from six to eighteen months; 

 

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that if a position in the City remains open (vacant) for a period of two years from the date that it last had an Owner that the position be declared as surplus to the Corporation’s needs and that the budget allocation and FTE(s) associated with the position be removed from the corresponding departmental budget; and

 

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that should there be a substantive reason that the position remain open that a staff report be brought before the appropriate Standing Committee for their consideration with a reason why the position is still needed and with a plan that will ensure that the position is filled.

 

 

DISCUSSION

 

Human Resources

 

It is suggested that   Managers with vacancies remaining for a period of two years, report back to Standing Committees with justification as to why the position is still needed and staffing action plan. 

 

There are currently 40 positions that meet the two year threshold.   Some of these positions are intentionally held vacant in order to facilitate the progression of employees through apprenticeship and training programs as they advance through levels of proficiency.   HR will work with Managers to initiate a process to review any positions that have been vacant for more than 24 months and   report back to respective Standing Committee   by the end of second quarter 2010.  On a go forward basis, the Annual FTE Analysis Report that is submitted as part of the budget submission in Q4 will include a status update on any positions that fall within this category.

 

 

CONSULTATION

 

This item will be advertised in the local dailies as part of the Public Meeting Advertisement on Friday preceding the Community and Protective Services Committee Meeting.

 

 

RURAL IMPLICATIONS

 

N/A

 

 

LEGAL/RISK MANAGEMENT IMPLICATIONS

 

There are no legal/risk management implications associated with the recommendations contained in the report, provided that any collective agreement obligations are respected, such as the minimum staffing obligations contained in the Ottawa Professional Fire Fighters’ Association collective agreement.

 

 

FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS

 

Removal of an FTE and budget allocation would result in a compensation budget savings. The identified savings would be accounted for in the annual budget process whereby annual budgets are adjusted for permanent changes identified throughout the year.

 

 

DISPOSITION

 

Staff to take appropriate action as directed by the Committee and Council.

 



1.         VACANT POSITIONS

POSTES VACANTS

ACS2010-CMR-CSE-0011                            CITY WIDE / À L'ECHELLE DE LA VILLE

 

Mr. Clarence Dungey spoke on items 1 and 2 concurrently (Vacant Positions – ACS2010-CMR-CSE-0011 and Vacant Positions Due to Retirement – ACS2010-CMR-CSE-0012).  He reported having attended a number of election-related meetings recently and talking to people about perception.  He felt that because the general public did not have all the facts, people were left with a flawed understanding.  Therefore, on the question of perception, he recommended that before proceeding with the subject at hand, Council should consider what the perception was, amongst the general public and amongst City staff.  He suggested considering a summit-type meeting of all the City’s managers because he believed there were questions that needed asking and answers to be heard.  He posited that, good or bad, there were all kinds of reasons why people retired and why vacancies were not filled.  However, he maintained these positions all had one thing in common; impact on services.  In closing, he submitted that Councillors may, inadvertently, not have all the information needed and that they should dig deeper to find out why vacancies were not being filled. 

 

Councillor Wilkinson liked the presenter’s recommendation about meeting with people.  However, she did not believe these items needed to be held up in order for it to happen.

 

At this juncture, Councillor Wilkinson introduced a motion calling on Committee to “approve” the report recommendations. 

 

Councillor Deans asked for a staff comment on the recommendations:  whether staff supported moving forward in this way and what was magical about two years as opposed to one year or 18 months.  Ms. Elizabeth Marland, Manager of Compensation and Benefits and Acting Director of Human Resources, stated there was nothing magical about the two year timeframe, noting staff could report on positions that had been vacant for one year or more, or for 18 months or more, depending on what Council felt was appropriate.  However, in light of the current recommendations, staff had done the analysis for two years.  In terms of whether staff supported moving forward with the recommendations, she felt there were good reasons for positions to have remained vacant and advised that Human Resources would be working with managers to address the issue. 

 

When asked for examples of good reasons for positions to have remained vacant, Ms. Marland advised some positions had been held open because of on-going restructuring.  In some cases, funding for the permanent positions was being used to fill temporary requirements.  In other cases, positions were held for training purposes, so the funding was used to bring employees into the organization and have them trained to fill the vacant positions. 

 

Councillor Deans felt training was a valid reason, whereas she felt using the money for other purposes was not a good reason.  She maintained that these “other purposes” should be reflected in the budget rather than taking the funds from phantom positions.  Ms. Marland explained that there may be temporary requirements to fill operational needs.  However, she advised there were very few such positions. 

 

As an example, Mr. Steve Kanellakos, Deputy City Manager of Community and Protective Services, referenced a memorandum of agreement with the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) to hold open a number of maintenance positions in Public Works because of change over between seasonal operations.  He advised that management was supportive of the motion.  He felt it was good practice, from an accountability perspective, to review vacant positions from time to time.  However, he added that there were gapping provisions built into the budget and he advised that even through positions may be held vacant, the money was not sitting there because any surpluses at the end of the year were contributed to the budget, which had already been reduced for the forecast in terms of the number of positions that would remain vacant in the organization.  Therefore, Financial Services would withdraw those dollars, on a monthly basis, from the various departments, so these funds would not be accessible to go towards a vacancy factor, which was built into the budget.  He reminded Committee that the City budget was reduced by 1.6% of compensation on an annual basis and adjusted, depending on the actual experience, to reflect the number of vacant positions in the organization.

 

Ms. Simulik confirmed that there was a 1.6% vacancy allowance built into every department’s budget and that she had another 1%, which she assigned during the year.  Therefore there was 2.6% of the compensation budget, which was actually removed right off the top to account for vacancies or turn-over throughout the year.  She acknowledged that there were 40 positions that had been vacant for two years but she advised that the City had not been taxing for these because the gapping reduces the tax requirement.  The cost of those 40 positions would have been accounted for in the gapping.

 

Responding to a question from Councillor Deans with respect to the financial impact of the 40 positions referenced in the report, Ms. Marland indicated she did not have a percentage figure on hand.  However, she noted that there were approximately 15,000 positions in the City so these positions would be 40 out of 15,000.  Ms. Simulik advised that the average compensation costs, including benefits, was somewhere around $60,000 per position.  Therefore the impact would be about $240,000 out of a total compensation budget of $1 billion, so less than 1%.

 

Noting the gapping provisions that were built into the budget, Chair Jellett wondered if approving the recommendations would amount to double counting these 40 positions.  Ms. Simulik clarified that it would not be a double count.  However, she advised that it would put the City at risk of having a deficit in its compensation amount because gapping would still be built into the budget and, if departments did not have the vacancies, the result would be a deficit in the compensation line.

 

Responding to a question from Councillor Desroches with respect to how the budget was built in terms of human resource needs, Ms. Simulik explained that temporary positions were added into the gross, budgeted for at mid-range, and then the total compensation was reduced by 1.6% within the departments and another 1% for non-departmental.  This was done to account for the fact that not all positions were filled for the entire year.

 

Councillor Desroches wondered why the City would not simply ask managers to identify what they needed, in terms of human resources and knowing that some positions would be in transition, to do what they were supposed to do and then submit that instead of some phantom numbers.  Ms. Simulik indicated she would not refer to them as phantom numbers, noting this was the City’s historical trends in terms of looking at what the gross compensation was and what actually ended up being spent at the end of the year.  She explained that management recognized there would be turn-over in the organization and that this would traditionally account for about 2.6% of the total compensation budget.  She submitted that Council could ask a particular manager precisely what he or she needed, but managers would not know which employees might decide to leave and they would probably come up with the exact same number as was obtained through the gapping provision.

 

Councillor Desroches maintained that the 40 positions referenced in the current report had been vacant for two years.  Therefore, he was included to support the recommendation because he felt that was a sufficient amount of time to indicate these positions were not critical.  However, he recognized that this was a dynamic organization; that people were coming and going all the time and some re-organization was ongoing.  He wondered how difficult it would be for managers to create new positions, if needed.  From a budgetary perspective, Ms. Simulik advised that if Council eliminated these positions, there would be no ability to create a new position until another FTE was approved by Council in the next budget cycle.  However, assuming it was the same position as existed before, it was not that difficult because it existed; there was a job description and it had been through the classification process.  She deferred to Ms. Marland to discuss timelines for same.

 

Ms. Marland advised that creating a new position would take approximately one to two months.  The manager would have to identify the needs and a job description would need to be developed.  This would then go through a joint management union rating team.  Therefore, it was normally a one to two month timeframe.

 

Mr. Kanellakos re-iterated that staff was supportive of the report recommendations; that positions having been vacant for two years be declared surplus and that managers have to bring back the requirement in order to have the position.  He felt it was an important accountability tool.  He noted these were 40 positions out of 15,000 and that they were spread across almost every department.  He submitted it would not be a burden and advised that management would monitor it and, if there was a valid need, staff would be back before Committee and Council to justify the position(s). 

 

Councillor Desroches agreed with Mr. Kanellakos’ comments and advised that he would be supporting the recommendations.

 

In response to a question from Councillor Qadri with respect to the positions held vacant for training purposes, Ms. Marland explained that when someone was brought in for training, during their training period, they were working at a lower level and not actually occupying the vacant position, though their compensation during training would be funded by that vacant position.  Once they were fully qualified, they would then move into the position on a full-time basis. 

 

Councillor Qadri wondered if some temporary or casual positions could be used for this purpose instead of maintaining these vacant positions.  Ms. Marland explained that during the training period, the City actually created temporary positions for these employees, but that these were funded from the full-time vacancy.

 

Councillor Qadri inquired as to how positions were funded when their work related to a specific capital project.  Ms. Simulik explained the process followed was that the City charged to the capital account whatever labour costs were involved in the delivery of that capital project.  She advised the actual salary was budgeted for within the operating branch and then was recovered from capital.  As an example, she indicated that if an individual was not working on a capital project, their compensation would be 100% funded from the operating budget.  If that individual started working on a capital projects, then a portion of their salary would be recovered from the capital budget so there would be a net savings in the operating budget for that particular position.  She noted this was fairly rare because management knew who working in capital and these positions were set-up this way at the beginning of the year.  It was fairly unusual to have someone who did not work in capital suddenly be assigned to work on a capital project.

 

Councillor Qadri wondered what happened to such surpluses at the end of the year.  Ms. Simulik advised that any such surpluses would become part of the total City position and would go to offset other deficits within the City or be contributed to the City-wide reserve.

 

Responding to a follow-up question from the Councillor with respect to the positions associated with the infrastructure projects that came in during the previous year, Ms. Simulik advised that the majority of the positions in Mr. Newell’s shop were recovered from capital.

 

Councillor Bloess wondered if it would have been more appropriate to deal with this issue at budget time in order to account for any savings in this year’s budget.  Ms. Simulik acknowledged that would have been better timing if Council wanted to eliminate the positions and have a budget savings.  However, she believed the departments would have been asking Council to reduce their gapping provisions accordingly so there most likely would not have been a net savings.

 

Based on the information received so far, Councillor Bloess believed management staff was already managing this issue.  Therefore, he wondered what the actual savings would be, if Committee and Council approved this now.  Mr. Kanellakos advised it was unlikely that there would be any savings.  He submitted the true intent of the recommendations related to more accountability with respect to positions left vacant for a length of time and he re-iterated management’s support for this. 

 

Councillor Bloess agreed with Mr. Kanellakos’ assessment in terms of the recommendations’ intent.  However, he believed there was a perception that the City had been over-charging taxpayers for these positions.  He re-iterated his belief that Council should have dealt with this at budget time. 

 

Responding to a question from Councillor Monette with respect to any future impact of this decision, Mr. Kanellakos submitted that management would have to be careful of not double-counting for any of these positions.  Otherwise, he felt the issue would be that, if a manager believed, after reviewing a position that had been vacant for two years, that the position should be cut, then the manager would make this decision in the best interest of the budget and of balancing out the workload.  On the other hand, if a manager felt the position was really needed, then he or she should justify it.

 

Councillor Wilkinson expressed a preference for a “clean” budget so that if money was needed for interns or things of that nature, it should be a corporate budget rather than using another position to pay for it.  Therefore, she recommended that Committee and Council approve the current report. 

 

Councillor Brooks recalled that several years prior, he had brought a similar motion, which resulted in a $10M savings.  He wondered what the difference was between now and then.  Ms. Simulik indicated she did not remember the substance of the Councillor’s previous motion. 

 

Councillor Brooks explained that his advisory finance committee had gone through, looked at the numbers and found there was a discrepancy between the number of employees and the revenue on the other side.  He believed it had related to approximately 800 vacancies, with about 100 under negotiation to be filled.  As a result, the balance of these positions were closed off, for a saving of $10M.  Mr. Kanellakos seemed to recall the outcome of the motion was that the vacancy factor was increased and the money was harder lined in terms of the amount by which the compensation budget was reduced to account for the number of vacancies.  He believed this related to the City Treasurer’s references to 1.6% and an additional 1% of the compensation budget coming off the bottom line to account for turn-over in the organization.

 

Responding to a question from Councillor El-Chantiry with respect to positions held open for training purposes, Mr. Kanellakos believed about 15 of the 40 positions fell into this category in terms of training for advance care paramedics, building officials and so on.  He explained that the City was bringing staff in at a lower level of pay, training them and trying to get them into the job because of an inability to recruit at the higher level due to market conditions in these fields.  He suggested that the senior management team would bring back a report to identify these positions and he hoped Committee and Council would support this.  He submitted that Council would then know that the identified positions, out of the 40 referenced in the current report, were for this specific purpose.  He re-iterated his belief that it would not be a burden for the respective directors to review the positions, make a decision as to whether to cut them or to come back to Committee and Council to ask that they be retained.

 

In response to follow-up questions from the Councillor, Mr. Kanellakos confirmed that this particular report would not result in savings because this money had already been accounted for and that if managers needed the positions, they would have to come back to Committee and Council to justify the need.

 

Following these exchanges, Committee voted on a motion from Councillor Wilkinson.

 

Moved by Councillor M. Wilkinson

 

That the Corporate Services and Economic Development Committee approve the report recommendation.

 

                                                                                                CARRIED

 

Committee then voted on the item, as amended.

 

That Corporate Services and Economic Development Committee approve the following motion, for recommendation to Council:

 

1.                  That if a position in the City remains open (vacant) for a period of two years from the date that it last had an Owner that the position be declared as surplus to the Corporation’s needs and that the budget allocation and FTE(s) associated with the position be removed from the corresponding departmental budget; and

 


2.                  That should there be a substantive reason that the position remain open that a staff report be brought before the appropriate Standing Committee for their consideration with a reason why the position is still needed and with a plan that will ensure that the position is filled.

 

                                                                                                            CARRIED as amended