Centre Wellington's Chief Administrative Officer is recommending the township create six new staff positions in 2022. Two of the positions involve moving existing temporary or part-time roles to permanent full-time.
At Monday's committee of the whole meeting, councillors agreed to include the proposed positions in the upcoming draft budget. They'll decide which ones get funding during budget deliberations later this year.
The total salaries and benefits for the six potential new township employees is $429,202.
The proposed positions are:
- Health and safety position, would develop, implement, and evaluate employee health and safety programs and services to meet goals and legal obligations, along with overseeing all matters related to health and safety for the township.
- Digital media association, currently a temporary part-time position focused on tourism, would move to full-time permanent to assist with township corporate communications in addition to current responsibilities
- Information Technology Coordinator, part-time position would help existing IT division keep up with increased workload
- Seasonal employee for Elora and Fergus downtown, would improve cleanliness and provide additional snow shovelling/removal in the downtowns and public spaces from November to April
- Wastewater Operator, staff say additional operator needed to ensure existing wastewater and stormwater assets are properly maintained and inspected given growth in the township
- Recreation programmer, currently a temporary full-time position would move to permanent full-time and continue to assist with expanding and developing recreation programming in the township
Council voted 5-2 to include the new positions in the draft budget. Those in favour were councillors Ian MacRae, Kirk McElwain and Neil Dunsmore, along with Mayor Kelly Linton. Councillors Stephen Kitras and Bob Foster were opposed.
"I consider the proposed hires as reasonable," MacRae said. "And I appreciate the need for a dedicated health and safety officer. I used to do that in a past life and it's pretty time consuming."
Meanwhile Foster said the township had been in a pattern of escalating spending, borrowing and hiring for the past eight to ten years.
"I won't support this, Andy," Foster said, levelling an accusation at CAO Andy Goldie. "You've never proven the justification for the hiring. You continue to build your empire and I won't be voting yes to that."
Linton asked that Foster retract his statement, calling it "very unparliamentary."
"There is no justification for saying our CAO is building an empire," Linton said.
Foster refused.
"I won't be retracting that statement," he said. "That is my opinion. that is the opinion of my constituents."
