This out in the last few days from City of Vancouver general manager Penny Ballem. Your thoughts welcome on what this means, especially you, Brent Toderian. This follows on rumblings I’ve been hearing from here and there in the city about the higher-ups pondering not having a director, but a cluster of people heading up the planning function, similar to the five-person crew that ran the department shortly after Tom Fletcher left. (Eventually, it ended up being Larry Beasley and Ann McAfee that co-ran the department, with Larry handling the downtown and Ann managing planning activities in the rest of the city.)
To all City Staff,
I wanted to write to you to announce progress on some organizational changes. As you know, in January 2012 David McLellan joined the City Manager’s Office as the Deputy City Manager responsible for Housing and Public Amenities.
Since David’s transition to his new role, Brenda Prosken has served as the acting General Manager, CSG and has done a great job moving the complex agendas of this portfolio in support of both David and I and Council. Over the last 4 months I have had a chance to better understand the pressures on CSG from the perspective of Council business (they currently account for about 80% of reports to Council) and their key role in many of the strategic issues in the city on the planning, development services and the broad social policy front. In addition, on a day-to-day basis, CSG is responsible for issuing the majority of the City’s permits and licences, a business that represents our primary source of non-tax revenue. Finally, under the VSR we are undertaking one of the most complex and significant projects in the city (the Permits and Licenses Project) which will drive business transformation in Planning and Development Services and other related areas in the city.
Given the volume, complexity and strategic importance of the work of the CSG portfolio, and after considerable discussion with other members of CMT, I have decided to reconfigure the existing CSG portfolio into two separate portfolios which will encompass the following activities:
1. Planning and Development Services
2. Housing, Culture, Social Development and Licenses and Inspections.
Each unit will be led by a General Manager focused on the range of priorities within their respective sphere of responsibility.
I am delighted to announce that Brenda Prosken has accepted the General Manager appointment for the portfolio encompassing Housing, Culture, Social Development and Licenses and Inspections. Brenda first joined the City family when she started at the Vancouver Public Library in 2006 as the Director, Human Resources, and, in 2008, was promoted to Deputy General Manager, CSG. Brenda has built relationships across our organization and has played a strategic role in integrating the work of many partners in the city in the area of housing, homelessness, social inclusion, bylaw enforcement, local area planning and others. She is a great team member and in her acting GM role over the last few years has clearly earned the respect of CMT colleagues.
The General Manager, Planning and Development will hold the responsibilities of Director of Planning as set out in the Vancouver Charter. A major focus will be leading the business transformation in this important portfolio and building the strategic relationships internal and external to the organization to ensure that our Planning and Development Services activities are responsive to the needs of the public, our business partners and the policy goals of the rest of the organization.
Within the coming days, we will begin the recruitment process to fill the General Manager, Planning and Development role. We will be posting this opportunity internally as well as advertising external nationally and internationally.
Please join me in congratulating Brenda on her appointment. And I thank her for her ongoing work leading the 2 portfolios, pending the recruitment of a General Manager, Planning and Development.
There are a number of details yet to be determined regarding the delineation of specific responsibilities between the two new General Manager roles. As those matters are resolved over the coming weeks, we will confirm the particulars for any of you who may be impacted.
Finally, to all of our employees working in Community Services, thank you for your continued effort and commitment to serving our public. I trust the rationale for the structural changes described above resonates with you and I appreciate your support as we move forward with implementation.
Penny Ballem
City Manager
16 responses so far ↓
1 Michelle // May 10, 2012 at 8:00 pm
This is how the power concentrates more and more in the hands of a few. Welcome to the Republic of Ballem. How is this total incompetent at the helm of this city, still, it’s beyond any reasoning. Sad, very sad news. And with a Vision council + Mayor pushing for whatever their financiers are telling them to do, not much happiness in this city at the horizon! Good job Vancouver!
2 Morry // May 10, 2012 at 8:19 pm
“Welcome to the Republic of Ballem”
She will be turfed sooner rather than later.
3 Silly Season // May 10, 2012 at 10:25 pm
What planning?
4 Agustin // May 10, 2012 at 11:46 pm
How is this concentrating power in the hands of fewer? How many held the power before, and how many will hold it after?
5 jolson // May 11, 2012 at 9:27 am
All the issues of city building need to be managed in seamless orchestration not just the aesthetic ones as defined by successive directors of planning. Beauty has its place but it is not at the head of the parade when we are facing catastrophic environmental challenges. This is a vey smart structural change to the organization. Congratulations to this administration. Best news ever.
6 babalu // May 11, 2012 at 10:23 am
What was Ken Dobell, chicken soup?
7 Mira // May 11, 2012 at 11:00 am
Vancouverism.
Welcome to the Communist Centralized Planning of Vision. Workers working together for the Vision’s good. Long live the representatives of our Party and our Great Leader.
8 Roger Kemble // May 11, 2012 at 11:05 am
“ Beauty has its place but it is not at the head of the parade when we are facing catastrophic environmental challenges. ” Stop the fear mongering, Jolson @ #5, you’re much more believable when you’re being yourself!
Check . . . http://www.activistpost.com/2012/05/un-global-governance-funded-by-climate.html
“ . . . industrialized countries has (sic) spawned a demand for responsibility for carbon emissions while the fear-mongering of man-made climate change moves into the political areas. ”
Time to catch up on your reading. Operative phrase, “ the fear-mongering of man-made climate change “. It is quite tiresome having to flag, avoid, the numerous antediluvian troglodytes still cashing in on that canard.
I saw no beauty coming the last managers-five (2000+/-) (Beasely, Droettboom, McAffee Dobell, MacGregor) at Thu Hall: False Creek North, Kingsway at Knight etc. and, trust me, anything but green despite the expense of LEED! And we are still not thru with the leaky condos!
Don’t expect too much from Thu Hall, Jolson, no matter what managerial configuration. Essentially its job is to make sure the building doesn’t fall down, the sewer doesn’t clog and the yellow lines don’t fade away.
9 brilliant // May 11, 2012 at 11:09 am
Who needs a Director of Planning when the Vision majority on Council just forces onto neighbourhoods whatever tbeir developer-donors want?
10 babalu // May 11, 2012 at 11:17 am
Love it! Mira red baiting in this day and age. (lol) (lol) (lol)
11 West End Gal // May 12, 2012 at 4:34 pm
Mira #7
Loved it!
12 Joseph Jones // May 12, 2012 at 5:51 pm
It is clear from the Ballem letter that the City of Vancouver is in the business of promoting development. Little more.
The function of government continues to disappear. Public assets are directed toward ensuring private guaranteed margins, with risks and liabilities (Olympic Village etc.) offloaded to the quasi-corporate municipal taxing authority. The scale and rate of this asset conversion continue to accelerate.
A longer term view would consider the sustainability of submerging most of Vancouver in sea water. At least that outcome has some chance of lasting for a while — and might even really be green.
13 Lewis N. Villegas // May 13, 2012 at 10:08 am
@ JJ 12
I agree with your first two paragraphs, but I find the Apocalyptic alternative a bit thin as analysis.
My view is that we are in a moment of change. A director of planning, even if Moses himself, is not going to be able to bring change about.
If we are moving away from “modernism” into a different kind of modernity, then the level of change is at the scale of society as a whole, not just a single office.
The evidence is all around, and the Doomsday scenarios might be used by someone with a better anthropological resume than mine, as just one further indication.
Hopefully the next wave, whatever it may be, will be more participatory and inclusive. It looks like one clear indication is that we are moving away from building suburbs and towards something else.
If the alternative as we see it delivers on “livable streets, walkable neighbourhoods and affordable regions”, then the new modernity looks a lot more humanistic than the wild frontiers of towers and skytrain.
It’s not downtown Manhattan, Tokyo, Hong Kong, or La Defense. It looks a lot more like the pre-automobile, pre-modernist vintage Montreal, Boston, Greenwich Village, San Francisco, etc.
The most viable option ahead is human scaled, up close, and in ever-increasing balance with nature seen from afar. Technology is leverage to achieve undreamed of levels of efficiency and productivity.
14 Max // May 14, 2012 at 1:58 pm
On the topic of ‘development’ – is everyone aware of this: Son of STIR: New rental policy proposed for Vancouver (by Elizabeth Murphy, in VanCourier May 11, 2012)
http://www.vancourier.com/Reader+Soapbox+STIR+rental+policy+proposed+Vancouver/6607833/story.html#ixzz1ubSD7Tuv
(And note – NO Public Consultation…..again)
15 Frank Ducote // May 15, 2012 at 11:59 am
Raising the new DoP to a General Manager status seems to make some sense in my view. At least that way the person will have equal status to similar positions for Engineering and other major portfolios in the city org chart. And Development Services and Planning wil be more directly linked than they have been in recent years.
I’m sure it must have irked the CM’s office that a more or less middle management position was actually the most visible and perhaps powerful one in the City, at least in the eyes of the general public. Whether one liked the incumbent or not is beside the point.
Remember, from around 1993 or so to 2006 (when Brent T. was hired), there was nobody whose actual title was the DoP. And the City ran pretty well.
16 Trish French // May 16, 2012 at 9:16 am
To follow up on Frank’s comment, it is interesting to us former Planning Dept folks that the decision to combine Planning and Development Services is more or less a return to the structure that existed up until a re-org in the late 90′s, when Dev Services was spun off (and enlarged) into its own dept. Having a more senior position (GM) in charge of a combined dept could be a good thing, because that person will have a seat at the most senior management table (which the DoP did not). However, it will be critical for the person hired as GM to have strong skills and focus on urban planning, in all its aspects, and not just be a manager/administrator.
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