Council keeping quiet over troubles

A former staff member who quit the Dunedin City Council because of alleged bullying and other problems within its city property department says the organisation needs to come clean.

The Otago Daily Times has been asking questions since last March, when it emerged Deloitte was scrutinising the department responsible for hundreds of millions of dollars of ratepayer-owned property assets.

City property manager Kevin Taylor was initially replaced in the day-to-day running of the department, but resigned following the completion of the Deloitte review in June.

However, requests for a copy of Deloitte’s final report into the troubled department have been repeatedly rebuffed since then, last June and again this week, following official information requests by the ODT.

The council, in declining to release the report this week, cited the need to protect privacy and commercial sensitivity as reasons to withhold it.

That was not good enough for one former city property staff member, who told the ODT ratepayers deserved answers and the Deloitte report should be released.

"When you look at what [city] property does, and their responsibility for the management of millions of dollars of ratepayers’ assets, if anything is the least questionable, I think the ratepayers actually do have a right to know.

"Why keep it so quiet? I think definitely the ratepayer has got a right to know."

The staff member quit because of bullying and "ongoing false accusations" which allegedly began after Mr Taylor took over as the manager of city property in September 2014.

"There’s only so much of this type of rubbish a person can take," the former staff member said.

The staff member was one of 12 office staff in city property in 2015, but eight had since left — mostly for similar reasons, the staff member said.

That included one staff member in charge of a significant council property asset who quit after allegedly being labelled "useless" by Mr Taylor, only to be quickly snapped up by a rival in the private sector, the staff member said.

Deloitte had also scrutinised other aspects of the department’s operation, including its approach to contracting, staff appointments and delegated authority.

Some new recruits to the department appeared to have been appointed without relevant qualifications, over other candidates considered more suitable, the staff member said.

In December 2015, the ODT reported a city property staff member had resigned part-way through an investigation into "irregularities" in his CV, leaving behind a trail of upset business owners inside the council’s Wall Street mall.

There were also concerns about the decision to use an expensive IT-based client management system, costing "tens of thousands of dollars" in fees, which was already considered "useless" by other staff and at least one other council, the staff member said.

Attempts to contact Mr Taylor again this week were unsuccessful, and Deloitte Dunedin partner Kyle Cameron declined to comment on his firm’s work.

Senior DCC staff, including chief executive Sue Bidrose and new city property manager Laura McElhone, also did not return calls.

Mayor Dave Cull and deputy mayor Chris Staynes could also not be reached for comment.

Instead, in a written response to ODT questions, the council would only say Deloitte’s review had highlighted "a range of matters than required resolution", which were being addressed.

Questions about the specific issues raised by the former staff member, Deloitte’s findings and the need for council transparency, were ignored.

The DCC’s decision not to release the Deloitte report has been referred to the Office of the Ombudsmen.

chris.morris@odt.co.nz