The success of a municipality is determined partly by the quality of the mayor and councillors, and partly by the quality of the public servants who serve those elected people. [...] In Canada, the distinction between the perspective of the mayor and councillors, on the one hand, and that of the CAO and management staff on the other hand plays a major role in policy-making and service delivery. [...] Journalists and other observers of local government might not understand the value of the CAO model or might prefer the more colourful model of "political management." Efforts to clarify and strengthen the role of CAO have not produced a substantive response in the latest set of proposed reforms to the Municipal Act. [...] After the Enron, WorldCom, and sub-prime loan debacles, and the financial crash of 2008, good governance was at the top of the corporate and business 8. In practice in Ontario, the elastic and variable application of these principles is reminiscent of the humorous observations drawn from the screenplays of Ghostbusters and Pirates of the Caribbean, that principles "are not rules, but more like gui [...] Change culminated in the Dodd-Frank legislation and a focus on the fiduciary duties of boards of directors, conflict of interest, strengthened audit and human resources functions (including the link between performance and compensation), and maintaining a clear distinction in the roles of chair of the board of directors and the chief executive officer.

Th e Evolving Role of City Managers an d Chief Administrative Officers Michael Fenn and David Siegel May 4, 2017 @imfgtoronto. [...] Not doing so undermines the City Manager's effectiveness..." "Although the Mayor can properly be involved in hiring the City Manager, there should be a clear division of responsibility between the Mayor and the office of the City Manager - a separation of the political from the administrative...". [...] Madam Justice Denise Bellamy,. [...] Toronto External Contracts Inquiry, 2005, p. 424 How to destroy this relationship • "Strong mayor" system • Make the role of mayor unclear - Mayor as CEO • Unclear role for political staff • Expect CAO to tell council what it wants to hear New developments • Statutory requirement for a Council / Staff relations policy • Expanded role for Integrity Commissioners and other Accountability Officers •

In most municipalities across Canada, the top public servant is the chief administrative officer (CAO) or city manager. Compared to elected politicians such as the mayor and the council, the work of a CAO is often overlooked and not well understood. InLeaders in the Shadows, David Siegel brings the CAO into the limelight, examining the leadership qualities of effective municipal managers. Using the examples of five exceptional CAOs who have worked in municipalities of varying sizes across Canada, Siegel identifies the leadership traits, skills, and behaviours which have made them successful. Interweaving the stories of his subjects with insights drawn from leadership theory, Siegel offers an engrossing account of how CAOs must lead “up, down, and out” in order to succeed. Offering well-rounded accounts of the challenges and opportunities faced by public servants at the municipal level,Leaders in the Shadows is a valuable resource for academics and practitioners alike.

Selected Contents: 1. Introduction2. Theories of Institutional Dynamics3. Political and Administrative Cities4. The Evolution of Political Cities5. The Evolution of Administrative Cities6. The Evolution of the Model City Charter7. The Discovery of Adapted Cities8. Probing the Complexities of Adapted Cities9. The Conciliated City10. Conclusions

This new work offers an in-depth look at the roles played by professional local government managers within the changing circumstances of American community life. It analyzes the societal and political influences that have shaped the professionalization of local government managers, and projects how the roles of these officers will develop, now that the professional movement has been accepted. In preparing the work, the author has accessed, for the first time, the International City Management Association's decade of national survey information on cities and countries with recognized professional administrative officers. Data from this study is merged with two author-conducted surveys of communities with recognized professional, full-time managers, allowing the author to analyze the local government profession as seen over a 13-year period. The book opens with a discussion of the trends in professional roles and presents profiles of city managers and their career paths (the link between professional education and experience). Next it covers the occupational values and associated activities (the symbolic and practical roles of professional public managers) and the impact of the professional movement on practitioners, their jobs, and their cities. The book also presents a typology of professional services, status, and standards and gives a general evaluation of the profession of local government management and its place in the community. An extensive research bibliography is included. This book will have equal appeal for academics in public administration and practitioners in local government (state, city, county, and so on).