A document released by the city has confirmed that Greater Sudbury city council members were told the full projected cost of last year’s wage hikes as early as Dec. 12, 2023.
This contradicts the claim that Ward 7 Coun. Natalie Labbée made in an open letter published by Sudbury.com on May 21 of this year.
Specifically, she wrote, “We all know that the $520,000 was never disclosed to us prior or during budget discussions, nor was it disclosed to us in any closed documents until it was leaked to Sudbury.com, and I will die on my sword over this fact!!!!”
Budget discussions were in December 2023, and included meetings held after Dec. 12, 2023. Sudbury.com first reported on the leaked documents on March 22, 2024.
The idiom to “fall on one’s sword” means “to resign from one's position as a result of failure, wrongdoing, etc.”
The document which proves city council members were provided the $520,000 figure (or, more specifically, $520,067) is a report by city integrity commissioner David Boghosian that looks into allegations Labbée breached the city’s Code of Conduct in various ways.
Among the allegations that Boghosian investigated was Labbée’s claim that she was “blindsided” by Sudbury.com’s March 22 story regarding the previous year’s wage hikes, and public comments she made which were critical of city CAO Ed Archer. This, despite the fact Archer hiked wages using the delegated authority a unanimous city council voted to afford him, including a vote from Labbée.
Within Boghosian’s report is a heavily redacted page from a slide presentation city council received during their Dec. 12, 2023, closed-session finance and administration committee meeting.
Under a column titled “Contractual Changes,” is “Approved salary adjustments,” with $520,067 identified for 2024 and $481,098 identified for 2025.
As Sudbury.com previously reported, these numbers represent the projected costs to the wage hikes non-union city managers in pay groups 15-18 received last year.
In past email correspondence between staff and city council which was leaked to Sudbury.com earlier this year, city solicitor and clerk Eric Labelle wrote that city Corporate Services director Kevin Fowke clarified during the Dec. 12, 2023, meeting that the amounts were attributable to an increase for pay groups 15-18.
In conversation with Boghosian, Fowke affirmed Labelle’s recollection, that during the Dec. 12, 2023, meeting, he “specifically advised those present” that the numbers “reflected the cost of the salary increases for pay groups 15-18 that had been previously discussed by council to be implemented by the CAO through the delegated authority.”
(Labbée attended the Dec. 12, 2023, meeting.)
Fowke relayed that his presentation consisted of five slides and took him approximately 10 minutes to get through.
In his report, Boghosian also shared that Ward 5 Coun. Mike Parent’s recollection of the Dec. 12, 2023, meeting was similar, with Parent agreeing that Fowke clarified that the increase reflected pay groups 15-18, but that no percentages were ascribed to the numbers to reflect the degree to which these wages were increased.
Parent “noted that this was part of an exhaustive budget process where little time was provided to consider each item presented with any care,” Boghosian added in his report.
Boghosian’s report also notes that Labelle informed him that a report to city council dated Feb. 21, 2024, told the city’s elected officials that Archer used his “delegated authority in 2023 to adjust salaries by eight per cent for director-level positions and by six per cent for senior manager-level positions. This adjustment brought salaries within approved guidelines and created a positive effect on the level of candidate interest in vacant positions.”
A city spokesperson clarified that the report was included as part of the Feb. 21, closed-session agenda and was not issued as part of the public agenda. Although the meeting was cancelled due to the death of city council member Gerry Montpellier, the agenda package was available to all members of city council two weeks in advance of the meeting date.
Despite these two examples of city council members being informed about the wage increases, Labbée gave Sudbury.com no indication during a phone interview this week that she intended to follow through with her pledge to resign.
She still maintains that she did not know about the pay increases, and that the Dec. 12 conversation regarding them, which Labelle, Fowke and Parent all said took place, “did not happen.”
“We did not know, as a council, until it was leaked to Sudbury.com,” she reiterated this week, adding that she doesn’t deny that the numbers were released on a slide which was presented during the Dec. 12, 2023, closed-session meeting, but they were glossed over.
She also claimed that city council members did not ask questions about the numbers on Fowke’s slide presentation during the Dec. 12, 2023, meeting, “because we’re not allowed to talk about budget stuff in closed.”
Contrary to Labbée’s assertion, a city spokesperson clarified to Sudbury.com that city council members are permitted to ask questions on agenda items during both open and closed sessions.
For “false and misleading” comments and several alleged Code of Conduct violations, Boghosian has recommended that Labbée face a 20-day suspension in pay and that she publicly apologize to Archer for “the impertinent comments she made about him.”
Although Labbée was the most vocal in claiming she was “blindsided” by last year’s pay hikes, she wasn’t the only city council member to claim as much.
Parent supported Labbée publicly, but he did clarify to Boghosian that the associated costs were released to city council on Dec. 12, 2023, albeit without percentage increases discussed. He has also expressed concern about how the matter was communicated to city council, and did not realize the six/eight-per-cent wage increases did not include the three-per-cent cost of living boost, which brought them up a net nine and 11 per cent in 2023.
Ward 4 Coun. Pauline Fortin told Sudbury.com in March that it’s “always of great concern” when she finds out something as important as salary hikes at the same time as the public, and Sigonretti used the word “blindsided” to describe what took place.
The public portion of the Sept. 3 city council meeting is scheduled to begin at 6 p.m. It can be viewed in-person at Tom Davies Square or livestreamed by clicking here.
Fact-checking Labbée’s claim took time
When Sudbury.com received an open letter from Ward 7 Coun. Natalie Labbée in May wherein she claimed that the cost of last year’s wage hikes was not disclosed to city council members prior to Sudbury.com breaking the story on May 22, our fact-checking began.
The main roadblock in fact-checking her claim was that the information was provided to the city’s elected officials during a closed session of city council, which are closed to the public, including their presentations and agendas.
It would take a city staff member or city council member to leak the information to Sudbury.com to clarify this key point, so we reached out and received internal city emails from an anonymous source which reflected on the contents of the Dec. 12 closed session. Although this correspondence clarified that the wage hike information was provided during the Dec. 12 meeting, we were not provided the slide presentation in question.
(Meanwhile, Fowke clarified during a public city council meeting on May 14 that the wage hike expense information was provided during a closed meeting in December 2023.)
Sudbury.com filed a Freedom of Information request seeking the closed-session meeting slide presentation from Dec. 12, 2023, which showed exactly what city council members were shown (if not told, as closed-session meetings are not recorded).
This request was denied in a letter from the city dated July 2 on the grounds that it was from a closed session of city council, so can be exempt from public disclosure.
Sudbury.com appealed the city’s decision, arguing that because the matter was discussed openly by city council members and staff on May 14, and the city is not legally prohibited from making pay group-specific information public, the information should be released.
Our appeal has been made redundant as a result of the information we requested being published within the report Boghosian tabled this week for the Sept. 3 city council meeting.
But, if the information can be released, how was the Freedom of Information request denied?
The city isn’t answering this question.
“From the City’s perspective, this document is confidential,” a city spokesperson said, noting that concerns regarding Freedom of Information requests are legal matters to be appealed through the Privacy Commissioner.
In his report, Boghosian wrote that although the slide presentation was part of a closed session of city council, he was able to share a partially redacted version of it because its contents had already been reported by Sudbury.com, “so any confidentiality of the document has been lost.”
Tyler Clarke covers city hall and political affairs for Sudbury.com.