After days of refusing to step down from their posts, seven of Toronto Community Housing Corporation's nine citizen board members have resigned on the heels of a spending scandal at the agency.
The resignations came during an emergency meeting Thursday morning, convened to address an auditor's report that revealed $200,000 was misspent on luxury chocolates, spa trips and a party. It also revealed issues with record-keeping and procurement at the agency, finding between $4 and $10 million was wasted on sole-sourced contracts.
"I'll be blunt: In my eight years as auditor general at the City of Toronto, I've never seen such a blatant disregard to policies and procedures as they relate to employee expenses," said auditor Jeffrey Griffiths on Thursday.
Mayor Rob Ford had been calling on the board members to resign since the report was released on Monday. Until Thursday, they repeatedly refused, saying they accepted the report's 41 recommendations, and noting a handful of senior staff members had been the ones abusing their purchasing cards.
Later in the day, CEO Keiko Nakamura issued a statement saying she would stay in her position, despite calls for her resignation from Ford.
"As long as I can contribute meaningfully to the company's goals, I will proudly serve as CEO," she said.
Nakamura also thanked ex-chair David Mitchell, who resigned Thursday morning, for his service: "As chair, he has been a strong supporter of community engagement, particularly for youth, and of creating conditions that enable each and every resident to reach their potential."
The organization named a new five-person executive team this week, saying several of the employees responsible for the misspending have been fired or disciplined.
"I have taken action," Nakamura said earlier. "We have six staff (members) who are no longer working for this company; 14 remain employed but have undergone discipline through suspension, repayment and warnings; four remain under investigation still with the internal audit."
Board members began Thursday's meeting with a private session, later revealed to be a discussion of the day's resignations. Once open to the public, the meeting continued with deputations from several angry community housing residents before Mitchell announced the resignations.
"I'm angry because I can't see how you can spend this money on whatever you've spent it on and not fix your buildings," said one distraught tenant, a middle-aged woman.
Her concerns were not addressed by the chair in his resignation. However, Mitchell did take a shot at the mayor, slamming him for going to the media with calls to resign instead of doing things privately.
"We can not effectively work when the mayor is unreachable for constructive dialogue," Mitchell said.
"The mayor did not give me the courtesy of a phone call, an email, communication through his staff, or formal letter," Mitchell told the media Thursday.
"There's an issue of courtesy and process."
The two citizen members who did not resign represent the agency's tenants and are said to retain the support of their constituents. The four city councillors on the board remain in their roles.
Ford has mused about privatizing the agency, which serves 164,000 tenants across Toronto, even discussing selling off TCHC headquarters in the upscale Rosedale area. A real estate expert told CTV Toronto that the building, located on Yonge Street, could be worth between $9 and $11 million.
