Calgary city council has voted unanimously to conduct a forensic investigation of the expenses of Councillor Joe Magliocca.
Magliocca has been under fire after a Postmedia investigation into his expenses into last year’s Federation of Canadian Municipalities Conference which showed he expensed far more than any other councillor.
There is no timeline on when the investigations will be complete.
“When you’re doing a forensic audit you don’t necessarily know where the path will lead, so it will be a little premature to give you a concrete date,” Palmer said. She has promised council an interim report during the process.
Besides the investigation into Magliocca, there will also be a look at other councillor expenses dating back to 2017, as well as looking at ways to improve the system in how councillor expenses are handled.
Councillor Druh Farrell said she expects to see at least one change.
“I would like to see us disallow expensing of alcohol. That is a contemporary code of conduct issue with many companies, so I would like to see that addressed.”
Still to be decided is who will investigate a formal complaint filed against Magliocca now that the integrity commissioner has recused himself.
“All of that stuff is in limbo and until we sort that out, this is our best course of action” said Councillor Jyoti Gondek, who spearheaded the motion to look at the expenses of Magliocca and a better governance process for expenses.
“What we do with those existing complaints is a different discussion for a different day. But, I do believe that the people who have filed complaints deserve to be advised we are taking some sort of action and we will come up with a plan and in the meantime this is being done.”
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