Halifax Mayor's Office Faces Financial Irregularities Investigation
The RCMP is investigating 'financial irregularities' in Halifax Mayor Andy Fillmore's office.
The auditor general found that the mayor's office broke rules for buying services.
The auditor general looked at how the mayor's office spent money and found problems.
The auditor general did not plan to check the mayor's office, but he got concerns from others.
The auditor general found four transactions that were not done correctly.
Two of these transactions were for legal fees, one was for a human resources consultant, and one was for a speechwriter.
The mayor paid back the legal fees, which were around $7,700.
The auditor general sent his findings to the police.
The auditor general thought some transactions were very wrong and asked the police to look into them.
The auditor general said it's not his job to decide if something is illegal, so he asked the police for help.
Mayor Fillmore said he agrees with the auditor general's report and his staff has learned from their mistakes.
The mayor said his staff has learned the rules now and they were short-staffed when the mistakes happened.
The mayor said the legal fees were for complaints against him as the mayor, not for personal issues.
The mayor said he only found out the police were involved when the auditor general said so.
The mayor still trusts his staff and said they were all learning the rules together.
The auditor general said the report doesn't have recommendations because the solution is simple: follow the rules.
The report looked at four transactions and found that all of them broke the rules.
Two transactions were for consultants.
One consultant was hired to help the mayor's office, but the process was not competitive.
The initial cost of the consultant was $50,000, but it went up to almost $100,000 without a new contract.
The second consultant was a speechwriter who was hired without a competitive process.
The speechwriter was paid $14,000, but there was no contract and the payment was not done correctly.
Two transactions were for external legal fees.
One legal fee was $1,425 and was approved as an exception.
Another legal fee was $6,272 and was approved by the mayor's chief of staff, but it should have been approved by the municipal solicitor.
The staff has been trained to get approval for external legal services.
The mayor paid back the money for the legal fees.
The auditor general sent his concerns to the police because he thought they were serious.
The police are investigating the financial irregularities.
The RCMP confirmed they are investigating the financial irregularities.
The investigation is ongoing and there is no more information to share.
Global News got a file from Mitchell Bailey.
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