City agencies shouldn't be allowed to use your money to pay for lobbyists, councillors say

Taxpayer-funded organizations shouldn't be allowed to hire consultants or public relations firms to lobby municipal politicians for more city cash, two city councillors say. 

"I've been hearing from the community about the discomfort of having public tax funded money being used for external consultants who then lobby council for more budget," said Ward 11 Coun. Skylar Frank, who along with Ward 7 Coun. Corrine Rahman is asking to have the practice be prohibited.

"People don't want their money spent in this manner."

The move to prohibit the practice comes after the London Police Services Board came under fire for spending more than $104,000 on crisis communications firm Navigator to sell an unprecedented budget ask to Londoners and city council. 

"I'm a taxpayer as well and I don't love the concept of having an agency with the largest budget using taxpayer money to get more money," Franke said. 

What 104k bought the London Police Services Board when it sold the budget to Londoners

2 months ago

Duration 1:26

The London Police Services Board hired the crisis communication firm Navigator to pitch the largest-ever police budget to Londoners. Chair Ali Chahbar said they did so because they didn't have a dedicated communications team in-house. Here's what they got for taxpayers money.

The police services board successfully lobbied to for a four-year $672-million police budget, the largest-ever increase in the city's history. Navigator was hired, the chair of the police services board said, because there was no one who could lobby for the increase in-house. 

Other boards, such as the library, arts council and public transit commission, created their own advertising and lobbying campaigns without spending money on an outside agency such as Navigator. 

"A lot of people had concerns. We don't want boards, agencies and commissions to use city funding in order to influence our decision making," said Rahman. "It hasn't been a guideline in the past but going forward I think it would be helpful to have a guideline and also a level set to put every board, agency and commission on the same footing when making their request." 

Organizations can still use their own internal communications resources to pitch for additional funds, Rahman said. 

Mayor Josh Morgan and councillors Steve Lehman and Susan Stevenson sit on the police services board. Politicians will discuss the prohibition on Tuesday at a committee meeting before it goes to a final vote next week.