London councillors furious after $104K spent to hire PR firm to sell police budget

Organizations seeking city dollars shouldn't be allowed to use taxpayer money to hire public relations firms to help sell requests for new money to the community, city politicians say. 

The London Police Services Board paid the high-profile PR firm Navigator $104,000 to make the unprecedented $672-million budget more palatable to the public and, ultimately, politicians. The information was revealed through heavily-redacted documents obtained by The London Free Press. 

The revelation came as a surprise to councillors who express anger that the controversial decision to award the police their budget ask may have been influenced by a marketing campaign.   

"I am worried that now that the police have done it, every agency will feel the need to hire crisis communications people every time there's a budget ask, and spend tons of taxpayer money on consultants," said Ward 11 Coun. Skylar Franke. "I want to make sure there there's way to enshrine this in policy to make sure it doesn't happen again." 

Ward. 6 Coun. Sam Trosow said he supports Franke's idea to prohibit such hires in the future, saying paying Navigator was an inappropriate way to spend tax dollars and "an attempt to influence a decision of a sitting council." 

"I am upset that there are members of council who presumably knew about this and didn't tell us about it," Trosow said. 

'Spending money wisely'

Mayor Josh Morgan, Ward Ward 8 Coun. Steve Lehman and Ward 4 Coun. Susan Stevenson sit on the police services board. The rest of the board is made up of chairperson Ali Chahbar, a London lawyer who works for the Thames Valley District School Board, and vice chair Megan Walker, who used to run the London Abused Women's Centre. It has two appointed members — former city councillor Nancy Branscombe and Liberal staffer Ryan Gauss.

"I supported the position of the board in hiring Navigator for the initial contract to not only prepare a communications campaign, but also to prepare materials for the public to review and provide feedback on so that we could consider and make any adjustments along the way," said Morgan.

Morgan said the board doesn't have the staff to run a communications campaign.

"When you don't have the expertise in house, you have other people help you, and that can be more cost effective in the long run than a full-time staff person who does it," he said.

Ward 4 Coun. Susan Stevenson, who voted in favour of hiring Navigator to create a budget website, email address, and other marketing material, said she stands by the move. 

"For me, as a city councillor, public safety has been the No. 1 issue and the police chief said that our city isn't safe, and this is what is needed to make or city safe," Stevenson said, speaking as a city councillor and not on behalf of the police services board. 

"Fiscal prudence isn't just about not spending money. It's about spending money wisely and ensuring that you get the results you want." 

Morgan said the police budget increase was the most significant ask they had ever made of the City of London.

"It was something that there was a lot of opinions on and so doing something above and beyond what we would normally do in a budget process was appropriate to ensure that there was that two-way avenue of communication," he said.

The included information covered the what and why of the budget along with the ability to provide feedback to the board throughout the process," he said.

Some councillors upset

Ward 7 Coun. Corrine Rahman said she was shocked to find out that $104,000 had been spent to communicate budget needs to the public. 

"It doesn't sit well with me," she said. "I need more information about how the board came to this decision so I can better understand it, but there is substantial concern on my part. I see Navigator as a crisis communications firm, and when you're communicating with the community about the needs you have as an organization, I don't see that as a crisis. It's not a good use of funds." 

Ward 2 Coun. Shawn Lewis said there's a fine line between lobbying and communications, but that it's a grey area. He would have voted for more money for the police budget whether there was a slick marketing plan from Navigator or not, he said.

"I'm not entirely sure why they felt the Navigator assistance was needed. I don't think we should need third-party agencies doing communications or lobbying or anything like that." 

The work done by Navigator made the police budget weigh heavily on councillors' minds, said Trosow. "I think whatever lobbying was done was exceptionally effective and it tainted the process. I'm very upset about it. I think an expense this size should have been authorized in a public session, and it might be grounds for a complaint." 

Franke points out that other agencies, many of whom did not get the money they were looking for, wrote letters, had phone calls with council members, and shared information on social media pages to get their message out about their needs.

"I feel the police service and their board could have just done that."

Franke wants to see the money that was spent on Navigator redirected to other services in the next budget cycle.

Lehman, like Stevenson and Morgan, stood by the decision to hire the firm. "I believe in effective communication, especially when you're dealing with a budget of this magnitude," he said. "It's critical for the public to understand why these monies are being asked for and to show that the concerns of Londoners are being heard and addressed and I think it was appropriate that myself and fellow councillors had professional delivery of that message."