Aug. 16, 2021 – Senior City of Brampton staffers and Mayor Patrick Brown have claimed a third-party investigation into allegations of widespread fraud and corruption would be handled transparently.
That has not been the case.
With City Hall’s highest ranking employee, CAO David Barrick, and Brown at the centre of disturbing accusations now being investigated by Deloitte, it’s no surprise to many that the probe has been shrouded in secrecy since the bombshell allegations were levelled publicly by a senior staffer.
Gurdeep (Nikki) Kaur emailed her blistering accusations to hundreds of City staff, members of council, and media outlets during the early hours of April 22, resulting in a Council decision to hire Deloitte for the ongoing investigation.
“I think it’s important that we have the highest level of transparency on how we respond to complaints and have them investigated for their veracity,” Brown claimed at the June 2 City Council meeting.
However, Brown and his supporters, Councillors Rowena Santos, Paul Vicente, Michael Palleschi, Harkirat Singh and Pat Fortini, have consistently tried to shut Brampton taxpayers out of the process.
The other members of council have made clear through public comments that because those six Council members have the majority of the votes on an eleven-member legislative body, they have created a cloud of secrecy to control the investigation and lock the public out.
Before Councillors Martin Medeiros, Jeff Bowman and Gurpreet Dhillon, with the support of colleagues Charmaine Williams and Doug Whillans, were finally able to force some transparency, almost all debate and decision making around the corruption investigation were handled behind closed doors during in camera meetings where the public is prevented from getting any information.
The investigation lacked transparency since the very beginning, when Brown claimed it would be handled openly. Basic information, including the decision led by him and his five supporters to handicap the probe by setting an unreasonable investigation deadline of 30 days, was kept from the public. Yahoo! News reports. | READ MORE
