Ford seeks to replace TCHC board with Case Ootes

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The Ford administration wants to take tighter control of Toronto's embattled public housing agency by temporarily replacing the board with a single ally: Case Ootes, head of the mayor's transition team.

City council is expected to go behind closed doors as early as Tuesday to vote on making Mr. Ootes the "interim managing director" of the Toronto Community Housing Corporation until a fresh board is appointed, city hall sources told The Globe and Mail.

Mr. Ootes, a former city councillor who served as deputy mayor under Mel Lastman, is close to Mayor Rob Ford and his new chief of staff, Amir Remtulla. Mr. Remtulla worked for Mr. Ootes when the latter was a city councillor.

The mayor's press secretary declined to comment because the name of the proposed interim managing director is considered confidential until after council votes on the matter either Tuesday or Wednesday.

But at least one councillor was quick to denounce the choice.

"Frankly, at the end of the day, it's a concentration of power in the hands of someone who has been very unsupportive of affordable social housing," Councillor Joe Mihevc said of Mr. Ootes.

Deputy mayor Doug Holyday could not confirm that Mr. Ootes has been recommended as the interim managing director, but said the former councillor is eminently qualified.

"He's a very capable guy and he'd be a good choice for the position," Mr. Holyday said. "I'd be surprised if Rob would want someone in that position he didn't have absolute confidence in and Case has an impeccable record."

Naming a one-man replacement for the TCHC board would be the latest twist in the saga of Canada's largest affordable-housing provider, which has been under a cloud since the auditor-general lambasted it for inappropriate expenses and sloppy procurement in reports released last Monday.

Mr. Ford has asked that everyone on the 13-member TCHC board resign, along with CEO Keiko Nakamura. She has refused.

As the rules stand now, only the board can fire the CEO. But if Mr. Ootes is granted the powers of the board, it's possible he could fire Ms. Nakamura.

Seven citizen members and two council appointees bowed to the mayor's demand last week, but four remaining representatives - councillors Raymond Cho and Maria Augimeri along with tenant representatives Catherine Wilkinson and Dan King - rejected calls for their resignation.

Ms. Wilkinson said that resigning based on pressure from the mayor's office would undermine the democratic process by which she earned her position. Each of the two tenants who serve on the TCHC board are elected by tenants' groups across the city.

"This is not about me," she said of her refusal to step down. "This is about ensuring a democratically elected tenant voice remains on the board."

The next tenant elections are slated for December. Ms. Wilkinson estimated that choosing new tenant representatives would be "absolutely impossible" within the one-month time frame Mr. Ford has established to form a new board.

"New elections would take two months at an absolute minimum," she said. "That means the board would run for two full months without tenant input. That, to me, is an indication that tenants are not valued and that we could be excluded from future boards altogether."

Mr. Cho was similarly obstinate. Selected for the board in December, he and Ms. Augimeri have served only long enough to attend a single meeting.

"Why should I resign?" Mr. Cho said. "I am a new member, I had nothing to do with the problems identified by the auditor."

The auditor-general's findings prompted the mayor to muse about privatizing the TCHC, something some tenants say would be detrimental to them.

"We're not for sale," said Susan Gapka, a social housing tenant, at a news conference Monday in Regent Park. "Mayor Ford's comments make us feel like we're commodities to be bought and sold."

Mr. Ootes did not return calls seeking comment.

With a report from Tamara Baluja