Excerpt from Ottawa Citizen

25 June 2003

   

 “City hall drops communications chief:  Seen as the beginning of budget slashing,” 

By Jason Fekete

“The City of Ottawa’s director of communications and marketing has ‘left the city’ in what appears to be the beginning of a major overhaul of one of its main departments.

“The departure of Marie-Josee Lapointe, who was earning $113,000 per year, comes one month after an emergency meeting in which council told communications and marketing to slash $900,000 from its budge this year.  A Citizen column pointed out nearly three months ago that the city could trim a lot of fat from the $5.9-million, 84-employee department – one twice the size of, and cost more than twice as much as, the communications department in the comparable-sized City of Edmonton.

“Ottawa’s communications department has 10 managers, with a salary range of $76,000 to $93,000.  Edmonton’s communications director, David Schneider, takes home $90,000 and has two $75,000 managers overseeing a department of 48.

“Kent Kirkpatrick, the city’s general manager of corporate services, refused to elaborate on the details surrounding Ms. Lapointe’s departure, but said the department is in the middle of restructuring.

“'Marie Josee has left the City of Ottawa effective (Monday).  I’m the sole person on the issue for the corporation and that’s all I’m going to say about it,’ Mr. Kirkpatrick said”. . . . . .

“Ms. Lapointe, who could not be reached for comment yesterday, was hired by the city about 21/2 years ago during amalgamation.  She previously worked for the Canadian Tobacco Manufacturers’ Council.”