Two long-time Sturgeon County managers are out of a job this week now that their boss has re-jigged the county’s org-chart.
Sturgeon County chief administrative officer Reegan McCullough announced Aug. 20 that he had reorganized county administration to make it more responsive and efficient.
McCullough said the move was based on several operational reviews and studies, including the MNP review completed last May.
“We put all the residential services into one division and we put all the co-ordination of infrastructure or public works operational needs into another division.”
Previously split between three divisions, the re-org puts engineering, transportation, utilities, and fleet services under the same roof (Infrastructure Services). Community, agricultural, and protective services are still together, but their branch is now called Community Services instead of municipal services. Current municipal services general manager Scott MacDougall will oversee these two branches.
McCullough noted that the MNP report strongly recommended the county set up a procurement department instead of having every manager make their own purchasing decisions. (The report noted that the county bought some $49.3 million in goods and services last year on a “very decentralized and siloed basis” and without oversight from a trained procurement person or department, creating the risk that it was not getting the best value for its money.)
The re-org assigns finances, assessment, and procurement to financial services under Ed Kaemingh – a change McCullough said should save the county considerable dollars. Travis Peter will head up the planning and economic development branch, which will now also handle intergovernmental relations, while Jesse Sopko will manage human resources, legislative, and legal matters as head of corporate services.
The re-org means that two general managers (which the Gazette has confirmed to be Rick Wojtkiw, who worked 21 years with the county, and 12-year county staffer Collin Steffes) and a manager are out of a job, McCullough said.
Steffes could not be reached for comment, and Wojtkiw declined comment on these changes.
