Winnipeg CAO Deepak Joshi's suspension stretched out 30 more days
City of Winnipeg acting CAO Deepak Joshi will be watching municipal politics from the sidelines for another 30 days.
His three-day suspension was extended Wednesday by the executive policy committee (EPC) at the urging of Mayor Brian Bowman.
The three-day layoff started this week but Bowman is seeking a longer term.
Bowman used his authority under the City of Winnipeg Charter late last week to suspend the city's top bureaucrat. But Bowman's jurisdiction is limited to three working days, which meant the suspension would expire today.
Anything beyond that must be a decision of the EPC, which held a closed-door meeting on Wednesday to discuss the matter.
Bowman said last week he has "lost confidence" in Joshi's capacity to serve as CAO, but has not elaborated on why he feels that way.
The mayor said he would provide more details following the results of Wednesday's meeting.
Chris Leo, a retired University of Winnipeg political science professor, said Bowman could be trying to clean up what is "at the very best possible interpretation, a very sloppy administration."
"I mean, there have been a lot of things that have gone wrong [at City Hall]," he added.
Joshi, who was previously the city's chief operating officer, was appointed acting CAO following the departure of Phil Sheegl in October 2013.
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Sheegl abruptly resigned his post in October 2013 just days before days before an audit was to be released on the controversial fire hall land swap.
The swap was arranged between former fire chief Reid Douglas and Shindico and would have seen land on Taylor Avenue swapped for two fire stations that had been declared surplus by the city as well as a parcel of land on Mulvey Avenue.
When city council found out about the deal, they killed it and arranged for an external audit, to make sure the city was getting the best value for the properties Douglas had agreed to trade.
Douglas was fired about a month before Sheegl left.
The city is still trying to work out a price to buy the land from Shindico.
Bowman is also trying to juggle controversies around the police headquarters. The conversion of the former Canada Post building downtown has gone $75 million over budget and an audit of the project has prompted the RCMP to launch a criminal probe.