Windsor council has voted to move forward with an auditor general after seven years without one.
Council heard from several delegates Monday night, all in favour of an auditor general to oversee the city's operations.
"I find it's important to push this forward to help the citizens of Windsor to regain our trust in council and in the administration that all of our best interests are being followed," said Ward 9 resident Krysta Glovasky-Ridsdale.
Sherrill Zonjic of Ward 3 shared the same concerns, "I do not have confidence in city hall spending in a way I would like. I'm asking you to ensure that my tax money is being spent wisely as possible. Please open the books for all of us to see."
"This issue is your chance to redeem this council in the public eye, but in my opinion, regarding the AG, only a completely independent hire with complete autonomy will accomplish this," said Windsor resident Tom Dean.
Ultimately, council opted to appoint an AG from PriceWaterhouseCoopers — the accounting firm that currently handles the city's auditing needs.
Windsor's new Auditor General Christopher O'Connor seen on September 23, 2019 (Photo by AM800's Zander Broeckel)
That didn't sit well with those in attendance, including resident Howard Weeks who has been fighting for an independent auditor general for years.
"There's no independence and I'm not the only one that's not satisfied. But at the same time, if this is what we get, then I think the only thing that we can do moving forward is to see if there's some way of getting a little more, a little shred more of transparency."
Weeks says he's sceptical.
"I'm really hoping that the gentleman that they've now hired will get unfettered access to documents and if he will in fact, if need be, subpoena anybody. I can't imagine how it could happen that they would do this."
He says PwC is already too involved with the city to be truly independent.
"They've been working with the city all this time and under a certain way and all of a sudden to do a complete U-turn, I just can't understand. All of the councillors were talking and say how they're going to be independent. I just don't know how that could possibly be when they already work for the city and hope to continue to work for the city."
Windsor's new AG is Christopher O'Connor of PwC who assumes the role immediately.
The city currently pays PwC $300,000 a year — there will be no added cost for the additional auditor general services.