BY CAROLINE GRECH

The city's audit and operations committee is recommending staff and committee chairperson Regional Councillor Gino Rosati meet with the mayor to discuss outstanding bills from her 2007 office expenses.

The recommendation still needs to be approved by the full council.

Absent from the discussion was more than $13,000 in expenses, including meals, also without proper receipts.

In December 2008, council was outraged when auditors determined Ms Jackson broke policies on reimbursement.

According to the audit by Ernst and Young, $7,307 in expenses had no receipt. Of that, more than than $1,000 was for business meals and more than $6,000 for non-meal expenses.

The remaining $6, 688 had transaction slips, of which $1,137 were for business meals and $5,550 were non-meal expenses.

Former city manager Michael DeAngelis confirmed that since the initial audit, no receipts have been provided.

Only transaction slips and credit card statements have been provided to date.

For items where no receipts were provided, it was verified by the mayor the expenses were for official business of the city, Mr. DeAngelis said.

Those verifications were provided before the audit, Mr. DeAngelis said.

Mr. Rosati said the committee approved having a meeting with the mayor about all the outstanding expenses.

"The recommendation is to meet with the mayor to discuss outstanding issues. The recommendation from the auditor says if there are no receipts, the money should be paid back," Mr. Rosati said. "The position of the committee is clear. If there are no receipts you've got to pay it back."

Thornhill/Concord Councillor Sandra Yeung Racco, who is also a member of the audit committee, said it was also her understanding that in addition to the $3,000 in cellphone bills, the $13,000 is also up for discussion if there are no receipts provided.

City manager Clayton Harris said the auditor's report only dealt with cellphone expenses.

Mayor Linda Jackson said she has her cellular phone receipts from 2007 and has been waiting on the audit committee to figure out where she should submit them.

"I have the receipts now for my cellular, but I can't go back and get the other receipts because I've tried and they don't exist in these restaurants," Ms Jackson said.

She also added that the bulk of those expenses were regional and the region doesn't have the bills either.

"The city manager signed off on them as being legitimate city expenses back in 2007. They were legitimate then, how can you be expected to go back and pay for something that has already been signed off on?" Ms Jackson said.

The mood at the committee meeting was considerably more muted than the original meeting on the matter, where councillors fumed and demanded a better audit outlining what was a breach of policy and what was not.

City auditor Michael Tupchong has made several recommendations to be incorporated into the city's evolving expense policy, which the audit committee also agreed to.

The first draft of the expense policy was also presented at the meeting.

Among the recommendations is the tightening of language around rules on business meals.

The recommendation clarifies that reimbursement of expenditures for business meals with staff or external people will require the original detailed restaurant receipt and the transaction slip and that names be provided on who attended and the purpose of the meeting.

The old policy said reimbursement will take place with supporting documentation and receipts.

The 2007 audit concluded that the city policies on reimbursement were breached by the mayor.

Best practices would be for the person submitting the bills to also include who was there for a meal, Leonard J. Brooks, Professor of Business Ethics and Accounting at Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto, said.

"Otherwise, you're going to be exposed to, you are going to leave the opportunity on the table for people to take their friends and family and charge it to the city," Mr. Brooks said. "I think it isn't very useful to think that the transaction slip without the details is going to close the loophole."

Mr. Brooks also said who is there during a meal also determines if the meal was a $30 a plate meal or a $200 a plate meal, depending on how many people attended.

Woodbridge resident Carrie Liddy initiated the request for the audit and said during a deputation to the committee Monday that she is still waiting for answers.

"Why have more than $13,000 in Amex bills not substantiated by receipts be repaid by the mayor?," Ms Liddy asked.

Thornhill Councillor Alan Shefman did not attend the audit committee meeting but said the concerns are the same as they were last year.

"We must be accountable. The investigation into those expenses shows that there were clear problems with the mayor's accounting for her expenditures. That is still on paper, it's still the same document we had a year ago," Mr. Shefman said. "I'm just as concerned as I was a year ago with what that reveals."

Ms Jackson said she will sit down with the appropriate staff and audit committee members, but noted that the problems with managing expenses was city-wide.

"It was a problem that was systemic in Vaughan. We've learned from this and we've already revised our policies," Ms Jackson said.

Ms Jackson also re-iterated that there were others who received reimbursement for items with no receipts.

"If push comes to shove I will make a scene on this. But I really don't want to. I want to move on. I've got bigger fish to fry and this was almost three years ago," Ms Jackson said. "This should be put to bed."