Ponoka Town Council held a special meeting on September 15th, 2020, where they unanimously voted to terminate the employment of the Town's Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) Albert Flootman without cause.

Now former CAO for the Town of Ponoka Albert Flootman (center) from 2017.  

Ponoka Mayor Rick Bonnett said it's never an easy thing to let somebody go, but it was done with future Ponoka mayors and councils in mind, as they plan on unveiling their new strategic direction in the near future.

“It’s very hard for all of council to get their heads around it, but at the same time, council decided it was time for us to go into a new direction. We’ve done some strategic planning and in the near future, we will basically bring that out. This is our last year of our four-year term, and council wanted to force things in a new way, so with our budget and strategic plan that comes out, we will be showing that this will be an interesting year as we go through this COVID-19.”

A second motion was also approved naming Sandra Lund, the Town's General Manager of Corporate Services, as the Town's new Interim CAO.

Bonnett says they think Lund is the perfect fit for their CAO at this time, especially during the current economic times.

“We’ve definitely got some interesting budget discussions and decisions to come up. She’s been part of the administrative team for about the last ten years. We feel we’ve watched her grow and flourish, and we believe she’s got some great skills to lead this as we go into our last year of this council’s term.”

Bonnett also said that after 8 years as a mayor and 3 as a town councillor, he believes in fresh blood and new ideas, which is why he will not be running for re-election as mayor next election.

“I believe there’s a shelf life for everything and everybody on that side, and I said two terms was it. I believe that you need to have new people in places. So terminating the CAO is kind of like terminating the mayor, it’s time for me to go. I’ve been in this position now for eight years, and three years before that as a councillor. It’s time for some new people to step forward and lead the community in the direction that they want to go in. Hence why I didn’t want to make any plans and councils in agreement not to fully go into putting a full hiring cycle out to try and put a new CAO in at this point in time with one-year elf tin our mandate.”