There are calls for a survey on the use of restaurant cards in restaurants by the city of Richmond.
The documents obtained by Global News through requests for freedom of information indicate that around $ 498,000 have been spent on cards over three years. Less duplicates possible is about $ 445,000.
Richmond had previously indicated that the gift cards cost taxpayers $ 32,800 in 2022, $ 71,550 and $ 71,300 in 2024. The results of the faith indicate much larger figures. $ 156,000 in 2022, $ 218,000 in 2023 and $ 124,000 in 2024.
“There must be a complete investigation into how it happened and the best way to do so is that the provincial government refers the local auditor of the local government, there is therefore a guard dog to investigate boondogles like this,” said the director of the Federation of Canadian Taxpayers, Carson Binda, the director of BC Binda.
On Thursday, the former auditor general of British Columbia for the local government, Gordon Ruth, weighed on the questionable program.
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“These are the kinds of things that would come from the mandate of a general auditor,” he said. “The local governments of British Columbia no longer have this level of additional transparency.”
Richmond claims that most cards concerned employee, retirement or volunteer service prices.
But an employee, whom we agreed not to identify, told us that many were kept in a bowl.
Others were reportedly given for no particular reason.
“Why do we get them?” He told Global News. “We are very well paid to do our job and we are not a private organization, so these are all taxes.”
The employee also said that to receive gift cards, some employees had to play and that nothing was written to explain how they were distributed.
The city replied that “several recordings exist for the same transaction. Consequently, we have not been able to check your figures. ”
The figures contained in faith came from Richmond.
“This is particularly unacceptable when you increase taxes at the same time,” said Binda.
“The owners of the city of Richmond are struck by an increase in taxes of 6% in 2025.”
Richmond says that now the gift cards are “authorized only for retirement and the long-service volunteer service”.
The mayor of Richmond, Malcolm Brodie, refused to comment.
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