On July 22nd, well respected Vancouver City Manager Paul Mochrie “stepped down” from his post, after serving more than four years in the job.
Paul Mochrie, former City Manager in the City of Vancouver (Ben Nelms/CBC)
Said Mayor Ken Sim upon announcing the news …
“We thank Paul for his 14 years of dedicated service, including the last four as City Manager, and wish him nothing but success in the future.”
So, what led up to Mr. Mochrie’s untimely departure from Vancouver City Hall?
VanRamblings’ sources tell us in order to achieve a 0% property tax increase this upcoming December, in the lead up to the 2026 Vancouver municipal election, Mayor Ken Sim has decided the only way to achieve that balmy goal will be to fire as many Vancouver City Hall unionized CUPE workers as will be necessary.
Mayor Sim realizes that the voting public in our city is none-too-pleased with a cumulative property tax increase of 22.1% — not compounded — in his first three years in power, the highest property tax increase of any city in Metro Vancouver.
An aside (for which feature of our writing, VanRamblings is justly renowned).
Kareem Allam, former Chief of Staff to Vancouver Mayor Ken Sim
Early in his term of office, Mayor Sim had called his then Chief of Staff — Kareem Allam — into his office, telling Mr. Allam that he had come up with an “innovative solution” to not charging one red cent in property tax to beleaguered Vancouver home owners during his term in power. Mayor Sim told his Chief of Staff that during his tenure as Mayor by, in a methodical manner, selling off a number of parks / not parks in our city each year — the 142 parks in Vancouver that are not officially designated as parks — and by selling off large chunks of city owned properties in our city’s much ballyhooed Property Endowment Fund (approximately $3 billion), he could achieve his dream goal of an ongoing 0% property tax increase.
Poor Kareem Allam, who set about to explain to Mayor Ken Sim and the Mayor’s senior advisor, David Grewal — the two men who had dreamed up this nefarious scheme — that there are any number of municipal, provincial and federal legislative impediments to the City of Vancouver undertaking such a venture, as he set about to elucidate chapter and verse what governing legislation would prevent the Mayor from carrying out his unworkable and villainous plan.
Shortly thereafter, Mr. Allam “resigned” as the Mayor’s Chief of Staff.
On that February 6th day of 2023 leading up to Kareem Allam leaving the employ of the City, one of our sources at City Hall called us, saying “I’m standing outside the Mayor’s office. Listen …” as s/he held up the phone, upon which VanRamblings heard a protracted screaming match between what sounded like the Mayor and his Chief of Staff. Mr. Allam left the employ of the Mayor’s office immediately.
What is old is new again.
A thoughtful and pensive Paul Mochrie. Gone but not forgotten.
Just prior to his leave taking from the city, Mayor Ken Sim called Paul Mochrie into his office, to instruct Mr. Mochrie that he must fire the necessary number of City Hall CUPE workers in order that the Mayor’s party, ABC Vancouver, might achieve its desired goal of a 0% property tax increase this upcoming December.
The inevitable outcome of Mayor Ken Sim’s plan to mass fire CUPE employees
Paul Mochrie blanched at the words he was hearing uttered from the mouth of Vancouver’s Mayor, stating, “I couldn’t do that,” to which Mayor Sim — in his most Trumpian manner — replied, “You work for me! You do what I tell you to do”, with Mr. Mochrie replying, “With all due respect, I work for the people of Vancouver.”
A now furious Ken Sim yelled at Paul Mochrie, “If you won’t do it, I’ll find someone who will!” It was at this point, our none-too-stable (nor bright), nor sophisticated Mayor unceremoniously fired a flustered Paul Mochrie, bringing to a close Mr. Mochrie’s 14 years of loyal service to the city, and its grateful citizens.
ABC Vancouver then set about to locate and hire a new City Manager.
And lickety split they did, only 9 days after Paul Mochrie’s abrupt leave taking.
Vancouver City Council selected Delta’s Donny van Dyk as its new City Manager on July 31, 2025
Said Mayor Ken Sim of the city’s new hire …
“Donny brings a results-driven mindset and a strong mix of public and private sector experience that will help us deliver real, tangible outcomes for Vancouverites,” said Sim. “Donny’s proven ability to deliver practical results makes him the right person to lead the implementation of Council’s ambitious agenda.”
VanRamblings is told that Mr. van Dyk, as competent and skilled as he might be, finds himself decidedly on the “conservative” side of the political spectrum, and given his right of centre politics and orientation to city government would seem to possess no compunction in acting as Mayor Ken Sim’s hatchet man, towards fulfilling the Mayor’s goal of a 0% property tax increase this upcoming December.
To that end, Mr. van Dyk — no fool, he — negotiated a salary of $450,000 for his services, an increase of $57,000 over what Paul Mochrie was being paid, and further that Mr. van Dyk, knowing how unlikely it is that Mayor Ken Sim will be elected to a second term, negotiated a severance package, we are told, that is double his $450,000 salary. So, let’s review that untoward circumstance in economic terms.
Although the Mayor’s office has not announced the serverance package that Paul Mochrie will receive, as a reference point, we might consider what Dr. Penny Ballem, City Manager under Vision Vancouver, received when she left the employ of City Hall on September 14, 2015 — that would be $565,000. One can reasonably expect that Mr. Mochrie’s severance package will, at the very least, be on par with that of Dr. Ballem, given Mr. Mochrie’s long years of service to the city.
What then has Ken Sim, the Mayor of the City of Vancouver, wrought financially in the upper echelons of administrative governance at Vancouver City Hall?
By the time Donny van Dyk leaves the employ of Vancouver in November, 2026, when a new Mayor and Council will be seated, he will have earned $1.35 million, for you know with near certainty the next Council will want its own City Manager.
Add to that, let’s say conservatively, a further $565,000 for Paul Mochrie’s severance package, and you are left with an outrageously and fiscally irresponsible total expenditure for Vancouver’s City Manager(s) of just shy of two million dollars, when if Mr. Mochrie had been left in place, the bill to the city would amount to “only” $393,000, Paul Mochrie’s outgoing salary — or one fifth of $2 million.
For someone who is a certified professional accountant — that would be Mayor Ken Sim, who ought to know better — over the course of 15 months, to reiterate, the City of Vancouver will have expended near $2,000,000 (!) in payment / salary / severance packages to 2 individuals holding the role of Vancouver City Manager.
Surely the electorate and the citizens of Vancouver will be rightly outraged!
