While he was the highest-paid civil servant in 2015 as head of the Pan Am Games, Saad Rafi will be making even more in his new role leading the Ontario Retirement Pension Plan Administration Corp.
Rafi, was among four executives with Toronto’s 2015 Pan Am Games committee who cracked the top 10 on the Ontario sunshine list of public sector workers paid more than $100,000. Rafi, who won praise for his work as chief executive officer of the Games, was the highest-paid civil servant in 2015 at $427,326.64 plus $15,378.81 in taxable benefits as a deputy minister. But he’ll be making even more in his new role as CEO in administering the ORPP with his compensation set at $525,000 plus an annual performance bonus of up to 25 per cent.
Other senior figures on the sunshine list with roles in the ORPP include Nanji Mahmood, an associate deputy minister listed on the Ontario government directory as being with the ORPP implementation secretariat. Mahmood earned $219,274.80 last year plus $324.82 in taxable benefits.
Over at the Games, Pan Am chief financial officer Barbara Gail Anderson earned $862,000, executive vice-president Allen Vansen $817,000, senior vice-president Karen Hacker $804,000 and vice-president Katherine Henderson more than $776,000.
Neil Barton, Pan-Am senior vice-president of communications and media relations, earned $300,000.
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“The Pan Am Games were widely regarded as the best games ever,” said deputy premier Deb Matthews. “It’s an international sporting event and you’ve got to pay those rates.”
As usual, the electricity sector had the highest public sector salaries, but unlike previous years, about half of the power workers who used to be on the sunshine list are no longer on it because the Liberals sold 15 per cent of Hydro One.
Tom Mitchell, the former CEO at Ontario Power Generation who resigned last summer, topped the 2015 list at $1.59 million, followed by William Moriarty, CEO of the University of Toronto’s Asset Management Corporation, at $1.47 million.
Former Hydro One CEO Tom Marcello earned $745,000 in 2014, but compensation for his replacement, and all workers at the utility, is no longer public information.
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There are 115,431 people on the 2015 list, an increase of nearly 4,000 despite the fact 3,774 Hydro One workers who earned more than $100,000 last year are no longer on it.
The opposition parties said the Liberals shouldn’t have exempted Hydro One from the sunshine list or from oversight by the auditor general, ombudsman and financial accountability officer.
“When you consider the taxpayers own 85 per cent of Hydro One, to not have any of their staff listed on it I think is a terrible omission,” said Vic Fedeli, Progressive Conservative finance critic.
The New Democrats said removing Hydro One from the sunshine list is hardly open and transparent as the Liberals claim to be.
“We’re going to see a big hole where there used to be disclosure around Hydro One, and that is not good for the people of Ontario,” said NDP Leader Andrea Horwath.
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Donna Quan, the former Toronto District School Board director of education, who resigned last year amid troubles at the board and is now an adviser to the Ministry of Education, got $607,287 in salary and benefits.
Radiologist Robert Vinson of the Woodstock Hospital is the top earner on the list who isn’t a president, vice-president or managing director, at a salary of $654,052.
Fifty-eight people had salaries over $500,000 last year.
Ornge air ambulance president and CEO Andrew McCallum made $418,000.
Workplace Safety and Insurance Board president and CEO David Marshall made $400,000.