Halton losing social services commissioner to York

The woman in charge of Halton’s public housing, long-term care homes, children’s services and social assistance programs is leaving the Region after 26 years to take on an expanded role in York Region.

Adelina Urbanski, who has served for more than a decade as the commissioner of Halton’s massive social and community services department, will be assuming a similar position in York, but with an expanded responsibility to also oversee that Region’s public health department. Urbanski, a Mississauga resident, will take on her new role as York’s commissioner of community and health services on Feb. 1, according to a December press release.

At council’s health and social services committee meeting Tuesday, Halton’s top bureaucrat CAO Pat Moyle described Urbanski’s departure as a loss to the Region.

“When Adelina told me she was interested in this position, I wished her every failure,” Moyle joked.

One of five commissioners in Halton, Urbanski oversaw a department with a $170 million operating budget this year, almost the same as the City of Burlington’s entire 2009 operating budget. The department also has the highest number of Regional employees, led by its Services for Seniors division, which has more than 500 staff mostly located at the Region’s three long-term care homes.

In York, Urbanski will head up that community’s largest department, one with 1,500 employees.

“Different challenges, different environment,” said Urbanski as her reasons for leaving after a quarter century in Halton.

A bureaucrat known provincially due to her role on numerous task forces, Urbanski was recruited by York after the retirement of its former commissioner, Joann Simmons. “They convinced me the time was right to go.”

Asked to cite accomplishments in Halton, Urbanski highlighted the Region’s creation of emergency shelter beds and a comprehensive housing plan designed to build new affordable housing. She also cited less visible impacts such as a support services network for parents, children and those with mental disorders.

She credited regional council for supporting a department that often services those in need in a generally wealthy community, including aging seniors, poor families, abuse victims, the homeless and those needing social assistance.

“The councillors get elected on things that are very visible and very local on a ward level,” said Urbanski. “I think coming here (to the Region) starts to shift their perspective — that the community isn’t how they thought it was. Many people, if they’re lucky, don’t have to use our services.”

Halton has not yet named Urbanski’s replacement, though internal candidates could include the five directors that report to her at this time.

The last departure of a high profile bureaucrat in Halton was the exit of former planning and public works commissioner Peter Crockett, who moved on to become the director of Toronto’s major capital infrastructure coordination office. Crockett’s department in Halton was subsequently split in two, and Mark Meneray is now commissioner of legislative and planning services and Mitch Zamojc for works and engineering services.

Urbanski did not cite money as a factor in her decision to accept the position in York. According to Provincial data, her salary in 2008 was just over $185,000. Her predecessor at the position she is taking in York received more than $215,000 the same year.