Kelowna mayor's office looking to hire a speech writer

Elected officials spend a lot of time speaking to the media and making public presentations, sometimes with the help of a professional speech writer. In January, the City of Kelowna posted for a communications officer on its Job Opportunities website. “This role will be primarily focused on supporting the Mayor’s Office’s communication initiatives,” the posting says. “This role will provide support for the Mayor’s Office, including: researching, writing, and advising on content for web and internal publications, responding to inquiries and managing correspondence, as well as authoring speeches. “The Communications Consultant provides internal and external strategic communications primarily for the City Manager and Mayor and Council. The position also develops and delivers communications and marketing strategies to maximize effectiveness of corporate priority plans and departmental initiatives.” The job was posted on Jan. 18 and closed on Feb. 6 so it’s no longer on the city's website. It’s a non-union position with a salary range of $80,800 to $94,300. It seems that the position is necessary since neither the mayor nor the city’s communication department responded by publication time to repeated requests from iNFOnews.ca for more information. It’s unclear whether this is a new position adding to the more than a dozen members of the city’s communication department, or whether it's replacing an existing staff member. READ MORE:City of Kelowna's spending of thousands of dollars on mayor videos is unusual https://infotel.ca/newsitem/city-of-kelownas-spending-of-thousands-of-dollars-on-mayor-videos-is-unusual/it93347 In August 2022, iNFOnews.ca pointed out that despite having 14 employees in that department, it was spending tens of thousands of dollars on outside contractors to film and produce videos, many of which focused on then-Mayor Colin Basran. Current Mayor Tom Dyas is scheduled to deliver his first State of the City speech to the Kelowna Chamber of Commerce https://secure.kelownachamber.org/events/SOLD-OUT-Speaker-Series-The-State-of-the-City-with-Mayor-Tom-Dyas-6358/details  on Feb. 15. The event is already sold out. To contact a reporter for this story, email Rob Munro mailto:rmunro@infonews.ca  or call 250-808-0143 or email the editor mailto:news@infonews.ca . You can also submit http://tips@infonews.ca photos, videos or news tips to the newsroom mailto:tips@infonews.ca  and be entered to win a monthly prize draw. We welcome your comments and opinions on our stories but play nice. We won't censor or delete comments unless they contain off-topic statements or links, unnecessary vulgarity, false facts, spam or obviously fake profiles. If you have any concerns about what you see in comments, email the editor in the link above. SUBSCRIBE to our awesome newsletter here https://infotel.ca/newsletter .