Absolutely agree!
If you want to attract the best talent to civic administration, you have to be prepared to pay them accordingly. To do otherwise is false economy. If you have inferior leadership then the actual costs of civic adminstration might actually go up as incompetence has it's own inherent liabilities.
I wish CBC (and the other media) would get off this witchhunt. I don't know if it is envy or what, but it is an awful Canadian trait to tear down successful people. This attitude has to stop!