I am delighted to announce the appointment of Ron Saporta to the position of Chief Operations Officer, Facilities & Services, with a start date of June 25, 2018.

Ron joins U of T from Baycrest where he is the Executive Director, Redevelopment & Support Services. A Civil Engineer by training, Ron has a Bachelor’s with an environmental specialization and a Masters in Civil Engineering both from University of Waterloo. Ron also holds an MBA from Rotman. Ron has led business transformation initiatives at Baycrest, as well as in his past roles with some of our healthcare partners (St. Michael’s Hospital and Mount Sinai Hospital). He has been at the helm of a multi-phase $700m capital redevelopment project and is recognized for having fostered an environment of learning and growth within his current and past leadership teams.

Ron has also played several active roles in developing sustainability and greenhouse gas reduction programs throughout his career. As a result he has been awarded several national and international awards for this work, including those from the Canadian Healthcare Engineers Society and the British Medical Journal.

Ron will be working with the Facilities & Services team and our tri-campus colleagues on various ongoing initiatives: the execution of GGRP Innovation Fund Grant projects; the identification and assessment of new opportunities for GHG reduction projects to continue our progress towards our 2030 goal; the receipt and implementation of recommendations from the Campus Police organizational review; and the execution of pilot project recommendations from the AODA audit, to name a few. We are hugely excited to welcome Ron to U of T, and to his new position and role within the University Operations portfolio.

I would like to express my deep appreciation to Anne Macdonald, Assistant Vice-President, Ancillary Services, for her stellar job in shepherding the Facilities & Services portfolio in the months during our search; Anne has moved vigorously forward on several new initiatives in a short amount of time, and will now return to focusing on just one large portfolio at a time.