The city has quietly parted ways with the head of its office of emergency management in the midst of a global pandemic.

Charles Jansen had served as the director of the city’s office of emergency management since October but on Wednesday city spokesperson Brad Ross confirmed to CP24 that Jansen is no longer employed by the city.

It is unclear when Jansen left the role, however his Linkedin page indicates that his employment with the city ended sometime this month.

Fire Chief Matthew Pegg, who also serves as the general manager of Toronto’s office of emergency management, continues to lead the city’s response to COVID-19.

“The City of Toronto does not discuss personnel matters. What’s important to know, however, is from the moment COVID-19 began to emerge as a public concern in January, Fire Chief Matthew Pegg, as the head of the city’s office of emergency management, has led the city’s operational response, and continues to do so,” Ross said in a statement. “Dr. Eileen de Villa, Toronto’s Medical Officer of Health, continues to lead all public health aspects of COVID-19 in Toronto.”

Emergency operations centre now at level three

News of Jansen’s exit surfaced one day after the city confirmed that its emergency operations centre is now operating at its highest possible level.

The emergency operations centre was opened last week at a level one activation but the city quickly escalated it to level two in order to staff it 24/7 and gain access to other resources.

On Tuesday night, Pegg confirmed on Twitter that the centre is now operating at a level 3 activation, which is the highest possible level.

He said that the move was automatically triggered by the province’s decision to declare a state of emergency.

It will result in the deployment of some additional resources into the centre, Pegg said, though at this point it is unclear what form those resources may take.

“Transitioning from level two to level three really will not produce anything visible from our residents’ perspective,” he told CP24 on Wednesday morning. “But with the declaration of the provincial emergency there will now be direct connection that we maintain with the provincial emergency operations centre. So there will be some additional provincial coordination, and some additional city coordination.”

Pegg previously said that upwards of 50 people “from each and every city division and city agency” were working on the response to COVID-19 at the emergency operations centre but it is unclear whether additional staff have since been brought in.

Speaking with CP24 earlier on Wednesday, Mayor John Tory said that the level three declaration is not “indicative of anything getting any worse” and is rather just another example of how seriously the city is taking the outbreak.

“I don’t think anybody will notice anything in the context of people going about their lives and staying home and avoiding crowds and so on. I just think it means that from the standpoint of our emergency operations centre and the way it is staff that they will be at the highest level of engagement and that is what people would expect,” he said.

The city’s emergency operations centre has not previously operated at level three and Pegg said last week that the designation would ordinarily be reserved for natural disasters.