File F091 - Fields and Chatham Steel buildings heritage record

In the early years the management of City-owned properties was the responsibility of the Office of the Assessment Commissioner. By 1912 the Land Purchasing and Claims Department was established to take over the function. The names for this unit fluctuated, e.g. by 1932 it was the Land Sales Department and by 1936 the Lands and Rentals Department. By the late 1940s the functions included land sales, rentals, building repairs, land subdivisions, and insurance; by the 1948 expansion additional responsibilities were land purchasing, industrial development, lot clearing (transferred from City Engineer), and wartime housing (159-E-6 reel 1 file 1). On July 27, 1957 City Council passed the recommendation of the newly formed Board of Administration (1956) that the following units would become part of a new Finance Department headed by the City Comptroller: City Comptroller's Office, Accounting, Addressograph and Multilith, Assessment, Internal Audit, License and Business Tax, Motor Vehicle Inspection, Personnel and Payroll, Property and Insurance [referred to as the Properties Division], Purchasing and Supply, Revenue Collection, Tabulating, and Treasurer. In 1978 the Properties Division became part of the Civic Buildings Department, which was reconfigured as the Housing and Properties Department in 1989. With the major City reorganization of 1995, the Housing and Properties Department became Real Estate Services, under the broad financial unit called Corporate Services.