Sechelt council has rejected the idea of pursing a long-term loan of up to $4 million for the construction of the proposed Public Works Operations Centre, and sent the proposal back to staff.
The old public works building was demolished to make way for the Water Resource Centre, and the department has been operating out of temporary structures on a district-owned property off Dusty Road.
Earlier reports on the need for a new building pointed out that the current arrangement isn’t meeting the same workplace health and safety standards as a new building could. The original estimates for a new operations centre were around $2 million. The budget for the latest proposal was $4.8 million.
After getting the endorsement of the finance committee, the proposal ran into stiff opposition at council’s June 20 meeting, and the price tag was the main issue.
Coun. Doug Wright has maintained for some time that the plans on the drawing board call for a building that’s well beyond what the district needs, but after offering “reluctant” support at committee changed his position when the issue was before council. He said being reminded of his election promises helped tip the balance.
“I quote, ‘If elected I will spend our tax dollars carefully, effectively for the benefit of all Sechelt… I will do my utmost to convince the balance of council to do the same.’ This is not a careful expenditure of money,” Wright said.
Coun. Mike Shanks, who wasn’t at the finance committee meeting, said he too has serious concerns about the cost, which he thinks should have come in around $150 to $200 per sq. foot.
“What’s put it exceptionally high is the requirement that it be an architecturally designed building. And I don’t know of any other that’s to the same standard,” Shanks said. “It isn’t as though it will be a tourist attraction or anything like that.”
Coun. Darnelda Siegers spoke in favour of moving ahead with a loan authorization, through an alternate approval process or referendum, and getting on with the project.
“When this first came to us a number of years back, staff had looked at other buildings, other proposals, and other locations in the community and could not find anything that would fit the needs of our staff for a cost that would also allow for expansion and future use of the municipality,” Siegers said, noting that construction costs are rising. “My fear is that if we do not start moving this forward, this building is going to keep increasing in cost… It’s demoralizing for a staff not to have a place to work. We need to provide a proper facility.”
Coun. Noel Muller, who was the one to vote against the proposal at the finance committee, reaffirmed that opposition at council.
“We know our staff need it,” said Muller, “but when the same thing gets put in front of us again and again and again and the issues we raise are more or less degraded or muted, we get to a point where tough decisions that needed to be made years ago never got to happen.”
Mayor Bruce Milne suggested that before the proposal is revisited, council needs to return to a fundamental question. “We never decided at the very beginning what kind of building, what value we wanted to build into the facility,” Milne said. “We weren’t asked that question.”
Coun. Alice Lutes, who has supported the proposal in the past, was not present for the June 20 vote because she was representing council at a community event. With councillors Darren Inkster, Shanks, Muller and Wright all opposed, one vote either way would not have swayed the outcome.
It’s unclear when a new plan to replace the public works building will come forward.
