Last Construction Project Built By City Hall

Conference Centre Was To Cost $52 Million

Actually Cost At Least $75 Million

Paid $3 Million To NOT Build a Hotel

The demonstrated skills seen at the last construction project overseen by the management team at city hall would never get anyone hired in the real world to build another project. There is not enough space here to compile a list of the demonstrations of complete incompetence in the field of construction management demonstrated by city hall staff during this huge waste of money.

But, remember this is not the real world as much as city staff and city council would like to pretend they are in charge of a multi-million corporation. For you see, that is how the city is run. The city is actually a corporation with a board of directors (elected councilors) a slate of officers (senior staff) and last but the ones with the most to loose are the shareholders in the corporation, which are each and every taxpayer in Nanaimo.

The reality of the matter is that city staff have to work for a civic organization as they would never get hired in the real world where there is consequence for incompetence. You see, in the city of Nanaimo, if you screw up a major project, like the VICC you get a golden handshake and in some cases even a promotion. That's the way it is at city hall, which as most close observers will tell you is likely where Alice wound up, when she fell down that hole.

Annex Is Just Like VICC

The VICC was the pet project of city hall who used every trick in the book to see it was built, right down to a questionable referendum. It was built without going to public tender, so to this day, we have no idea what that white elephant might have cost if it had been put out to bids. We were told the interests of the taxpayer were being taken care of, only to find out later we had paid a company $3 million to NOT build a hotel, and had no means of recovery. Of course good business managers would not have paid the $3 million in the first place. The $52 million quickly turned into $72 million (that they will own up to) and just for good measure they spent $650,000 to tear down the civic arena.

The new $16 million city annex is a pet project of city staff, who had little difficulty getting this current city council to put a rubber stamp on the project. A project they are so uncertain about they will not come out of the dark and tell you who supported this outrageous idea. Honestly, who on this city council do you think has any idea how to appraise the pros and cons of a major construction project which accounts for 35% of all capital spending for one year, and 10% of the entire budget for one year? In the real world, the current annex might get renovated in pieces, over time and instead of looking to build bright shiny new offices to house an expanding city hall, they would be thinking about downsizing as the local economy continues downward.

This annex has been approved without going to public tender ( a smooth move to avoid public scrutiny orchestrated by a slippery staff ) there is NO contract in place now and I will bet anything it will have lots of room to expand from the advertised $16 million to say $18 million ---- $20 million........ pick a number, and remember this is being orchestrated and overseen by the same management team that brought you the VICC.