Consequence Of Poor Decision City Annex

CUPE Workers Forced To Work In Dangerous Building?

It seems that the Canadian Union of Public Employees are finally waking up to the fact that the city of Nanaimo has been allowing them to work in a building too dangerous to use in it's present state. It seems funny they didn't have any concerns in 2008 when a city commissioned seismic study was undertaken and used as the basis for condemning the old Annex.

Of course, some of us, yours truly included never did buy the line the city was peddling and saw the whole exercise as a way to get staff out of the old office and into a shiny new office with shiny new furniture. You may recall the secretive way this whole mission was accomplished about this time back in 2011. You may have forgotten that council decided to build the new building on Mar. 7, 2011 but didn't tell the public about it until May. Long after the wheels were put in motion, that might have been stopped if the public were told what was going on.

A decision council apparently is too ashamed of to release the council vote which made this decision in the first place. From documents I have obtained under freedom of information, I now know the first time council voted on the new annex, that motion was defeated.

So What Was The Basis For Declaring This Building So Hazardous?

A seismic assessment study commissioned by the city stated:


“Upon review of the seismic condition of the building, we conclude that in a seismic event, there is a high risk of significant damage or partial collapse of the building occurring.”

Is there any building on the face of the planet that doesn't have a high risk of damage in a seismic event, when you don't specify the seismic event?

Canadian Building Code Would Not Require Upgrade
Work Safe BC says the building is safe to work in, just as is.

Questions For City Managers & City Council

If the Canadian Building Code would not require an upgrade of this building if there is no change of use, and Work Safe BC deems the building safe to use, why have you cost the Nanaimo taxpayer nearly $20,000,000.00 building a building we don't need, and devaluing a building with an assessed value of $4,000,000.00.

The 'official' city story doesn't even pass the smirk test. This building presents such a high hazard which we have known about since 2008 that we won't allow anyone else to buy and use it, but we have occupied since 2008. If you really believe that, I've still got some swamp land for sale.