Gaming Centre Review Clears Air
By 250 News
Monday, April 12, 2010 08:00 PM
Prince George, B.C.- Prince George City Council has received the official review of the construction of the Chances Bingo Parkade.
The review was approved by City Council with the hope it would lay to rest questions about the development of the project and the City's involvement
The review provided answers to several concerns that had been raised about the project:
· City purchased the property for $1.29 million dollars
· Otter Properties paid $1.2 million for the “air space” ( did not purchase actual land)
· Documents show the full amount of the purchase price was held in trust by the City’s solicitor April 11 of 2007, but was not transferred to the City until August of that year because of several factors:
o City needed to close a lane to create one parcelo Neither party totally familiar with intricacies of creating new airspace parcelso Buildings needed to be demolished to create air space parcelso Demolition revealed environmental issues that had to be dealt with
· Otter Properties and the City split the cost of environmental cleanup of the parkade site ($70 thousand each)
· Otter Properties paid $800 thousand to demolish and remove existing buildings from site
· Restrictive covenant placed on property that called for townhouse development to be built within 2 years or City could buy the residential portion of the site back for $1.
· When asked why the City had not exercised its option to buy back the property when townhouses were not built, the answer was that it did not want to “pull the trigger” as the City has been negotiating with other parties and wanted a higher density building on the site. The covenant has been transferred to the new owner of the gaming centre
· City was to construct underground parkade (estimated cost was $4 million) the money from the downtown parking reserve and the downtown development fund would be used for this construction. The parkade to become a City capital asset
· Otter Properties constructed the parkade for the City as part of the overall development project. ( that is why the construction of the parkade did not go to open tender)
· Otter Properties announced it would drop the maximum the City would be responsible for from $4 million to $3 million (actual cost came in at $4.85 million)
· The question about whether the City needed a parkade was not clearly answered. The parkade’s average utilization rate was 16% during the first 6 months it was available, to a high of 65% during the last 6 months of 2009
The information reviewed came from more than 1000 pages of e-mails, a bankers box full of documents and a CD with Council meeting minutes.
The reviewer, Jane Neumann of Deloitte says the only item out of the ordinary she could see from the information provided was the failure to build the townhouses.
Councillor Brian Skakun had further questions he wanted answered, about the cost of heating the parkade, the funds paid for streetscape improvements and the total cost of the environmental clean up of the site before the parkade could be built.
Neumann said she had met with Councillor Brian Skakun and the Mayor before the review was started and those questions were not brought up, so they were not included in the scope of the review.
She fell short of saying the City got a good deal on the cost of the parkade, saying only that the cost of the parkade was $1.9 million less than estimated.
Councillor Munoz interpreted the lack of use of the parkade as meaning the construction of that facility benefitted private business more than the City. Councillor Don Bassermann took exception to that, saying initially the City was to only have 20% of the parkade for monthly rentals with the Gamaing Centre having access to the rest. He adds now that the City has full access to the parkade it benefits a number of facilities in the downtown, Civic as well as commercial.
Neumann concludes that she could find nothing untoward in the City's involvement in the sale or construction of the Gaming Centre and the parkade.
Councilor Murry Krause says this report is a vindication of concerns surrounding the construction of the parkade and Gaming Centre "As one of the Councillors who supported this development, I continue to do so. I believe the investment was worth it and we will have the benefit for a long time."
Mayor Dan Rogers says the work done by Jane Neumann shows there was nothing untoward in this project, "The intent of this scope of work was to review the processes and to respond to some of the concerns Council had and the community had about whether the processes were fair and conducted in a highly professional manner. I think the questions posed and were responded to by Ms Neuman clearly answer that. Any suggestion either direct or indirect that something untoward has occurred here is totally false and wrong."
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Posted by: Denaljo on April 12 2010 10:00 PM