Veteran's Plaza Price Tag To Hit $1 Million

By 250 News

No grass, no flowers, no shrubs, no irrigation system....yet

Prince George, B.C.-  Today, there is a site meeting for  those planning on  submitting a bid  to the City  for the job of installing an irrigation system at the  Veteran’s Plaza/ Spirit Square.

You may very well be asking yourself, why wasn’t this work done last year?  The short answer is …..money.

Initially,  the designers of the new Veteran’s Plaza/Spirit Square, estimated the  entire revamping of the area (including their design work )  would  cost  $950 thousand dollars.  The Province (as part of its Olympic Legacy program) agreed to pay half of the bill, to a maximum of $500 thousand.

The City spent just under $80 thousand for the design, meaning there was $870 thousand dollars left for the actual work and put out the call for bids on the project which included the installation of an irrigation system, and landscaping.

The lowest bid came in at $967,777.00  and that did not include taxes.   That would have put the project well over the budgeted amount says  Aiden Kelly, Manager of Solid Waste and Park Services for the City of Prince George “We wanted to make sure the money that we had was the money that we spent, so  we had to  reduce the scope of work and we looked at a number of areas on  how that could be accomplished and irrigation  was one of the areas we had to scale back on to  get the project on budget last year.”  They also agreed to hold off on landscaping, which explains why the Veteran’s Plaza/Spirit Square looks very barren.

The City went back to IDL, which removed those portions from its bid, and the revised price tag was just shy of $838 thousand plus tax.

City officials   say it isn’t really fair  to  say the project ran over budget as it was,  technically,  a little under budget for  2009 and now, a new budget for 2010 has set aside  $50 thousand  for the irrigation system installation.   But if you add the  two components of this project together,  it would  certainly  appear to the average person that a project which was supposed to cost $950  thousand,  is  going to cost  $1 million dollars. The initial  project  design also called for benches  and  First Nations  art of some sort, and  there are no signs of those elements  on the horizon.

A new tender has been issued for the installation of the irrigation system.  With the money that was left over from the 2009 budgeted amount, the City went out and bought the necessary pipe for the project.  The supplier also provided a design for the irrigation system.  Price tag for those components was $17 thousand dollars. The City has also purchased the plants trees and shrubs   that will be put on the site once the irrigation system has been installed.  The budgeted amount for the installation of the irrigation system is $50 thousand dollars. 

Bill Gaal says “sleeves” have already been installed under concrete so  putting the irrigation  system in place  should be a simple matter of trenching it in.  Since the landscaping  was not done,  there  won’t be any turf or garden areas that will have to be “dug  up” and no duplication of work. 

There is a tight  time line to get the work  completed. Tender for the irrigation project  closes on May 4^th, and  all  work  is expected to be complete by  May 17^th.   The City workers will  plant the flowers, trees and shrubs all in time for  the Royal Canadian Legion’s  D-Day  Ceremony  and dedication of the Cenotaph on June 6^th. 

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