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Canmore Rec Centre moving forward with $12.9 million budget

CANMORE - The capital project to repair the Canmore Rec Centre is moving forward with a $12.9 million budget after elected officials approved an increase this week. Canmore council voted unanimously to increase the project budget by $2.
An image of the final design for the first floor of the Canmore Rec Centre lifecycle repair and maintenance project.
An image of the final design for the first floor of the Canmore Rec Centre lifecycle repair and maintenance project.

CANMORE - The capital project to repair the Canmore Rec Centre is moving forward with a $12.9 million budget after elected officials approved an increase this week.

Canmore council voted unanimously to increase the project budget by $2.1 million from $10.8 million after facilities project manager Kristine Bain provided an update on the results of the tender process.

"The overall tender results came in significantly over budget and an increased budget of $2.1 million is needed to award trades and tender design," Bain said. "Of the $12.9 million, $1.25 million is a contingency construction fund of 10 per cent, which is within industry norms for a facility renovation of this size and complexity.

"It is essential to complete this work now before further disruptions are encountered," she said, adding when it comes to asset management it is better to replace systems before they fail.

Mayor John Borrowman spoke about the overall project and process that brought council to this point of awarding the project at $12.9 million.

"This project was first envisioned 10 years ago by council, in 2007-08, when they were discussing what to do with this sudden windfall," he said, referring to the Municipal Sustainability Initiative (MSI) grant fund created by the province that year.

"At that time, council recognized the rec centre was nearing the end of its life and should be in the hopper for some sort of a renovation project to keep it functioning into the future."

By 2010, council had dedicated $5 million from MSI to the project, but it soon became clear that was not going to be enough to fix the multiple components in the facility that were nearing their expected lifespans.

"I am certain when the mechanical engineer says they are at the end of life, he is serious," said the mayor. "It is an important facility for our town and has served our community really well since it was first built.

"I think the onus is upon us as council of the day to reassure the community the facility is of critical importance and that we recognize the liability that exists if we do not do this work."

In February, Bain was in front of council to report that administration was anticipating the tender process to return $3 million to $4 million over budget.

At the time, council reduced the scope of the work to try and bring it in on budget, removing items that could be considered improvements and keeping the project geared toward a lifecycle rehabilitation.

Bain said 90 per cent of the work included in the project currently represents lifecycle maintenance and work to bring the facility up to building code.

Bain said only two things in the overall scope at the time could not be added to the rec centre in the future - ventilation for the concession so it could include a grill, and a central staircase for $1 million.

Council voted at the time to keep the ventilation, but scrap the staircase, as the focus of the project was to complete much needed maintenance work on the building and its components, which date back to 1983.

User groups of the facility have expressed frustration with the process, and not being included in the design process from the very beginning.

As a group, Canmore Minor Hockey has been outspoken in its criticism of the process and the lack of improvements users of the building can expect.

Councillor Rob Seeley said he was struggling with the decision to approve the budget increase given those issues.

"I wish I was getting support letters saying 'we agree with the project,' but I am not getting those," Seeley said. "I am hoping that as we move forward we can work with some of the groups to address the shortfall and add scope items in the future.

"We are spending so much, but there are items not being captured ... it is difficult to move forward with a project when the community has been divided."

Bain told council that of the 16 sub-trades, 10 had good representation in the tender process. The results came in higher than estimated in all areas and one of the factors that contributed toward that was it is a busy construction season in Canmore already.

"Currently, there is a significantly large volume of work in the Bow Valley, leading to capacity restraints in local trades," said Bain, adding that has led to increased premiums for out of town trades that bid.

As for alternatives, Bain estimated to build a new recreation centre with two ice arenas would cost upwards of $50 million and take several years to plan and fund.

"Administration, our cost management firm and design team do not believe the work can be deferred or split into multiple projects," she added.

Council voted to use a restricted reserve account - the municipal reserve fund - to pay for the added budget.

There was some debate among councillors about the appropriateness of using that reserve instead of general capital.

Coun. Joanna McCallum put forward a motion to use MR reserve funds for the project, saying she sees it as a good fit for the project.

"This might be an opportunity to fund this without having to tragically deplete our general capital reserves," McCallum said. "We have been working hard to build those up based on our long-term strategy and it would seem a shame to deplete those."

Coun. Vi Sandford opposed the motion, saying the account only has enough funds in it to cover the $2.1 million budget increase.

"If we had a very robust municipal reserve to draw from, I would support it," Sandford said. "There is more wiggle room in (general capital)."

The funds in the MR reserve are restricted to pay for recreation related projects and the money in it comes from the development industry when it is unable to dedicate lands as municipal reserve at the time of subdivision. It also contains funds from the sale of MR land, like the old daycare lands, for example.

The rest of the project budget comes from $5 million in municipal sustainability fund grants from the province, $5 million debt and $825,000 from the general capital reserve.

Manager of financial services Katherine Van Keimpema said she would prefer to use debt for the budget increase, but because the project has already begun and the fact a borrowing bylaw would cause delay, that was not the recommendation from administration.


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