A Victoria watchdog group is calling for an independent inquiry after a freedom of information request produced a memo that suggests city manager Gail Stephens might have misled councillors in October 2011 about the Johnson Street Bridge replacement being on budget.
At the October meeting, a month before the municipal election, Stephens told councillors the bridge replacement was still within the then $77-million budget. However, in August, the city’s acting assistant director of finance, Troy Restell, wrote the bridge project team a memo indicating bridge costs had risen an estimated $5.2 million to $82.2 million.
The memo, obtained through a freedom of information request made by johnsonstreetbridge.org director Ross Crockford, showed the additional costs included $600,000 for permits, $1.5 million in fees to construction management firm MMM Group, $828,000 for Telus utility duct relocation, $1 million for procurement assistance and $600,000 for insurance.
In his memo, Restell recommended that, based on the analysis, councillors be informed of the additional costs. But other than the Telus duct relocation work that was about to begin, council was not told of the additional costs until March 2012, when it learned costs had escalated more than the earlier $5.2-million estimate — increasing by $15.8 million, to $92.8 million.
“The memo shows that you’ve got a department in city hall saying this is a problem, tell council. Then somebody else is making a decision, no we’re not going to tell council,” Crockford said.
Mayor Dean Fortin said he has full confidence in Stephens, who has a responsibility to be sure she has all the facts before reporting to council. He said there is no need for any inquiry.
“It’s a case of where the city manager got some preliminary information and, when she’s confident of the numbers analysis, she brings it forward … to council,” Fortin said. “She got some preliminary information and instructed staff to do a full review of the costs and funding related to the project. … That takes time to do, but council wants to have full and complete information.”
In a statement, Stephens said: “Complete and tested budget information was presented to council when the necessary due diligence had been completed. Based on the preliminary information I had received as of October 2011, I believed the project was within the approved budget.”
The statement added, “civic elections do not factor into the timing of staff reports to council.”
Given that all the cost increases were reported in March, Fortin said there is no new information in the material Crockford received. The mayor said he’s satisfied with the process followed.
Crockford said that doesn’t make sense. “It’s kind of like saying: ‘We’re not going to listen to the smoke detectors. We’ll believe we have a fire when the fire trucks show up.’ ”
He said council should get regular updates on the bridge from the finance department.
Fortin said council wasn’t happy to hear of the increased costs last March.
“But what we are happy with is where we are now. We have that complete budget. We have a fixed-term contract. We know that the budget is not going to creep up any further,” he said.
