For years, we have been waiting for this moment – the tearing of four envelopes and reading of the eight digit bids for the pool project.
A pin drop could be heard in the room as Athabasca County manager Ryan Maier read each of the four company’s bids for building the new facility.
Then again, there also were not many people in the room. Neither the county or the town publicly announced the meeting on their Facebook pages or in the Advocate, and there were only 16 people gathered in the Athabasca County Council Chambers – mainly municipal leaders and employees.
Regardless, the financial figures were the most surprising thing about that meeting. The cheapest of the bids was almost equal to the cost consultant’s latest estimate, with a difference of a few dollars. The prices ranged from Clark Builders’ bid at $15,295,000 up to $19,754,346 from Krawford Construction. The prices do not include equipment for the exercise room.
That puts the figure for the town’s contribution at $6 million, taking into account the county agreement to pay 60 per cent of the pool’s construction. That’s leaves the town on the hook for a good chunk more than the loan OKed by town voters in the 2014 plebiscite.
Our front page has two major stories – this one, and the completion of the municipal inspection report into the affairs at the Town of Athabasca.
Town voters said in 2014 they agreed to get up to a $5-million loan for the pool. In 2016, they declared a lack of faith in their municipal representatives through a petition. Should this council, which lacks a member, be the one to tie up the town’s finances for the next couple of decades? Should this project move ahead with no whisper of guaranteed funding from other levels of government, and with so little official public input from county residents? We are unsure of the answers.
The next step in the process is for councils from the Town of Athabasca and Athabasca County to get together and discuss the viability of the project for both municipalities, which they will do at the Athabasca County office June 7 at 5 p.m. The joint council meeting is a public one. If you have interest in the pool project, go to the meeting. And get on the agenda for the next regular town and county council meetings to speak as a delegation. Have your say before it is too late.
