The Town of Athabasca will take a hard look at some invoices that have recently crossed the desk of Mayor Roger Morrill, which will face scrutiny from the town’s legal team.
At a Sept. 6 meeting, town council voted to take bills to the town’s lawyers for an opinion – one for nearly $70,000 in road work at the Aspen Village trailer park and several others for software from PMH Insights that totaled $17,897.25.
“It is my fiduciary responsibility as mayor, to bring matters to Council’s attention if I am not aware of a supporting motion of Council and or budget concerns that might exist,” Morrill said in an email after the meeting.
The bill from the West-Can Seal Coating Inc. – in invoice for $67,685.10 for cape seal and micro-surfacing – was approved by town outside services superintendent Rick Kolach. A representative from West-Can also said he had been in communications with Kolach, who approved the work.
In an interview after the meeting, Kolach said former chief administrative officer Josh Pyrcz gave him approval on the project.
“He approved it, gave me the go-ahead,” Kolach said. He also said the town used West-Can’s micro-surfacing for a pilot project to extend the lifespan of roads by 10 years, testing it on roads near Whispering Hills Primary School over the past couple of years.
At the meeting, Morrill pointed out that when the request for proposal was sent out, the fact that it would be work done at the Athabasca Trailer Park was not mentioned.
“I do not understand why we’re paying, being the middleman for this,” he said, noting that he was unsure of what liability the town had exposed itself to with the transaction.
“Basically, we hired a subcontractor and I don’t know how this can exist,” he said. “In all my years of being on council I’ve never been asked to pay for somebody else’s paving that needed to be done.
“So, again, I hope you realize why I brought this here. I definitely need direction, this is not a small amount of money and this is not a small amount of liability as far as I know,” he continued. “What happens a year from now if that pavement doesn’t hold up?”
Coun. Nichole Adams – who was not at the Sept. 6 council meeting – includes in her public profile on the town’s website that she is president of the board of directors for Aspen Village Condominiums. She verified this in an email after the meeting.
“Given that this appears to be a potential legal issue between the Town and the Condominium, I will need to decline to answer further questions at this time,” she said. “Sorry I cannot be of more assistance, however I am not comfortable commenting further on something that could potentially harm either the Town or the Condo, or put me in a conflict of interest of some sort, until I can get some more information and legal advice on how to handle this moving forward.”
At the meeting, Councillors Steve Schafer, Tanu Evans and Joanne Peckham all voiced being in favour of contacting both West-Can and Aspen Village regarding the invoices.
Morrill requested interim chief administrative officer Warren Zyla provide details and documentation as possible to the council.
“I can explain that West-Can was hired by us to do some microsealing, Aspen Village Condo requested that their roads be done,” Zyla said. “Basically, West-Can billed us, we billed Aspen Village, they paid us, and this invoice here is us paying West-Can, so we are the middle ground.”
In an email after the meeting, Morrill said he had consulted with others and he believes an arrangement like this may be unprecedented for the town.
“No other instance comes to mind in my years on Council, where private land owners have asked the Town of Athabasca to be intermediary agents for work or improvements directly on their privately held lands,” he said.
At the meeting, Coun. Tim Verhaeghe called for the town to seek a legal opinion on the matter.
“I think that there’s possible pecuniary interest at play here, and my submission is that we need to get a proper legal opinion from the town’s lawyers on this whole issue from (Reynolds Mirth Richards & Farmer),” he said. “Was this legitimate, above board, pursuant to the MGA or anything else – or was this not legal?”
He made a motion to seek legal opinion, which was defeated by way of a tie with Councillors Shelly Gurba, Tanu Evans and Joanne Peckham opposed.
This was met with a chorus of heckling from the crowd of residents who turned out for the meeting, which prompted a point of order and a warning of expulsion from Evans.
Coun. Steve Schafer suggested council “revisit our decision to seek legal.”
Gurba agreed, and made a motion to seek for legal advice.
The motion then passed with all but Evans in favour.
The second set of invoices from PMH Insights came to a total of $17,897.25 for Envisio, a strategic planning cloud software. One bill for Envisio Data base fees, training and setup came to $8,321.25. A second bill for a two-year subscription for the service came in at $9,576. An email from Philip Hicks of PMH Insights states that an additional invoice had already been paid.
“I’m baffled here,” Morrill said. “I do not have a motion for council for this, I do not know where this came from. I don’t know what to do here.”
According to an expense claim obtained by the Athabasca Advocate, Pyrcz received compensation from the town for driving to a conference in Grande Prairie where he met with PMH Insights between Feb. 27 and March 12, 2015.
Official minutes from the July 28, 2015 town council meeting include a motion from Evans to “accept the strategic planning software by Mr. [Philip] Hicks [from PMH Insights] as information,” which was was carried.
“I can clarify why I did that,” Evans said. “That was a motion ‘for information,’ in the respect that it was going to be ignored. That’s why I made the motion for information rather than accepting it. I remember the proposal, the conversation around council being it wasn’t necessary for this community.”
A letter dated March 20, 2016 to the attention of former CAO Pyrcz provides two separate quotes, one for $12,800 and another for $3,200 – for the services.
Evans called for a motion for legal opinion, which was carried unanimously.
In an interview after the meeting, Evans reiterated that his motion in July 2015 was to not do anything about the software.
“I didn’t feel the software would be useful,” he said. “It was a cost the town didn’t really need. So I specifically made the motion to just kind of politically brush it under the rug. So I will say I’m concerned that we then purchased the software.”
When the Advocate requested more information from Envisio regarding their product and the company’s relationship with the town, they forwarded the request to PMH Insights.
When Hicks from PMH Insights reached out to the Advocate by phone, he asked for questions to be sent via email. The Advocate complied with the request. By deadline, PMH Insights had not returned the request, which was for more information about the product, how it might benefit the town and whether the company had done any other work with the town.
The Advocate also sent former CAO Pyrcz an email with questions about both sets of invoices. Although he responded to the email, he did not answer the questions.
