Bowman urges province to make transit corridor funding dispute public

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This article was published 21/02/2018 (2255 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Mayor Brian Bowman has escalated the latest funding dispute between city hall and the province, challenging the Pallister government to release the funding agreement for the completion of the southwest transit corridor.

Bowman told reporters Thursday that there’s been no resolution to the province’s refusal to pay its outstanding share of construction costs on the corridor project and he didn’t know how the difference between the two levels of government can be resolved unless the Pallister government agrees to honour the terms of the written agreement.

“They are not paying until such time as they feel changes are made for either an amendment or a new agreement,” Bowman said. “We obviously expect the funding as contemplated in the agreement will be honoured. We’ve been communicating that very clearly with the government.”

Bowman repeated claims he made a week ago that the changes the province wants would be “significant in additional costs to Winnipeg taxpayers. In the millions of dollars. It would be significant.”

Bowman would not detail the changes the province wants but described them as “fundamental changes to the agreement. That’s why it hasn’t been agreed to.”

Bowman said a confidentially clause in the original agreement prevents city hall from disclosing what the province has been demanding, adding city hall has requested the Pallister government to make the deal public but they have yet to respond.

A spokeswoman for Municipal Relations Minister Jeff Wharton said the province has received the city’s request and it “will respond through official channels after careful review.”

Under the terms of the original funding agreement for the $587-million transit corridor project, city hall and the province were to each contribute $225 million and Ottawa the remaining $137.3 million.

The overall cost of the project was subsequently lowered by $120 million as a result of a series of cost-saving moves implemented by the consortium building the corridor, with the savings to be shared equally by all three levels of government.

A provincial government spokesman confirmed no payments have been made to city hall for the past year, adding the Pallister government believes the deal needs to be amended to reflect the lower overall cost and no payments will be made until city hall agrees to the changes.

aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca