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The mayors of North Vancouver are calling for a public inquiry into a wastewater treatment project whose completion has been delayed by more than five years and whose cost has gone up by more than five times its original budget.
The North Shore Wastewater Treatment Plant was first announced in 2011 as a $700-million project, but its estimated cost has since ballooned to $3.86 billion, and its timeline for completion has been pushed back from 2020 to 2030.
City of North Vancouver Mayor Linda Buchanan and District Mayor Mike Little say they’re calling for an “equitable approach” to sharing the increased costs.
In a joint statement released on Thursday afternoon, the mayors say they met with B.C. Premier David Eby the same day to voice their concerns.
In addition to the public inquiry, they’re asking for a governance review of the Metro Vancouver Regional District, and a “fairness mechanism so that no municipality can ever again be held to a cost-sharing formula applied to costs that were never contemplated when the agreement was made.”
The mayors of North Vancouver are calling for a public inquiry into a water treatment project whose cost has gone up by more than five times its original budget. (Ben Nelms/CBC)
“We feel that we’re being asked to pay an unfair fair share of a project that has really spiraled completely out of control,” Buchanan told CBC News over the phone after the meeting with Eby.
“We have tried to fix this from within the structure of the system that is currently in place and we haven’t been successful.”
Little echoed her comments.
“We had been consulted on the project back when it was $700 million. Now it’s $3.86 billion and we’re expected to pay a significant portion of that extraordinary cost,” Little told CBC News.
“And we don’t think that’s fair.”
In their statement, the mayors say North Shore households face additional annual costs of between $590 and $1,182 for the next 30 years, while some costs, including decommissioning and remediating the site of the existing treatment facility, have not yet been quantified.
Asked about the mayors’ concerns, Mike Hurley, board chair for Metro Vancouver, says recent updates to financial policies ensure the regional district is able to deliver critical infrastructure “in the most affordable way possible” and align it with best practices for large utilities and cities across Canada.
He says Buchanan and Little both sit on the board for the region, so they know Deloitte Canada has completed an independent governance review, issuing recommendations that the region is in the process of implementing.
“I am not clear on their motivation for asking for something that is already being done,” Hurley said in an emailed statement later Thursday.
The water treatment plant is pictured in June 2024. Asked about the mayors’ concerns, Metro Vancouver Board Chair Mike Hurley says recent updates to financial policies ensure the regional district is able to deliver critical infrastructure ‘in the most affordable way possible’. (Ben Nelms/CBC)
Housing Minister Christine Boyle, meanwhile, says she and Eby met with Buchanan and Little and they are taking a “serious look” at the mayors’ letter.
Boyle says they “agree things aren’t working with Metro Vancouver, and that changes need to be made,” adding that’s why the province appointed a representative to the governance committee for the regional district.
In their Thursday statement, the mayors say they do not dispute Metro Vancouver’s cost-sharing formula for the original budget of $700 million, but the region is treating the formula “like a blank cheque.”
“When Metro Vancouver approved its cost-sharing formula, municipalities could calculate their own costs from a defined budget and scope,” the statement reads.
“There was no open-ended commitment to absorb whatever cost overruns Metro Vancouver incurs, no matter how far a project drifts.”
Buchanan and Little say local governments in B.C. must meet strict requirements before taking on significant long-term debt.
But they say Metro Vancouver’s sewerage borrowing operates under a different framework, allowing it to “borrow and assign the debt” to municipalities.
“No direct elector vote is required from the communities that will carry that debt for a generation,” Buchanan and Little say in the statement.
“Our residents bear the financial burden of Metro’s borrowing decisions without the democratic safeguards that provincial law otherwise guarantees.”
The mayors say it amounts to a “fundamental accountability gap.”
Construction workers are pictured working on the plant in June 2024. Housing Minister Christine Boyle says she and Premier David Eby met with Buchanan and Little, and they are taking a ‘serious look’ at the mayors’ letter. (Ben Nelms/CBC News)
Buchanan told CBC News that residents in her jurisdiction are demanding answers.
“These costs are astronomical,” Buchanan said. “So there needs to be a very serious conversation with everybody at the table to see how it is that we move forward with this.”