So it's a done deal, or is it?
The Cobourg Community Centre saga just drones on and on like the Energiser Bunny - with a life of its own. Yesterday the resolution to approve the project was put and voted upon. The result was a 5-1 win for the "four dead white men". Councillor Mutton was convinced that financing the Municipal portion of it, over twenty five years at a fixed rate with money we don't have yet, was a good idea and she went along with the majority. Councillor Frost, still objecting to the lack of details, voted against the process not necessarily the project. He is still stating, with all of his professional experience, that the project is bound to over-run its costs without seeing a detailed scope of work that Council should approve.
It is an amorphous piece of work. Council approves the idea and then shops out all the details to "the best Project Managers we can find" and then sets up committees to liaise with the PM to actually build the box with two rinks. CAO Robinson told me yesterday that the scope is in the report that outlines the project that was issued in June, so what's the problem. The Director of Works tells me that the scope is limited because the building is designed to be so flexible it can be a convention centre one day, a Seniors' centre the next and at the same time can host a basketball tournament. He didn't use those words but says, "The key to this building is its flexibility, no one group will have a piece of it, All will share it" It appears that the word "scope" has two meanings: one - Frost's (the traditional PM definition) where the costs and uses are fully outlined so that one can see future risk and potential over-run and the rest that say "These guys we hired will build it for $27 million and eat the over-run. But the danger in that is when over runs or rework or increased material costs happen the building will be redesigned to accommodate it and we won't get what we thought we would get. However as the next stage of the process is the issuing of the RFP Council will then get to see what we think we will get at the end. That's why the process drones on and on, Council can still get out of it by not issuing the RFP. But the philosophical differences in this debate can be summed by by watching a huge beast of a man - Cllr MacDonald rising to the full height of a bull elephant fulminating with condescension and disdain as he rose to rebut Frost, he was ready to speak at the start of the debate, and could hardly wait to knock Frost's arguments. Speaking with much pomposity and arrogance, as only he can, proudly declared, "As all the scope is outlined in the report I can only assume that the Steering Committee's work, on which you have a seat, will be complete by 2010, and we have have two professionals (Peacock and Robinson) who, in their considered opinion, say it can be done." So there you have it folks we don't need a Council to take ownership of the project send it off to unelected committees and let Councillor MacDonald concentrate on serious matters - points of order and other picayune points of procedure that Cllr Mutton may cause that offend his senses of parliament!
As to the problem of the Lawn Bowling Club going into the building on public money that will solved because the bowlers can't agree on moving. Especially if they have to pay full market value for the privilege.
In other Council news, revealed by the coordinators' reports, Cllr McCaughey told the world that some of our public trees are bug infested, and Cllr Mutton revealed that the Committee for Art in Public Spaces could not find any local takers to carve the tree stump in Victoria park so an invitation will be sent to esteemed out of town tree carvers to produce a work of art from a limbless stump, albeit a thirty foot high stump.
It is an amorphous piece of work. Council approves the idea and then shops out all the details to "the best Project Managers we can find" and then sets up committees to liaise with the PM to actually build the box with two rinks. CAO Robinson told me yesterday that the scope is in the report that outlines the project that was issued in June, so what's the problem. The Director of Works tells me that the scope is limited because the building is designed to be so flexible it can be a convention centre one day, a Seniors' centre the next and at the same time can host a basketball tournament. He didn't use those words but says, "The key to this building is its flexibility, no one group will have a piece of it, All will share it" It appears that the word "scope" has two meanings: one - Frost's (the traditional PM definition) where the costs and uses are fully outlined so that one can see future risk and potential over-run and the rest that say "These guys we hired will build it for $27 million and eat the over-run. But the danger in that is when over runs or rework or increased material costs happen the building will be redesigned to accommodate it and we won't get what we thought we would get. However as the next stage of the process is the issuing of the RFP Council will then get to see what we think we will get at the end. That's why the process drones on and on, Council can still get out of it by not issuing the RFP. But the philosophical differences in this debate can be summed by by watching a huge beast of a man - Cllr MacDonald rising to the full height of a bull elephant fulminating with condescension and disdain as he rose to rebut Frost, he was ready to speak at the start of the debate, and could hardly wait to knock Frost's arguments. Speaking with much pomposity and arrogance, as only he can, proudly declared, "As all the scope is outlined in the report I can only assume that the Steering Committee's work, on which you have a seat, will be complete by 2010, and we have have two professionals (Peacock and Robinson) who, in their considered opinion, say it can be done." So there you have it folks we don't need a Council to take ownership of the project send it off to unelected committees and let Councillor MacDonald concentrate on serious matters - points of order and other picayune points of procedure that Cllr Mutton may cause that offend his senses of parliament!
As to the problem of the Lawn Bowling Club going into the building on public money that will solved because the bowlers can't agree on moving. Especially if they have to pay full market value for the privilege.
In other Council news, revealed by the coordinators' reports, Cllr McCaughey told the world that some of our public trees are bug infested, and Cllr Mutton revealed that the Committee for Art in Public Spaces could not find any local takers to carve the tree stump in Victoria park so an invitation will be sent to esteemed out of town tree carvers to produce a work of art from a limbless stump, albeit a thirty foot high stump.
6 comments:
Maybe we could carve the likenesses of Cobourg's past (and present) mayors into this 'pillar of worship'. In some cases the medium would certainly be the message. Just letting the creative juices gel.
Maybe an artist from Alderville could carve a totem pole to tell the story of how they lost their beautiful country to a bunch of hooligans with no respect for the planet.
Why don't we leave the tree just like it is? It appears to have a face that is looking at folks watching the goings on in the band shell.
I did make a submission to the Public Arts Committee. They called for "wood carvers", and "wood artists" and sculptors. I am none of those, so I would have to hire them to execute my piece.
Here's the poem that illustrated the trunk I photoshopped last June 23
This is not the piece I had submitted. Mine is a Totem Poem -- by a WASP male.
Something about the cavalier manner in which some on council have dealt with the Centre reminds me of the present library site. One councellor of the day pretty much summed up the affair, when pressed about using existing parkland ( other, viable sites were available ) for the new building, said that council was pretty much exhausted by the ordeal and had to do something. And something they did.
When walking along Albert downtown I often wonder what the streetscape could have been with a beautiful library beside the town hall instead of the existing parking lot. The way the built structures walled along the waterfront hog the site is just the latest example of missed opportunity in my opinion. Lackluster councils are a Cobourg legacy, it would appear.
I too remember the controversy about the location of the library, and I still think the site across from Victoria Hall was perfect, especially if the goal really was to keep the downtown vibrant.
Guess that only counts when its something really important, like the liquor store. Talk about culture, gimme some merlot please, and make it snappy.
Just recently my handsome spouse and I were in the Library, and he commented on how much wasted space there is in its design. This was after I wondered why the main entrance is buried secretively in the parking strip and not facing the street with a more suitable and noteworthy portal befitting of this important local landmark.
But then, mediocrity seems to be our byword here in Slow-bourg.
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