Vancouver’s Olympics albatross continues to weigh heavily. The latest: The bid deadline for the non-profits bidding to operate the city’s three buildings had to be pushed back to Sept. 27 from Sept. 7 last week because there is so much confusion about the city’s demands. The bid has prompted a flurry of questions about the city’s plan to claw back any surpluses, the requirement to prepay huge leases, and more.
BC Housing, which is managing the bid process for the city, had to post two full sets of questions and answers to perplexed potential bidders. (You can see the Request for Proposals plus appendices with the Q and As here. My story here.
Also, since my story appeared, Dave Eddy of Vancouver Native Housing got back to me with this message:
Due to the complexities involved we have decided not to put a bid in on the Olympic site housing. I am quite certain that in the end whichever group is successful on the RFP their agreement with the city and BC Housing will look a lot different than what is currently proposed in the documents.
7 responses so far ↓
1 Joe Just Joe // Sep 13, 2010 at 9:33 am
There have only been 7 admendants to the proposal so far. Perhaps they need to hire someone for clarity mining.
2 Jon Petrie // Sep 13, 2010 at 11:07 am
To me it is real curious that the Bula Globe article gives no figure for lost rents, (I estimate $300,000 a month minimum), does not explicitly raise the question as to why the circa 100 market rental units are empty and unadvertised but focuses exclusively on the 151 social-housing units, and generally seems to excuse/ cover up what I see as gross negligence, e,g. a sentence from her article >>Renting out the city’s 252 apartment units has been a difficult process.<<
3 Frances Bula // Sep 13, 2010 at 11:19 am
@Jon. Yes, shocking how I wrote yet another sycophantic story about the Vision administration by focusing on how their process has resulted in months of delay of filling the apartments. And sneaky of me to realize that readers would be too dumb to figure out that 252 unrented apartments equals a lot of money per month.
Btw, my story constantly refers to their three buildings, the 252 apartments that are a mix of market and non-market, all of them not rented.
4 Dan Cooper // Sep 13, 2010 at 12:42 pm
The link above seems to lead now to a different bidding opportunity. The Olympic Village apartments are at:
http://www.bcbid.gov.bc.ca/open.dll/showDisplayDocument?sessionID=23467711&disID=17935617&docType=Tender&dis_version_nos=6&doc_search_by=Tend&docTypeQual=TN
5 Dan Cooper // Sep 13, 2010 at 1:17 pm
From the RFP: “After the mortgage of lease has been repaid in full, the Operator will be entitled to retain half of any net surplus remaining after expenses and capital replacement reserve fund contributions have been paid, and will pay the other half to the City, it being understood that the Operator, as a not-for-profit organization, will use such proceeds only to further its stated goals and objectives. Prior to repayment of the mortgage, the Operator will pay over to the City any such net surplus.”
This seems to say that only half, not all the surplus must go to the city, although the final sentence is vague enough to possibly indicate otherwise (as well as contradicting the first sentence on whether the payment to the city takes place “after” or “prior” to the mortgage payment.) Of course, the situation still seems odd – at least to me, admittedly not a specialist in this field – since it is stated elsewhere that the non-profit operator is taking all the risk:
“Accordingly, no operational subsidies will be available from BC Housing or the City”
There does seem to be some room for negotiation about this, though not up front. From the second Q&A:
Q: “The RFP provides for the return of “net surpluses” to the City but also implies the possibility that all rents in all income categories may have to be raised depending on expenses. Would the City consider allowing retention of surpluses from any sources to a maximum of, say, $1000 per unit?”
A: “This is an issue that can be discussed with the successful proponent.”
Similar “once you’re committed, then we’ll talk,” wording seems to be in several other answers. The question that arises for me is whether any non-profit will go ahead with a bid, based on such uncertainties. Question to those who know about such bid processes: Can a non-profit back out without penalty after winning the bid, if they do not like the City’s decisions or willingness to negotiate in these “wait and see” areas?
6 Bill McCreery // Sep 13, 2010 at 2:29 pm
What this item is really all about is the incompetent management of the entire Olympic Village [what is now becoming] scandal. It started by them leaking confidential incamera information during the 2008 election to gain a political advantage. It worked in the short term but, now VV have to live with the monster they created. And, the taxpayers’ money they’ve apparently misdirected to pay J. Ross & co. is peanuts by comparison to the $300,000 / month of also taxpayer money flying out the window from the Olympic Village debacle.
The really, really serious mistake was for Gregor & co to bad mouth this project during the election because any development project gets a life of its own, good or bad. They gave it a bad rep from the get go, creating a marketing disaster! We’re still living with it. Once a project has a negative image it’s very, very difficult to shake.
Since then, they’ve been in office for almost 2 years. They knew before they were elected they would need to have a plan in place to effectively manage the post Olympics transition of the OV. They delayed making a decision until a few months ago, the delay clearly showing they had no plan. &, the decisions they have made also clearly show they are ideologically driven & rigid despite what the on the ground conditions are. Among other sand traps they’ve created they’ve decided to rent to a select group of people who we now know don’t want to rent there &/or can’t afford the rents. Surely after +/-3 months with no takers maybe its time for a 2nd look? On the social housing side the conveluted process is another obvious no go. They knew from the day they were elected they had to deal with these matters. They’ve slashed programmes, facilities budgets & cut jobs across the City but, they haven’t dealt with something they knew they had to. Is this good management?
But, the icing on this flop of a cake was this morning hearing Gregor wondering out loud from China [he was supposed to be getting away to avoid things like this] that maybe there should be more rental in the OV or something to that effect. He referred to the +/-400 unsold units & blamed the down market.
Boy o boy! Magee, Bob Rennie, pls ask this man to stop talking about the OV. He’s not helping. He’s making a bad he created in the 1st place, then made worse & now much worse.
7 Mary // Sep 13, 2010 at 5:37 pm
One of the main contributing factors to this fiasco is the almost complete loss of corporate memory on how to make these projects and processes work. Cameron Gray, Larry Beasley, Brent MacGregor, Jody Andrews, James Ridge – all gone; replaced entirely by people whose major qualifications are:
1. they don’t ask questions when given instruction, and
2. don’t listen when provided with information that doesn’t appear to fit the current agenda.
Even when provided with advice on how the bigger goals and long term (small v) vison could be achieved, this administration has so much of a ‘my way or the highway’ value system that the advice is ignored.
Leave a Comment