16 responses so far ↓

• 1 Max // Jan 13, 2011 at 4:48 pm

  The financial problems is one thing.

  But, Mayor Robertson and Councilor Meggs making several disparaging remarks to the media also badly, badly hurt this project.

  The impact of their collective ‘negative messaging’ campaign surrounding this project to both the media and the public and for nothing else, but to point fingers at the pevious council in a sad attempt to gain political points, will cost us money.

  50 communications people on board with this council and they still shot themselves in the foot over this project.

  Any first year meedia, communications or pr person knows – no negative statements.

  And now the taxpayers get to hold the bag.

• 2 The Fourth Horseman // Jan 13, 2011 at 6:12 pm

  …and a rather telling comment on that article, that says the reason that no-one will buy is that the building is “lower”, there is a loss of view from most units — and that building “towers” at the site would have made the 1 million price tag worth it!!

  Well, that should comfort supporters of towers and the investor class (not the average Vancouvite) who want more towers.

• 3 Ben // Jan 13, 2011 at 6:51 pm

  Maybe I’m missing something, but I don’t understand why Sullivan and the former NPA council are getting a bye on the blame for this one. The problems with the basic structure of the deal date back to Sullivan’s council, not Robertson’s.

  For example, the city’s retention of the ownership of the land as mentioned in the article, or the city’s willingness to let the developer start this project with very little of their own capital invested, as not mentioned in the article, were all negotiated well before the last election.

  I’ve been a bearish on Vancouver’s real estate market for several years, and when I read the details of the original deal, I was already chomping at my fingernails about the money taxpayers stood to lose. Admittedly, Robertson & Co. have done nothing to help the marketing efforts, but they weren’t the ones who got the city involved in this potential mess in the first place. Municipal governments can do a lot of things, but they’ve got no business being involved in high stakes for-profit development schemes.

• 4 Max // Jan 13, 2011 at 8:15 pm

  @Ben #3

  It was Robertson and Vision that insisted that the project go from a planned Leeds Gold to Leeds Platinum.

  This put the project over–budget as well as had labor working 24/7 to get it done. Huge tax payer dollars.

  Look at Robertson’s letters when he was still and NDP MLA to the at the time NDP council begging them not to not cut $50 M in ammenties .

  That $50 M in amenities were rubbber stapped when he got in.

• 5 Frances Bula // Jan 13, 2011 at 9:16 pm

  @Max. I don’t exempt Vision from making its own share of mistakes in handling the Olympic village, but your timing is all wrong here. All the design work and any decisions about green standards were all long decided and being built by the time Vision was elected in 2008. Same with the amenities.

  It’s true that Robertson was pushing for the city to go as green as possible in the early design stages, when he was still MLA, but he had no part in any of the decisions.

• 6 Bill McCreery // Jan 13, 2011 at 9:42 pm

  There were actually 3 Councils involved in this mess Frances if one wishes to properly and impartially cover the blame ground. The other was the ‘Little Vision’ Campbell Council. Were they not the ones who piled on the social housing, amenity and LEEDs gold platting? Was it not the Sullivan Council who tried, with the ferocious opposition of the Vision members, to bring the project back into the realm of fiscal responsibility? That Vision opposition resulted in compromises, which turned out to be fatal.

  And during the 2008 election, after someone, unknown to date, among the 11 people who had the documents, leaked them to the media. This was a criminal act, which Vision very effectively employed the very next day to their political advantage in the election. This is where the badmouthing by Vision started. Then, from the day they were elected in November, 2008 this Vision Council knew the Olympic Village needed to be occupied as of 1 March, 2010, but did nothing to even begin that process until June, 2010, 3 1/2 months later. And the Village social housing is today, almost 1 year later, not yet filled. What has that cost in interest let alone marketability?

  So, to all you reasonable people, who is in fact mostly to blame?

• 7 Frances Bula // Jan 13, 2011 at 10:21 pm

  @ Bill. I was only responding to Max’s particular comments, not attempting to recount the entire chronology, which we’ve all been over quite a few times.

• 8 Coco // Jan 14, 2011 at 5:16 am

  Hey Bill,

  I agree with your observation about the social housing portion of the OV. Why is it still mostly empty?! I thought it was supposed to be filled by Christmas.

  I have never understood why the decision over who would run that part of it wasn’t completed long before the Olympics even began. People should have been moving in there right after the Olympics were over. Honestly, I feel that this is one of the biggest fumbles Vision has made with the site. What am I missing here? Didn’t they have over a year prior to the event to work this out? Maybe there is a reason for this that I can’t see so if anyone can explain it to me, I’d appreciate it.

• 9 Morven // Jan 14, 2011 at 9:24 am

  Even in their wildest dreams, our elected representatives are not experts in either architecture, project finance or risk management. They should have some understanding of these issues but on a project as complex as the Olympic Village, we have to hope that the elected representatives from several council cycles, and their senior officials relied on expert advice from independent professionals.

  The elected officials are not obliged to take that advice.

  But no one seems to have any idea regarding at what stage along the project chain was it before independent advice was sought.

  I have an uneasy sense that the optimism bias of the local development industry led our elected representatives of all political stripes along a route that prevented recognition of all the risks involved since they may not have had independent advice.

  The senior unelected officials past and present have some role in the matter.
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• 10 Miga Loves You // Jan 14, 2011 at 12:52 pm

  I don’t really care who is to blame for the mess, I just want it cleaned up.

• 11 ITK // Jan 14, 2011 at 3:20 pm

  Typical that some want to blame only the NPA for what happened over the terms of 4 Councils now. I simply ignore those people because most of us are capable of understanding that it was not just the NPA, but also Vision and COPE who made good and bad decisions regarding this development over the years.

  Any political candidate in this next election who thinks they can get away with blaming one side or the other for the entire boondoggle will never get elected. I think people are sick of the constant finger-pointing after hearing it constantly over the past two years.

• 12 Bill McCreery // Jan 14, 2011 at 10:05 pm

  Morven, you’re being gracious in the 1st instance:

  “…our elected representatives are not experts in either architecture, project finance or risk management.”

  But, some basic knowledge would help, ie:

  “They should have some understanding of these issues”.

  If they do, they haven’t demonstrated it to date. As I said above, 1 year and counting (that means counting with real taxpayers dollars) and it’s still a mess.

  They brought this crisis on when some unidentified to date person released an “in camera” document illegally, which had a significant affect on the outcome of the election, and when they were elected they proceeded to ignore looking after business” for a full 18 months (November, 08 to June, 10, that’s half way through their mandate).

  I find this incredible, don’t you? How could you possibly not have as one of your top priorities as a Councillor looking after the single most important financial obligation of Vancouver taxpayers?

  The mind bogles…

• 13 Max // Jan 15, 2011 at 8:59 am

  @ Bill #12:

  Come, come Bill, we all know who ‘leaked’ those documents , cough, Louie, cough…..

• 14 Morven // Jan 16, 2011 at 8:53 am

  Bill McCreery # 12

  Yes, it is incredible.

  It is one thing to make the drains run on time; it is another to address the risks facing the city.

  The issue for me is not that they made bad decisions but that the process of reaching those decisions, whether it be sudden planning applications for megatowers or the Olympic Village advancement was/is neither transparent, fair and accountable.

  There is a systemic failure in our municipal power structure that cries out for change. Is, for instance, the role of the mayor to weld together the disparate partisan strands for the betterment of the citizens or is it to run an effective party machine ?

  We have to look pretty hard to find any evidence that the present and past two mayors rose above the partisan fray.
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• 15 Bill McCreery // Jan 16, 2011 at 2:11 pm

  Morvin, I agree that “the process of reaching those decisions” is badly broken. It needs to be fixed and will be in 2012 if I can work with others of like mind on Council.

• 16 Deacon Blue // Jan 16, 2011 at 11:40 pm

  “A year on, the village’s 16 buildings (renamed Millennium Water) form a near-empty ghost town on the waterfront of False Creek.”

  “But a bigger drawback was the property boom of the mid-2000s: this prompted the developer to bid too high for the site, causing it to price many of the flats at well over C$1m each. And then recession struck.”

  Both Ghost Towns and Boom-and-Bust cycles are featured in the local history. A good part of it has to do with our isolated position on the other side of the Canadian Rockies, and in the (far) North West of the U.S. economy. Separation takes its toll.

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