OLDS — Town council has approved a plan to drop a couple of park revitalization projects and pull more money from reserves to further fund another – construction of a year-round outdoor rink.
Council made that decision during its last meeting in July at the suggestion of administrative staff.
A report to council from administrative staff noted that the Town of Olds was successful in its application to the federal government for money to help fund revitalization projects on a 50/50 basis for Centennial Park and the Rotary Athletic Park.
Those projects are construction of a toboggan hill, community gardens and an inclusive playground, all at Rotary Athletic Park; as well as a permanent all-year outdoor rink and an outdoor gathering space, both at Centennial Park.
Requests for proposals (RFP’s) were issued for the toboggan hill and the outdoor rink.
A bid to build a toboggan hill at Rotary Athletic park came in under budget.
However, one to build the outdoor rink came in “significantly higher than anticipated,” the report said.
“Administration would still like to continue with this project, as it is much anticipated within our community,” the report said.
Finance director Sheena Linderman said in order to address that problem, administrative staff recommended dropping the community garden project, (projected to cost $20,000), delaying the outdoor gathering space project ($18,000) to 2023, then increasing the transfer from reserves.
“This would make the amount coming from reserves $352,884. There is currently $311,000 available in the municipal reserve, which can be used for public recreation areas,” the administrative report said.
“The remaining funds would come from the asset replacement/rehabilitation reserve, which currently sits at $2.34 million.”
Coun. Darren Wilson expressed concern about the possibility costs for the projects could escalate.
"Do we have any guarantees or assurances that there won’t be any further – any other – escalation? Or are we subject to the whims of inflation and everything else that’s going on,” he asked.
“It’s not necessarily inflation at this point," Linderman said.
She said she can’t guarantee that nothing surprising will be found once work on the permanent outdoor rink begins.
“It’s more just the unknown at this point,” she said.
Chief administrative officer Brent Williams echoed that thought, saying it’s uncertain what might be found once digging for the structure begins. However, he said town staff are being as risk adverse as possible.
Coun. Wanda Blatz was relieved to hear the outdoor gathering space project would still be considered for the 2023 budget “because I think that’s an important part of the whole Centennial Park revitalization plan.”
