Excessive spending of our tax payer money is simply not warranted. Suitable remediation options to mitigate the risk have not been properly explored, and the current two options do not meet the needs of the tax payers and the community. The cost-benefit ratio is not financially sensible whatsoever (spending $3-10 million in order to prevent $2.5 million in potential risk).

As well, the excessive amount of invasive destruction that would be incurred by these two options within this Community Registered Heritage Park is simply unacceptable given that there are other remediation options to pursue which are both less expensive and less intrusive.

Although one would assume that past failed processes would not be repeated – that assumption is incorrect.
In the original process, the dams were almost ordered to be destroyed due to suspected seismic issues based purely on speculation and without actually knowing the facts. After considerable uprise from the Community demanding that proper studies be completed before spending such a large sum of tax payer’s money and destroying the park, proper due diligence was begrudgingly permitted.

The results of these studies proved that the dams are well within regulatory requirements and are not at risk in the event of a major earthquake. This is why completing due diligence based on logic is crucial, rather than accepting “the sky is falling” fear based decisions in haste. Sound reasoning and logic based decisions is what the people expect of their representatives.

Unfortunately, the same failed process is being repeated. This process of spreading fear of extreme urgency and grave danger based on incomplete and unconfirmed information as stated by the engineers themselves continues to be substituted for logic in order to fulfill nothing other than a political agenda.

City Staff and the Provincial Dam Safety Section are quite simply unwilling to accept the undeniable facts which show that further due diligence before proceeding with a remediation option is both mandatory and reasonable.

City Council on the other hand, recognizes this failed process and fully understands the risk involved. The fact is that it simply does not make financial sense to proceed with a remediation solution at a cost of $3-10 million in order to mitigate a potential financial risk of $2.5 million or less. It also does not make sense to permit needless destruction of the park due to poor decision making skills.

This is why Council requires further time to conduct additional studies and collect key information in order to conclusively verify the perceived risk and determine appropriate remediation measures.

The extreme sense of urgency to complete remediation immediately is excessive – the waste of millions of dollars, needless destruction of the park, and potential damage to the fragile eco system before being able to apply proper due diligence is not justified. Political posturing by Staff and the Provincial Dam Safety Section is not an acceptable solution.