By Lara Fominoff @LaraFominoff on Twitter

Yates renovations over budget, New West Theatre Society asks for rent forgiveness

Sep 19, 2018 | 1:45 PM

LETHBRIDGE – After touting that the $13.4 million Yates Theatre renewal had been on budget, even while media were given a tour of the nearly-completed facility September 6, city administration revealed at Monday’s council meeting that the project was in fact, over budget by $560,000.

Tony Vanden Heuvel, Director of Community Services, says there was an administrative “oversight” as the documents with the correct numbers were being drafted. He says the overage occurred because the scope of the project was a lot bigger than they have anticipated.

“In the area of asbestos abatement, we had to work with our general contractor on the job to make sure that was all done properly, the requirements met. As a result of opening up the ceiling and finding out about things, some of our design work had to be re-done. So very typical with renovation.”

However, back in January when asbestos was found, and again last May during the third construction delay, when new structural issues were identified, Recreation services Manager Jason Freund told LNN the contingency budget had not been used up yet.

“I don’t know exactly how much is left, but I do know we have not fully spent all of the contingency that’s set aside for the project. So, we do still have money for extras and project changes over the time and whatnot.

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“If that were to change, which we don’t expect to be the case, then we would have to approach council for additional funding basically to finish the project. We’re not there, and we don’t anticipate we’ll be there, so hopefully that won’t be any kind of issue moving forward with the project.”

Vanden Heuvel told council that the original contingency for the project was only about $240,000 or just 1.8 per cent of the total renovation cost. Typically, during construction projects there is an 8 to 10 per cent contingency budget. Total project contingency, said Vanden Heuvel, ended up at 5.9 percent.

Mayor Chris Spearman also had some concerns.

“My question to the City Manager is the construction not scheduled to be complete until December. Have all the contracts been let? Are we confident that this is – that this will be – the final price?”

Vanden Heuvel said he was confident the overage would not increase.

“I had to make sure very clearly that…I don’t anticipate any other overages.”

Council voted to allow the extra money to come from anticipated surpluses in the 2018 Recreation and Culture operating budget, and from the Facility Services Lifecycle budget.

New West Theatre Society Request for fee waiver

At Monday’s meeting, a request was also heard from the New West Theatre Society’s Derek Stevenson, asking council to waive the society’s 2018-2019 rental fee for the Yates Theatre in the amount of $48,467.48.

Stevenson said it was a one-time request, because the group hasn’t been able to access the Yates Theatre for much of the year and is still facing ongoing renovations until the end of December. Some of the ‘back of house’ renovations including storage rooms, the workshop where sets are built, rehearsal areas and other spots won’t be completed for a few months.

“The reality of working a year in our community without our home, the Yates Theatre, was particularly taxing on us as an organization. Of course we’re excited to be back in there, and to be opening our show here in September. But there’s obviously challenges. We have a staff of one full-time person within our organization with delays to our building and a season to plan and a lot of commitments we have to have both to artists to the community, to the provincial government for our funding, just required a lot of extra work, a lot of extra costs in last year’s [budget]…and we continue to deal with that.”

Mayor Chris Spearman questioned the request, indicating that if the city renovated the parking lot at the Enmax Centre, would they then also hypothetically forgive rental fees of the Enmax Centre to the Hurricanes as well?

“If we’re going to do this and create a precedent, we have to walk into this very carefully. So, I’m trying to understand the justification for the full forgiveness of the full $48,000.”

Stevenson told council that they were hoping to be set up for success in the coming year.

“We’re a part of the fabric of this community and we have been for 30 years. I think it’s going to take some leadership and some vision to recognize that the arts and theatre have not only economic value, but intrinsic value to our community…every dollar invested back into the arts actually has a direct economic impact of 1.6 dollars.”

Council voted unanimously to receive the request as information and file it, and to request that administration investigate the impact that construction has had on the New West Theatre Society, the request to waive the rental fees and to come up with some solutions and report back to council at a later date.