The Servus Sports Centre will be seeing an update to its lighting. The City is replacing current bulbs to LEDs through Harris Electric for the cost of $209,927.65 plus GST.
Originally, $150,000 was approved to update the lighting within the SSC to include the fitness centre, fieldhouses, main corridors and parking lot. Two bids were received, with only one being accepted in the amount of $209,927.65. The other bid was deemed non-compliant.
To adjust for the funding shortfall, nearly $60K is being allocated from other portions of the budget. More than $14,000 is coming from other 2019 capital projects and more than $45,000 from reserve funds. Mayor Gerald Aalbers says much of the money being re-allocated comes from cost savings and is happy to remove the project’s impact on taxpayers.
“There was a little bit of an adjustment required, but I think that reserves are important to have, and there was some cost savings in the capital projects underway,” says Aalbers. “In that department, we were able to make it work with zero impact to the taxpayer.”
Aalbers assures the City does a lot of work to ensure they know the proper cost of the projects they issue bids for but admits it’s not always accurate. He adds that the price of materials can be very fluid.