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County holds out on Tawatinaw bill

Westlock County won’t pay for work done in 2015 to raise the Tawatinaw Valley Ski Hill chalet, citing shoddy construction and sinking concrete despite assurances from the contractor the work was done properly.
Westlock County continues to hold out on an $88,459 bill for work done in 2015 to raise the Tawatinaw Valley Ski Hill chalet.
Westlock County continues to hold out on an $88,459 bill for work done in 2015 to raise the Tawatinaw Valley Ski Hill chalet.

Westlock County won’t pay for work done in 2015 to raise the Tawatinaw Valley Ski Hill chalet, citing shoddy construction and sinking concrete despite assurances from the contractor the work was done properly.

At their July 12 meeting, councillors did not agree to pay the bill for the time being and instructed interim infrastructure and engineering director Wayne Bullock to investigate and report back to council July 26.

The county owes NCV Industries $88,459 — a balance of $28,605 from the original contract, plus $63,365 in unbudgeted work. The county was credited $3,500 by NCV Industries for deficiencies.

NCV Industries representative Darrell Osmond told council July 12 his company has been waiting for payment since February for work that was signed off on in December 2015.

“I don’t see any reason why we shouldn’t get paid fully, today,” Osmond said.

“We fulfilled our contract 100 per cent and we did extra work that was asked to do.”

Coun. Don Savage said problems including sinking around the building have come to light since the spring and justify holding off on the bill.

“You’ve noticed all the sinking around the building?” asked Savage.

“In some places it has sunk down two feet. All those cement pads have fallen down, they were not properly prepared.”

Osmond countered that proper procedure was followed.

“I wouldn’t say properly prepared. I would say backfilling in December and pouring concrete isn’t the best time of year to do the work,” Osmond responded.

“Project managers, construction managers approved the work. It was inspected in December … there’s not much more I can do.

“And it’s built on a swamp. I can’t help that.”

Reeve Bud Massey agreed the chalet was built on the wrong location, but said council was fully aware of the risks to undertake the work.

“This council sat in this room and said we wanted the ski hill open last year. Certain things had to happen for the opening to take place,” he said.

“We were aware it was a poor time of the year to be doing dirt work. We were aware of that … everyone knows that when you put cement on top of muskeg, it’s going to sink.”

Savage, however, questioned why the company would do the work if they knew it would fail.

“Why even pour a cement pad when it’s going to sunk four inches and the people of Westlock County are responsible to tear that all out and re do it?” Savage asked.

Osmond said there was common sense applied and the job was done properly, while laying blame on engineering documents.

“Everything was back filled and tamped in place and the concrete was poured on top of the tamped dirt,” he said.

“The only problem was the engineering drawings and directions didn’t say to dig out 20 feet of skeg and terrible backfill that’s around the building and underneath.

“We were instructed to put clay there and that’s what we did as per engineering drawings.”

Osmond further added the chalet’s parking lot was built for use as an emergency-access road and was never properly designed to be a parking lot.

At their June 28 meeting, councillors reviewed the invoice and opted to not pay in order to continue to negotiate with NCV. At the same meeting councillors suspended the $2.2 million Tawatinaw lease/purchase agreement with DK Consulting.

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