Here’s where the $600G went

By Jeremy Deutsch - Kamloops This Week - May 02, 2008

How much money did the airport expansion project actually receive from the federal government? The Kamloops Airport Authority Society (KAAS) and the city believe they got $6.6 million from Ottawa to do the expansion. But officials with Western Economic Diversification (WED), the department in charge of dolling out the funds for the project, insist the number is $6 million. “The announcement was a commitment of Government of Canada funds of $6 million for the airport expansion under the mountain pine beetle initiative,” Donna Howes, communications manager for WED told KTW. “That was together with operational funds of $600,000, which WED administers the project with.” Howes said a whole range of activities — from environmental assessments to project audits — falls under the administration requirement set up by WED as part of its due diligence process. But John O’Fee, president of KAAS isn’t buying the fed’s explanation. He said funding announcements are always for the full amount, noting he’s never heard of money being taken away for administration costs after a public announcement is made.

“When they make an announcement, there’s an expectation that’s the amount of money being delivered,” he said. The official press release from WED at the time stated funding for $6 million, but Minister of Natural Resources Gary Lunn guaranteed $6.6 million when speaking to the media. O’Fee said if a mistake was made, Ottawa needs to own up to it and deliver what it promised. “I don’t think [they] should be tap dancing around this issue,” he said. Prince George was also granted $11 million for its airport expansion through the pine-beetle initiative, but to O’Fee’s understanding, no administrative costs were taken off that project. While Howes didn’t have an exact figure for how much money was used to administer the funds for the Prince George expansion, she insists funds were taken off the project similar to Kamloops. O’Fee said to suggest WED always takes money off a funding announcement is not an honest way of dealing with the issue.

Mayor Terry Lake said the city learned about the change three or four months ago, but didn’t want to go public in hopes the situation would be resolved. But a letter last month from Lunn confirmed the amount of $6 million. And both local federal NDP and Liberal candidates are weighing in on the issue. “Let’s hope this isn’t one more reason to mistrust the Stephen Harper government,” NDP candidate Michael Crawford said. Liberal candidate Ken Sommerfield said it’s as if the Conservative government doesn’t know what it is doing.He called the disappearance of the funding consistent with the Conservative’s performance so far.