By Michael Smyth, The Province
VICTORIA — It’s 11 a.m. and the pedestrians bustling by the Environment Ministry building in a high-rent commercial district of Victoria would be forgiven for thinking busy civil servants are hunkered
The cost of this romper room for desk jockeys? A cool $45,000 to renovate the space and install the games, plus $85,000 a year in rent, about $5,000 a year for utilities and maintenance and $3,100 a year for leased equipment in an adjoining yoga studio. That’s more than $138,000 this year alone — and all while the government cancels surgeries and cuts community grants to save money in tough times.
What’s wrong with this picture? Environment Minister Barry Penner admits the expense looks bad. “I understand the optics, but the choice was to have the space used or not used,” he said.Penner explained that the space had been rented to use as offices, but it was later determined that local zoning prevented the government from using it for that reason — and, by then, the ministry couldn’t break the lease. “I am asking my staff to look to see if there’s something else it can be used for,” he added, insisting that he didn’t know about the “work-free zone” before it was approved and that he would have insisted on less-restrictive lease terms if he’d known. I suspect the explanation will be cold comfort for the thousands of patients who’ll have surgeries cancelled this year, or the parents of disabled kids who’ve had programs cut, or the hundreds of sports and cultural groups that have seen their grants slashed. Maddeningly, in the middle of all the cutting, it’s not difficult to find examples of wasteful government spending.
The $138,000 play room for civil servants is just one.(MORE)
-------------- B.C. Rail has a second $268,000-a-year president in charge of real-estate holdings (the government still owns the tracks, railbed and a 40-kilometre spur line) and two other senior managers bagging each more than $200,000. All told, taxpayers are paying a quartet of executives $1.2 million a year to run a money-losing, 40-kilometre railroad with 24 employees and no trains.
Olympic splurging - Most British Columbians support the Olympics, but why should the government buy $1.4 million worth of 2010 tickets on their dime? That’s how much three Crown corporations — B.C. Hydro, ICBC and B.C. Lotteries — are spending on Olympic tickets for their executives, staff, clients and contest-winners. Luckily, VANOC is setting up a website for people to sell their unwanted tickets, so the government could easily unload them.
Meanwhile, taxpayers will also cough up millions to pay civil servants seconded to work on the Olympics for up to six months. But if the government can do without their services for that long, are they really necessary employees? Or simply part of a bloated bureaucracy?
But the biggest news of all is how this collective of spin-doctors has grown in size and cost: $28 million this year and a staff of 197 — the largest communications apparatus in B.C. history. The Liberals did lay off eight people in this office last month — a good start for a branch of government ripe for downsizing.
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