Search KamloopsBCNow
Kamloops council has deferred any decision on the borrowing needed for a new RCMP building.
During the Tuesday meeting, city councillors were originally asked to authorize the borrowing of $150.75 million to fund the validation, detailed design and the construction of redevelopment and expansion of the detachment on Battle Street.
A staff report said the current property has surpassed both the functional capacity and spatial needs of the city’s police force.
The staff report says the current building, which was built in 1990, is about 40,000 square feet and was meant to house 75-85 occupants.
However, it is now housing around 150 employees.
During the Tuesday afternoon meeting, coun. Neustaeter suggested that the matter be forwarded to a Committee of the Whole (CoW) meeting for further discussion.
“This is a substantial decision, one that we will have a lot of questions on,” said coun. Neustaeter.
“This is, of course, been discussed at a very high level since we’ve been in this term, but we anticipate that there will be a lot of discussion needed and unpacking and also a lot of opportunity for the public to speak to us about what they read in the report.”
The motion was supported by council.
Mayor Hamer-Jackson wondered if the city had thought about selling the property to avoid parking and traffic impacts, however, city staff said the city did not own land in that area of town so it would require an expensive land purchase.
“At the end of the day we’re still talking orders of magnitude of $150 million. We own this property, we can renovate this property or create a new building on this property (and) have space for the next 30 years or more,”
“That was where the design team went as far as the most cost effective, efficient way of proving for our contractor and RCMP.”
City staff added that those details could be discussed in more depth during a CoW meeting.
There are COW meetings scheduled for Jan. 21, Feb. 11 and Mar. 11.