Total cost for Regina catalyst committee projects could top $490M

After nearly a week of presentations, Regina's catalyst committee's public consultations have wrapped up.

The wide-reaching mandate of the committee has made it hard to get a comprehensive view of what the five projects it is shepherding will look like and the enormity of the financial decision that will eventually be placed in front of Regina city council.

Now that the eight meetings spread over four days are over, there is more information available.

According to presentations offered on each day, and the comments made afterwards during Q and A sessions and scrums with the media, here are what the projects could cost:

• Brandt Centre replacement - $155 million (Construction: $100 million to $120 million, Land acquisition: $5 million to $35 million).
• New Regina central library - $125 million.
• New aquatic facility - $175 million.
• Outdoor soccer field - $15.1 million.
• Baseball stadium - $23 million.

In total, the price tag for the projects being examined by the catalyst committee could top $490 million. 

For the sake of comparison, Mosaic Stadium was a $278 million project.

LISTEN| Regina's catalyst committee gathers public feedback on downtown plans

That total comes with the caveat that these are only preliminary figures and many of the estimates were calculated in 2020 or 2021, before this year's inflation.

The costs are market dependent, and labour and materials could be significantly more if these buildings were to be built right now, according to Tim Reid, co-chair of the catalyst committee.

"The cost of inflation right now, I think on these projects, needs to be recognized as a significant risk. That may change in the next year, but right now we're seeing inflation on, frankly, the cost of borrowing and the cost of construction," Reid said on Tuesday.

"It's something we haven't seen in 25 years in Canada."

Criticism and questions remain

The committee has taken a lot of criticism about its approach to public consultation being rushed.

With each day project getting one day or less during this week's consultations, residents complained that the committee was moving too quickly.

Attendees expressed concern that each of these projects were big enough to warrant their own full periods of public consultation.

Coun. Bob Hawkins, who serves as co-chair for the committee, said city council will still be required to hold public consultations for any of the projects it decides to move forward on.

He added that residents who were unable to attend the public meetings could provide feedback through a survey on the city's website.

Hawkins said he was happy with how consultations have gone, in spite of the criticism.

"I was pleased about the openness of the community to the idea of planning. I think the message is that we're not going to do all this tomorrow. This is a long term plan. We want to be shovel ready when funding opportunities come up, and I think we've contributed to that," he said.

Officials said they were on track for total attendance of about 1,000 at the public meetings by the end of Thursday.

Earlier this week the committee revealed that its pace is driven by a mid-March deadline for federal funding that could be applied to the aquatic facility.

The committee says the Investing in Canada Infrastructure Program (ICIP) would cover about 45 per cent of the $172 million estimate for the new aquatic centre if the funding bid is successful.

However, ICIP was originally intended to cover transit infrastructure.

City council has already voted to attempt to use that funding for the new aquatic facility, but there's no guarantee that the federal government will allow the city to do so.

That raises another issue about the catalyst committee. It's not clear how these projects will be funded.

The committee wasn't tasked with solving the funding issue. It will be up to council to decide which projects it wants and how it might secure funding for them.

Committee members stressed that the city is looking to be the sole owner in many of these ventures.

With recent meetings of council being dominated by some members opposing a mill rate increase, it's unclear how these projects will get funded.

The catalyst committee's report is due to be submitted to council by the end of 2022.