Fletcher was originally considered part of municipal staff
Whistler’s Comprehensive Sustainability Plan is roughly $430,000 over budget to date.
Originally budgeted at $841,000 over 2002 and 2003, the $333,000 cost of Project Manager Tom Fletcher was not factored into the CSP budget. He was initially considered part of municipal staff.
His costs have since been added, bringing the CSP price tag to $1.27 million to date.
"It's just a new decision to bring out his fees as separate (from municipal staff)," said Diana Waltmann, information officer with the municipality.
The municipality released a rough breakdown of expenditures on the Comprehensive Sustainability Plan this week at the request of some members of council.
The information was posted to the municipality's Web site after Monday's council meeting, where Councillor Kristi Wells asked for all the numbers to be made public.
"The community is anxious to know about it," she said to her fellow councillors, some of whom weren't as eager to share the information.
The released numbers show that more than $800,000 was spent on the CSP through 2002. The following year a further $130,000 was spent for a total of $930,00.
This breakdown includes the amount that was spent on the proposal call, consultants’ fees for defining the success and sustainable criteria for a resort community, public participation, the Web site and a general category which includes information such as telephone, office, capital and advertising expenses.
But Wells said those numbers alone are a little misleading.
Her figures show that in 2002 an additional $154,000 was paid out to Fletcher, an outside contractor. The following year he was paid almost $179,000.
Over the two-year period he was paid more than $333,000 for his work on the CSP. He is no longer working on the project.
When Fletcher’s fees are added to the project, the total costs to date are more than $1.27 million, a figure the municipality made public three weeks ago. More than half of the money was spent on consultants/managers.
"We overspent," said Wells simply after Monday's council meeting.
"Things happened. There are reasons for it. I'm not going to make any excuses but I'd like to be accountable by that and say exactly what we overspent on."
The CSP update on the RMOW Web site also shows that $207,000 is budgeted for the process in 2004.
That's a figure that baffles Wells.
"The most important part of the CSP and the majority of the work is still to come," she said.
"We're maybe one third through it."
Council has yet to discuss the 2004 CSP budget and the $207,000 is a preliminary number at this time.
Wells pushed for the CSP information from 2002 and 2003 to be released to the public after a letter came before council on Monday night informing them of an official complaint to the municipal auditor from a Whistler resident.
Under Section 172 of the Community Charter, resident Guillermo Bright claimed that there was a "misrepresentation of funds" regarding the CSP process.
One of the main issues in the complaint was that the CSP costs did not include any municipal staff time as part of the overall budget.
At least one municipal employee has been dedicated to the project since 2002.
After a review of Bright's complaint, the municipal auditor explained that municipal staff time is not included in regular accounting practices.
"There is no requirement for the municipality to use activity based costing and we are not aware of any municipalities in the province that use activity based costing," wrote Bill Cox, Chartered Accountant with BDO Dunwoody in Vancouver.
Though the accountants found there was no evidence of any intentional misrepresentation by the RMOW or any need to conduct a special audit of the CSP expenditures, they urged council to release the financial information.
"We do believe that it would be prudent for the RMOW to clarify to the taxpayers just exactly what have been the costs to date and the type of costs that are included in that total," wrote Cox.
Councillors Ken Melamed and Nick Davies felt an initial press release issued by the municipality in mid February outlining the total costs to date was adequate.
"We have actually followed through with the recommendations of the auditor," said Melamed.
Davies added that it would be much more preferable to invite Mr. Bright to sit down with municipal staff to get a full explanation of the figures.
Releasing the figures he said would just open the door for anyone to draft a complaint to the municipal auditor anytime they want to know the entire costs of a project.
That is an exercise that would incur both staff time and the cost of the accountants he explained.
"Everybody knows it's been an expensive process," said Davies.
He went on to say that he rejects any implication that the process has been undemocratic or not transparent.
If there's one process that has been democratic with tremendous opportunity for public consultation it's the CSP process he said.
But Wells, with Councillor Marianne Wade backing her up, pushed to have all the figures released.
"All I'm asking is that (the breakdown) be distributed," she said.
"I think it's information that more than Mr. Bright would like to know."
Council resolved to release the numbers on the municipal Web site.
"I'm not trying to make a big deal," said Wells after the meeting.
"I'd rather come clean on it than appear as if we're hiding something."
Wells said it was also important to show the breakdown of expenses between 2002 and 2003, highlighting that the bulk of the money was spent on the process in the first year.
Three new councillors joined the council table at the end of 2002.
"There's a greater accountability to the old council than the new council," said Wells, who was on the 2002 council along with Davies, Melamed and Mayor Hugh O'Reilly.
"(The three new councillors) came into a process that was halfway through and down a certain path."
To see the breakdown of the CSP figures go to www.whistler.ca. Click on Reading Room, General Information and CSP Budget and Actuals.
