As the Boyle Municipal Centre comes closer to completion, the village’s council voted to pay up most of the money they had been holding back from Johnston Builders, the contractors who worked on the building.
Council voted to give the contractors $487,000 in a motion passed in a special meeting July 27. On Aug. 3, council passed another motion to pay $24,000 in GST.
Chief administrative officer Charlie Ashbey said “holdback money” is a routine procedure where 10 per cent of every payment claim is held back until satisfactory completion of the project.
“Under the terms of the contract, within 45 days of satisfactory completion, we’re obliged to pay the holdback,” he said. “We can still hold back portions of the original contract to reflect any non-complete or deficient items, but the holdback should be paid back and we’ve pretty much done that, except for the holdback that applies to any outstanding items.”
The total holdback of the $5-million municipal centre without GST is just over $665,000.
Council continues to holdback $178,000 until the floors are fixed in the Seniors’ Drop-in Centre and the council chamber doors are replaced, Ashbey said.
The village had ordered wooden chamber doors, but the supplier did not have them in stock.
“We don’t have the final doors, we don’t have the final lock sets for the entire building,” Ashbey said. “There’s still some work to be done there.”
At Boyle council’s regular Aug. 3 meeting, Ashbey said that he had given the seniors’ association an ultimatum to submit a design for floor curling by Aug. 8 so contractors could get to work.
The drop-in centre had another flooring issue, because of a slab that had been placed on a grade beam.
The slab had settled and created a ripple effect, and Ashbey said the contractors had suggested putting a bench over the ripple.
“It’s functional rather than cosmetic to hide the deficiency,” he said. “But the bench might be a good idea, because seniors like to sit down.”
But Coun. Sam Assaf questioned the suggestion.
“We can’t just hide things like that,” he said.
Mayor Bob Clark explained that without it, the contractors would have to drill a hole in the floor and pump up the slab.
Land issues have also done some damage, as recent heavy rains washed soil into the drain and the mechanical room.
Landscaping was not part of the original contract, so a separate contract has been drawn up.
Three companies submitted tenders and council awarded the contract to JLG Ball on Aug. 3.
The bid is not known at this time.
The library was not spared from problems, either.
It was noted that a few of the windows were not square, which gave the appearance of crooked blinds.
“The biggest problem that I noticed was the guy tried to cut them with his eyes, like he never cut them in a straight line,” Clark said. “It shows when they’re hanging in the window.”
Coun. Colin Derko agreed.
“It looks like a kindergarten kid cut those blinds,” he said. “I’ve never seen something so stupid in all my life.”
“We paid money for this,” Assaf added. “It should be perfect.”
