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qathet Regional District (qRD) directors have voted for the regional board to contribute $238,244 to the operation of Powell River Recreation Complex.
At the February 11 finance committee meeting, in response to correspondence from City of Powell River mayor Ron Woznow, directors considered a recommendation stating that in good faith, the funding participants from Electoral Areas A, B and C, of the subregional recreation service will contribute $238,244 this year to the city’s recreation service.
Electoral Area B director Mark Gisborne made a motion to postpone action on the recommendation until after the regional district conducts a recreation service review. He said he was opposed to going along with the motion until the board has gone through the review.
Electoral Area C director and board chair Clay Brander said the number that had been presented to directors in the finance committee agenda has been determined by a formula used by the finance department, based on the past agreement, which has expired.
“As a matter of goodwill, we should continue, otherwise the city is going to be without the funding for the recreation service,” said Brander. “The voters have said they want to support this, so we should go ahead and provide them with this amount of money for this year.”
City director Cindy Elliott said she concurred with Brander, and also wanted to point out that this was a decision to put something in the budget in the interim apart from anything that might come out of a service review, or subsequent negotiations for a new agreement.
“The recreation service is super important to everyone in the community and putting it at jeopardy to wait for other processes to happen, I’m not in favour of doing that,” said Elliott.
Gisborne’s motion to postpone failed, with Gisborne in favour and the rest of the committee opposed.
On the recommendation, Gisborne said he believed there needed to be a funding contribution agreement signed by both parties.
“That’s been the barrier to the challenges we are having with the subregional recreation service funding agreement,” said Gisborne. “The agreement expired the year before last in 2023 and if we wanted to renew it, we should have renewed it in June 2023. The municipality should have asked to upgrade the agreement a year and a half ago.
“The municipality can wait a little bit. We have to figure out what the amount should be.”
City director Rob Southcott said he believes city council asked staff to address the agreement some time before it expired. He said the city has had monumental challenges with staff turnover and capacity.
“I’m not making excuses, but things only happen as fast as they happen,” said Southcott. “I’m anticipating a healthy discussion and I’m looking forward to that with the expectation that we can come to an agreement that works for all of us in our region.”
Elliott said the intention is whatever comes out of the service review be implemented after the service review is over and to not make cuts or changes prior to that.
“What director Gisborne is suggesting is that we halt all our existing support to the recreation centre pending this review,” said Elliott. “It creates undue hardship on the parties involved. The people have had a referendum and said it’s important to support the recreation centre. We have some things to sort out, but it doesn’t mean we should be holding the recreation centre hostage while we sort them out.”
The motion for the board to consider the $238,244 recreation contribution carried, with Gisborne opposed.
According to qRD general manager of financial administration Linda Greenan, the request from the city did not include a specific dollar value, but rather, it requested the maximum requisition limit for 2025 through 2029. The maximum amount for 2025 would be calculated at $334,080, based on the BC Assessment completed roll values, Greenan stated in an email. The qRD finance committee, however, voted on the lower amount for 2025.
