qathet Regional District (qRD) board of directors has given first three readings to the resource-recovery centre and waste-transfer station loan authorization bylaw.
At the April 26 board meeting, unanimously gave first and second reading to the bylaw, followed by third reading, which also passed unanimously.
According to the draft bylaw, the estimated cost of developing and constructing the centre and station, including incidental expenses, is the sum of $21 million. The bylaw proposes borrowing not exceeding $6.4 million to supplement the money that has already been granted or borrowed.
Now that the bylaw has been read three times, it will be sent to the provincial inspector of municipalities for approval. According to qRD corporate officer Michelle Jones, it typically takes about six weeks for the inspector of municipalities to process the request, then the bylaw will be brought back to the board for adoption.
At the April 5 qRD finance committee meeting, manager of financial services Linda Greenan said the regional district has authority right now to borrow $5.5 million, and the regional district has been drawing that down, and to date, $1.5 million of that has been drawn.
“We still have some money, about $4 million, that we can borrow from that, but the costs are starting to come in faster now, so we want to get this [new] borrowing in place,” said Greenan. “We draw down as we need the funding and then we will turn it into a long-term debt through a security issuing bylaw.”
Electoral Area B director Mark Gisborne said at the finance committee that his understanding was that $5.5 million in borrowing had been approved and now the regional district was looking at borrowing another $6.4 million, which brings the total up to $11.9 million for this project.
Greenan said that was correct.
Electoral Area E director and finance committee chair Andrew Fall asked if the $6.4 million is not required, was the regional district getting the money and incurring costs, or was it drawing on that and not incurring costs if it is not used.
Greenan said the bylaw allows the regional district to borrow up to $6.4 million, so the regional district just draws on it as it is needed.
“If we have other funding,” said Greenan, “we could just not borrow the whole $6.4 million.”
