{"id":13310,"date":"2016-02-03T19:00:42","date_gmt":"2016-02-04T00:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=13310"},"modified":"2016-02-03T19:00:42","modified_gmt":"2016-02-04T00:00:42","slug":"joint-operations-centre-falls-just-short-of-the-gold-standard","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/joint-operations-centre-falls-just-short-of-the-gold-standard\/","title":{"rendered":"Joint Operations Centre falls just short of the Gold standard"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir<\/strong><\/p>\n

It isn\u2019t even done yet and already Aurora\u2019s new Joint Operations Centre is falling just short of getting the Gold.<\/p>\n

Nearly a further $100,000 will need to be spent on the already costly build on Industrial Parkway North, which will bring the Town\u2019s departments of Parks & Recreation as well as Public Works under one roof.<\/p>\n

When the Town approved the project in the last term of Council, they specified \u2013 and allocated the money for \u2013 the project be LEED (Leadership and Energy and Environmental Design) Certified Gold, with certification monitored by the Canada Green Building Council that evaluates based on sustainability, energy efficiency, and other \u201cgreen\u201d criteria. <\/p>\n

The investments Council has made to achieve the Gold, however, were only enough to clinch silver, they learned last week, raising the eyebrows of Councillor Michael Thompson who sought answers on why more money was needed to achieve the standard they already targeted.<\/p>\n

\u201cLEED Gold was always a standard we had approved and we put aside money to achieve that for the Joint Operations Centre (JOC),\u201d he said. \u201cWhen I look back through all the different reports we had, in fact, increased our fees to the architect to ensure that the building would be Gold. [Now] it says we\u2026need to do additional things to get to Gold. On top of that, we have to increase the funds to the architect again and it doesn\u2019t really indicate why.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe made a decision, we had lots of debate over LEED Silver or LEED Gold and, at the end, we said Gold and, as a result of it, costs were going to increase. We said that\u2019s fine and now I see a report that says, \u2018Yes, you may have made a decision to go to LEED Gold, you may have increased the cost of the building, but we\u2019re not at LEED Gold.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Turning to Mayor Geoff Dawe and Councillor John Abel, who sit on the financial task force monitoring the JOC build, Councillor Thompson requested more information.<\/p>\n

Mayor Dawe said Council did indeed direct the project to hit LEED Gold, but there have been complications.<\/p>\n

\u201cSomewhat surprisingly, it turns out there is a fluid nature to what gets classified as LEED Gold and what does not,\u201d Mayor Dawe explained. \u201cThere is a number of items that seem to be somewhat subjective in terms of how LEED Gold is determined.\u201d<\/p>\n

Added Councillor Abel: \u201cOne of the main criteria for Gold is the rehabilitation of a brownfield. When you present all these things that inspire LEED designation, it is subject to the body to say, \u2018You asked for five points, we\u2019re going to give you four,\u2019 and there is a margin of error. One of the biggest things we didn\u2019t realise when we [went] for the Gold was [the issue of] brownfield. That should have been discussed at that moment when we were realistically going for that certification. Had we known that, we might have phrased it a little different: do your best to get to Gold. Having said that, with the consultant and the architect, they feel that if they present a more detailed and more robust application, they might be able to attain that Gold.\u201d<\/p>\n

This was a view largely shared by Town Treasurer Dan Elliott, who told Councillors that there is just one shot to file a submission for LEED Gold. There is no \u201crunning back later with changes, amendments, additional arguments or more information,\u201d he said, but they are close.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe believe we need a few more points to kick it over just in case one or two [potential points] get dismissed,\u201d he said. \u201cThe additional funding is to have the consultant actually assist us in preparing some specific action items, document plans, and other documents that will be part of the submission that will help us achieve several other points. We hope that in doing so we can catch a Gold.\u201d<\/p>\n

Councillor Thompson, however, said he was not satisfied with these answers and, ultimately, the matter was referred back to staff for more information. If there is a $100,000 increase to achieve what Aurora has already paid for, he argued, there is a missing piece of the puzzle.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe paid for something, now I am hearing they missed the mark, so I am wondering: what did we pay for?\u201d he asked. \u201cNow we are paying again for that LEED Gold standard. For me, this is a significant issue and I am not sure why there are no details here to educate Council on this issue and I think it is a miss.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It isn\u2019t even done yet and already Aurora\u2019s new Joint Operations Centre is falling just short of getting the Gold.<\/p>\n

Nearly a further $100,000 will need to be spent on the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general_news","category-news"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-3sG","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-17 19:18:50","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13310","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13310"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13310\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13310"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13310"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13310"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}