{"id":15496,"date":"2016-10-13T12:02:01","date_gmt":"2016-10-13T16:02:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=15496"},"modified":"2016-10-13T12:02:01","modified_gmt":"2016-10-13T16:02:01","slug":"greenhouse-sprouts-additional-cost-for-joint-operations-centre","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/greenhouse-sprouts-additional-cost-for-joint-operations-centre\/","title":{"rendered":"Greenhouse sprouts additional cost for Joint Operations Centre"},"content":{"rendered":"

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

When Aurora\u2019s new Joint Operations Centre was completed, it was touted as coming in under budget, but a plan to install a $157,000 greenhouse floor left Councillors questioning whether that was actually the case last week.
\nCouncil tentatively approved a contract to pour the floor of the new greenhouse at the new Industrial Parkway North facility at the committee level last week to the tune of $157,695.
\nIf that decision is not ratified at Council this week, it could mean Aurora\u2019s streets will be a little less colourful this spring and summer as no greenhouse would mean few to no street plants. While the funds would come partially out of the money already earmarked for the JOC as well as reserves, some lawmakers questioned the optics of another expense.
\n\u201cMuch was made on the Joint Operations Centre coming in under budget,\u201d said Councillor Michael Thompson. \u201cThis is the second item that has come before us in the last few months on additional pieces [after a new fuel dispensing station already within the budget]. My concern is we set a budget for the construction of the facility and we were proud to say that it came in under budget, and there is a perception now that with these two items perhaps they were left off to allowsus to come in under budget and now we\u2019re dealing with them separately. I think it is important for us to say to the residents exactly what is going on here so that they know the project came in as budgeted.\u201d
\nAccording to Ilmar Simanovskis, Aurora\u2019s Director of Infrastructure, the greenhouse floor was intended to be part of the original contract and there was an expectation that if the Town took it out of the contract and went it alone costs could be reduced. But, after going through the tendering process, this turned out not to be the case.
\n\u201cWe need to do it and it is going to cost us the same,\u201d he said.
\nHarking back to a discussion at Council last month on the Town\u2019s speed cushion pilot project which was, for a time, up in the air after Council considered suspending the program and re-tendering the project in the New Year to take advantage of competitive pricing, Councillor Harold Kim questioned whether this greenhouse floor would be a candidate for that way of thinking as well.
\n\u201cIt is always a debate,\u201d said Mr. Simanovskis. \u201cWhen the refined budget was brought in, it was still fairly high but at the time we felt we needed to get something moving on this particular piece of the project to allow for (Parks and Recreation director Al) Downey and his staff to have use of the greenhouse this winter. I would suggest considering the fact there is some time pressure from the perspective of the operation, we are recommending proceeding with the price at this time.\u201d
\nA delay would make it \u201cvery difficult to actually have plants on the street next summer,\u201d he added.
\nThe concrete slab floor slated for the JOC is no ordinary concrete slab. It includes a drainage system, systems for stormwater from the greenhouse work, and excavation. A lot of work, he said, has been done to make this as \u201cefficient\u201d as possible, but Councillors questioned whether other efficient options were still on the table, including an asphalt alternative.
\nTo this, however, Mr. Downey said an asphalt alternative might have been easier to install if the greenhouse wasn\u2019t already built and in place as it is easier to pour and it will be a challenge to sufficiently compact the asphalt as needed.
\nAfter Councillor Kim questioned whether this was \u201cpoor planning\u201d in figuring out the order of operations on the construction, Mr. Simanovskis said he would \u201cnever say anything is the result of poor planning.\u201d
\n\u201cEverything is the result of proper sequencing,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen you are dealing with different projects,
\ndifferent seasons, construction activities that are occurring concurrently or adjacent to certain areas, certain activities have to happen before others. As the project was proceeding, it became evident that proceeding with the installation of the greenhouse was the preferred direction for a number of reasons, one not being the least [was] the manufacturer was not suggesting building a pad in advance because you need to build the foundations and where the foundations end up, they determine where that goes\u2026
\nThe reason we decided to take the greenhouse floor out of the project was the sequencing didn\u2019t make any difference whether we did it now
\nor later.\u201d<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Aurora\u2019s new Joint Operations Centre was completed, it was touted as coming in under budget, but a plan to install a $157,000 greenhouse floor left Councillors questioning whether that was actually the case last week.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_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},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15496","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\/p3D2k4-41W","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-15 01:34:26","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\/15496","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=15496"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15496\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}