{"id":17109,"date":"2017-04-26T17:07:41","date_gmt":"2017-04-26T21:07:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=17109"},"modified":"2017-05-03T15:28:51","modified_gmt":"2017-05-03T19:28:52","slug":"estimated-costs-of-mavrinac-park-on-the-rise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/estimated-costs-of-mavrinac-park-on-the-rise\/","title":{"rendered":"Estimated costs of Mavrinac Park on the rise"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Brock Weir
\n<\/strong>
\nIt will cost over $1.5 million more than anticipated to realise the plan for Mavrinac Park.
\nCouncil is looking to approve a boost of nearly $424,000 this week to implement the plan for the six acre parkland on Mavrinac Boulevard, which includes two tennis courts, two pickle ball courts, a full size basketball court, play areas, gazebos, a fitness trail, and tree buffers between the parks and nearby homes.
\nSecured by Council at a cost of $2 million after a contentious battle involving the Town of Aurora, Minto Communities, and area residents who fought to keep the land open space, the topography of the site is proving to be a particularly costly factor, according to staff reports.
\nSubstantial amounts of surplus dirt that will result from the park construction and removing it will cost a hefty $225,000.
\n\u201cWe have looked at a number of options to have material remain on site, building berms and grading alternatives, but it has been tweaked to the point where we have no more option in terms of dispersing this fill,\u201d said Parks Manager Jim Tree at last week\u2019s General Committee meeting. \u201cThere are other issues with the estimate that were included. There is a contingency fund and simply market related issues are a part of it. If it is any consolation, we did check with the market to make sure prices were in line with other similarly sized projects and, in fact, this shows it is actually a little bit lower than some of the more recent projects. It is a significant over budget amount, but it is within the budget parameters.\u201d
\nThe rising costs, however, ignited old debates around the Council table on whether or not this park should actually exist, with Mayor Geoff Dawe and Councillor Paul Pirri reiterating their firm position that it should not \u2013 at least as proposed.
\n\u201cI voted against this the last time because there was a general feeling around the Council table that this was a neighbourhood park and if Council is still of that mind, I will not support it,\u201d said Mayor Geoff Dawe, proposing the park be designated a \u201ccommunity park\u201d rather than a neighbourhood park. \u201cIf Council would be amenable to having a recommendation here that Council endorses this as a park for all residents of Aurora to use, I will support it.\u201d
\nCouncillor Pirri, on the other hand, would have none of that.
\n\u201cYou can put lipstick on a pig and it will still be a pig,\u201d said Councillor Pirri. \u201cRegardless of whether we classify this park as a neighbourhood park or a community park, ultimately it was a park that was never called for in our official plans. It was a park that was not needed and it is a park that is costing the taxpayers of this community apparently more and more in every report. If this is what we want to do and this is the direction we want to move in, that\u2019s fine but I will be opposed to it because it is still a park that was never warranted or needed or justified.\u201d
\nThose Council members who have supported the park development throughout the course of its relatively short history weren\u2019t impressed with Mayor Dawe\u2019s proposed change either. Councillor Wendy Gaertner, for instance, said there was a significant difference between a Community Park and a Neighbourhood Park in the Town\u2019s Parks and Recreation Master Plan, primarily that a Community Park would require parking.
\n\u201cWe can play around with the name, but according to our plan this follows the parameters of a neighbourhood park,\u201d she said. \u201cThis is just smoke and mirrors and I don\u2019t appreciate it.\u201d
\nCouncillor John Abel agreed: \u201cThis just befuddles me. I don\u2019t think it is a very nice way to be treating something like this.\u201d
\nHis concern, he added, was re-wording the motion to stipulate that all Aurora residents would be able to use the park implied that somehow all Aurora residents wouldn\u2019t be able to use the park without that stipulation.
\n\u201cIt is not like we were shutting the doors of the park to anyone who wanted to show up there,\u201d agreed Councillor Tom Mrakas. \u201cThe need to actually state that all residents can go to the park, are we going to do the same for all the other parks in Town? Are we going to state that Summit Park is for all the residents of Aurora? Of course, all the residents of Aurora can go to this park. I don\u2019t think we need to state it and put it in as a policy. It doesn\u2019t make sense to me.\u201d
\nWhen Mayor Dawe\u2019s motion failed, semantics were set aside in favour of the firm numbers.
\nSome Council members expressed disappointment the anticipated budget was on the rise, particularly in light of this spring\u2019s heated debates over the final costs of Aurora\u2019s Joint Operations Centre.
\n\u201cI feel like I have been t-boned and given the amount of people who are looking forward to this, and we have had internal emails asking if it is going to be on time, it just seems like there is another hurdle,\u201d said Councillor Harold Kim. \u201cI think I am fiscally conservative and like to manage my budget, even I find it challenging to approve a project that is going to be 30 \u2013 35 per cent over budget.\u201d
\nWhile Committee members mulled the possibility of taking items out of the budget and later considering them as future capital projects, the recommendation for the budget increase moved forward to this week\u2019s Council meeting for final approval.
\n\u201cI see that this is a benefit to the community as a whole,\u201d said Councillor Mrakas. \u201cWe\u2019re adding more green space to our Town, more parks, and I don\u2019t see what\u2019s wrong with that. We hear so many times that our Parks Master Plan states that we don\u2019t need this and that is why we should not be in favour of this. Would you rather have houses in this area, or would you rather have nice, beautiful green space, places for our residents to go and enjoy themselves and be active? There is a definite benefit and, as has been stated, it is not just for certain people in the community. It is for all of Aurora to enjoy.\u201d
\nConcluded Mayor Dawe: \u201cI have no problems that we acquired this land. I have no problems with it being green space. I have a problem with putting this much money into what is classified as a small neighbourhood park.\u201d
\n<\/strong><\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It will cost over $1.5 million more than anticipated to realise the plan for Mavrinac Park.
\nCouncil is…<\/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-17109","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\/p3D2k4-4rX","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-15 02:12:08","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\/17109","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=17109"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17109\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}