While there has been some public kerfuffle over the announcement that bridges along the former railway will be closed pending further engineering inspections, did anyone notice that it was federal authorities who conducted the inspections and sounded the alarm?
It's there, plain as day in the government public advisory:
Transport Canada, under the authority of the Navigable Waters Protection Act, carried out inspections of 109 structures located along the T’Railway Provincial Park and has prepared a report on their findings.
Transport Canada indicates that 18 structures pose an unreasonable life safety risk to the public. The report also indicates that many other structures should be examined for life safety issues.
Well, of course, they noticed.
The Telegram's Rob Antle led his story with just that point. Antle notes that the feds were inspecting the bridges that crossed federal responsibility for navigable waters. They looked up to see what might be coming down on Newfoundlanders and Labradorians in boats from bridges that are entirely within the provincial government's jurisdiction.
Fourteen of the bridges were found to be in such a state of disrepair that they posed a hazard to people passing below. Transport Canada has given the province until 11 March to submit an action place on the 14 most serious problems.
Interesting.
The provincial government - which actually owns the bridges - had to get the hammer dropped on them by the feds. The feds sent the province a message on Monday, along with the demand for the remedial work, and it took three days for the province to get going.
The federal message didn't cover all the bridges. It only covered the ones over navigable waters.
In 2003, the Auditor General criticised the provincial public works department for its bridge inspection policy and a subsequent report in 2005 noted improvement.
Nowhere, so it seems, did anyone think of the bridges and trestles on the T'Railway.
This situation gets a little more interesting when the former executive assistant to the minister responsible for the T'Railway makes a comment about the whole thing that "Justice and the Auditor General have prevailed in making the government realize that they had ignored a potential liability for as long as they dare try." [Emphasis added]
If we take that comment at face value, the problem with the bridges and trestles has been known for some time. It's just been ignored - or "managed, as the former EA prefers it - and not just by the former Liberal administration. Nope, in order for these bridges to get into such a state that the feds have demanded the province take action, the situation must have continued to deteriorate under the current five-year-old administration.
Meanwhile, the same guy lumps the provincial action on the bridges along with the threat this week to close personal care homes that don't have fire sprinklers. The homes still haven't complied with a 2003 order by the provincial fire commissioner.
Okay.
Well, let's not get carried away here.
First of all, if the feds hadn't stepped into the bridge issue, there's no way of knowing how long the thing might have gone on being "managed". The justice department and the Auditor general had little if anything to do with the T'Railway closure.
Second of all, there are more than a few questions surrounding this personal care home thing.
Sure it has taken a long while for government to act. The provincial government is getting plenty of praise for supposedly putting personal safety ahead of some other undefined thing.
But has anyone bothered to ask why now?
Why in the middle of February with a maximum of 60 days to have the sprinklers installed or face closure? The provincial officials in municipal affairs and in health are well aware of the issues involved with some of the homes that still haven't installed sprinklers and they aren't simple recalcitrance or neglect on the part of the owner-operators.
Nope, that simplistic view hasn't held up to the news coverage this week. Some operators have had trouble getting a contractor to do the work. Some are having trouble raising their share of the cost which, even allowing for the government subsidy, is still likely to require some to spend a hunk of cash from the bank. Some of those costs are due to the age of the buildings or problems with the water supply. One operator will reportedly have to install a reservoir just to provide the needed water since the municipal supply can't meet the need.
The question of timing is also interesting if you consider the problem starting in 2003. There were some 81 homes needing sprinklers, of which only 22 remain un-"sprinkled". One went out of business. That means the other 58 homes were done over the past five years.
That works out to 12 a year which - dare one consider - might just be the capacity of the local contracting marketplace for this work. That would give us about two more years to finish off the last of them.
The number of homes left to "sprinkle" could also reflect the cost and time involved in other structural alterations and any local permitting or rezoning. One personal care operator opted to renovate and expand his facility. After all, if you have to do some capital improvements why not do a bunch at once? He ran into zoning issues and is now looking at having to install sprinklers to meet the current order and at the same time look to abandon his current operation when he moves into a new site. The time spans involved here have been measured in years since the bureaucracy at the provincial and municipal level tends to be a bit sluggish at times. All understandable reasons in the practical world.
So you have to wonder why - very suddenly this week - a bunch of fire officials marched into 22 personal car home across the province delivering the closure orders, to be followed within minutes by a bunch of officials from the local health board to start talking about shifting potentially 290 seniors and developmentally delayed people to new digs. New digs, by the by, which do not exist in the system.
The orders were clear: 30 days to get a signed contract for installation, with a maximum of 60 days to get the work finished or you're out of business and your residents will be shifted.
But if it is such a life safety issue that can no longer be "managed", one must wonder why this became such a sudden realization. These personal care homes are regularly inspected and have been licensed annually. Health officials know the issues - presumably - and have either approved of or demanded successfully that the various homes put in place extra staff at night or whatever measures would be necessary to avoid a repeat of the infamous Chafe fire in 1976.
After all, it's not like the federales just showed up and complained.
The Tiffany fire, some have suggested.
Well, that's really an interesting choice. The Tiffany is an apartment building. It has a superintendent, just like all other apartment complexes and while it has a preponderance of elderly residents, it's not even close to being a personal care home with its staff who are there day-in and day-out to care for and protect the residents.
And that just brings us around again to wondering why - right out of the public blue - two departments decided to step in and tell 290 people they will possibly be moving to not just a new home but possibly a new town or a new part of the province, unplanned, just...just...because.
That's not to diminish the public safety issue. But don't forget this is the same administration that over in another corner just this past week had to be told by another government to sort out a bunch of bridges over which thousands of people ride each year and thousands more ride under.
Someone else had to tell them about the bridges.
Bridges the provincial government owns.
A closure in November 2006 wasn't enough.
So on the bridges, where exactly was the provincial inspection program that missed all the problems?
And on the personal care homes, why now?
The answers to those are not obvious and, given the provincial government's penchant for obfuscation, we may never know.
-srbp-